Something unusual has entered the grammar of U.S. foreign policy. Under President Donald Trump’s second term, the language of strategy has given way to a heightened language of civilization: warnings of “civilizational erasure” in Europe, invocations of a “Judeo-Christian” heritage under siege, and threats to Iran destroy the Iranian civilization. This is not incidental rhetoric. It signals a deliberate turn toward what may be called imperial civilizationalism—the use of civilizational identity as an instrument of aggressive populist foreign policy.
The civilization-state concept has become one of the defining rhetorical tools of our era’s populist leaders. In the past decade, leaders in China, India, Russia, Turkey and elsewhere have turned to civilizational identity to construct national cohesion, assert cultural distinctiveness, and justify both domestic authority and foreign-policy ambition.
Something unusual has entered the grammar of U.S. foreign policy. Under President Donald Trump’s second term, the language of strategy has given way to a heightened language of civilization: warnings of “civilizational erasure” in Europe, invocations of a “Judeo-Christian” heritage under siege, and threats to Iran destroy the Iranian civilization. This is not incidental rhetoric. It signals a deliberate turn toward what may be called imperial civilizationalism—the use of civilizational identity as an instrument of aggressive populist foreign policy.
