US’ international interests undermined by attack on democracy

A week on from the US Capitol violence, along with Wednesday’s news of Donald Trump’s second impeachment, there has been much soul-searching about the assault on the citadel of American democracy. However, the international implications of last week’s events could be as important as the domestic ones for President-elect Joe Biden.
The remarkable last few days in Washington have shocked many around the globe and shaken the US’ reputation. Allies such as NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg expressed alarm at the “shocking scenes in Washington. The outcome of this democratic election must be respected.”
Meanwhile, American foes from Venezuela to Iran and Russia relished the political disorder. Russia’s Deputy UN Ambassador Dmitry Polyanskiy tweeted on the evening of the attack: “Quite Maidan-style pictures are coming from DC,” referring to the 2013-14 pro-European protests in Ukraine that toppled Moscow-backed President Viktor Yanukovich and which Russia believes were orchestrated by the US. “Some of my friends ask whether someone will distribute crackers to the protesters to echo Victoria Nuland’s stunt,” he went on, citing a 2013 visit to Ukraine by then-US Assistant Secretary of State Nuland, who offered food to protesters.
Moreover, with less than a week left until Biden assumes office, concerns are growing that some of these US foes may seek to take advantage — geopolitically — of the apparent vacuum of power in Washington. Take the example of Iran, which last week announced it had stepped up its uranium enrichment to 20 percent purity, which could be used for its nuclear weapons program. This is the biggest break yet from its commitments under the 2015 nuclear deal struck with world powers, including the US and Europe.
It is not just last week’s events, alarming as they were, that have been highly irregular about what has become a chaotic transition. Almost without precedent in US presidential election history, Trump refused to concede to Biden for weeks and continues to dispute the result, despite providing no evidence that could stand up in court.
One of the specific areas where last week’s events will undermine, at least in the short-term, the US overseas is its promotion of democracy agenda. This is important, as Biden has prioritized restoring a commitment to democracy as the core of his foreign affairs agenda. He has pledged to return the US to its role as the “leader of the democratic world,” including potentially convening a widely trailed “Summit for Democracy.”
However, countries such as the nationalist-populists of Eastern Europe, including the US’ NATO allies Poland and Hungary, are now less likely to feel the pressure of calls to respect the rule of law and democratic norms. During his period as US vice president from 2009 to 2017, Biden had an active role in visiting these countries and speaking against corruption and in favor of the consolidation of democratic institutions, with an emphasis on the independence of the judiciary. Applying such pressure now is not likely to have the same strong effects. This is, in part, because of last week’s chaotic scenes and the much wider erosion of US democratic traditions during the Trump era, combined with the advances made by governments in capitals such as Warsaw and Budapest in formalizing disequilibrium in the rule of law and post-Cold War democratic norms.
The perceptions in some developing countries in Africa, the Americas and Asia, especially where popular anti-US sentiment is already a significant political force, could also be important. Damagingly, an abiding memory and political discourse in these countries could center on recent US political disorder and the allegation that American democracy involves an element of chaos and, indeed, sham.

The nationalist-populists of Eastern Europe are now less likely to feel the pressure of calls to respect democratic norms.

Andrew Hammond

In this context, there will be some Republicans, and even possibly centrist Democrats too, who would prefer Biden not to overemphasize the democracy-based political rhetoric that characterized some previous Democratic administrations. They argue, for instance, that ideas like a democracy summit, with a sometimes simple, binary distinction between “good” and “bad,” can sit awkwardly in a fast-changing, complex world of ambiguity and uncertainty, where there is a frequent need to work with states that lack democratic traditions, such as China. Moreover, bad governance, policy mismanagement and personal scandals have also dented the moral standing of a significant number of democracies in recent decades.
Critics instead favor an international approach based more on classic, quantifiable national interests. From this perspective, other states, especially developing ones, might be more likely to aspire to emulate the US because of its material prosperity, rather than appeals based on its democratic virtues. One policy implication of this is stressing the virtues of pressing economic reform packages in Africa, Asia and the Americas on the basis that economic modernization and liberalism will themselves create an impulse toward future democratic reform.
Taken together, this underlines why the international impact of last week’s political disorder in Washington could be so significant. While Biden is still likely to press his democratic promotion agenda in the coming years, the assault on the Capitol will encourage some domestic and international critics to voice their criticisms more loudly.

• Andrew Hammond is an Associate at LSE IDEAS at the London School of Economics.