International leaders breathe sigh of relief
Many hope for improved diplomacy under Biden
International messages of congratulation started rolling in Saturday for U.S. President-elect Joe Biden after he was projected the winner of the presidential election over President Donald Trump. International allies contemplated a new White House that has raised the prospect of resuming a form of business as usual: a more fact-driven, multilateralist American presidency that wants to build bridges, not burn them.
Fiji’s prime minister offered his good wishes before the race was even formally called, saying in a tweet that the U.S. and the tiny South Pacific island nation must work together to tackle climate change and rebuild a battered global economy.
“Now, more than ever, we need the USA at the helm of these multilateral efforts (and back in the #ParisAgreement – ASAP!),” Frank Bainimarama wrote.
Ireland’s Prime Minister Micheál Martin referred to Biden as “a true friend.” British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said he looked forward to working with Biden on “our shared priorities” and also congratulated Kamala Harris, the first woman elected vice president, on her “historic achievement.” Zimbabwe’s President Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa wished Biden “every success in leading the American people.”
In Germany, foreign minister Heiko Maas called for a “new transatlantic beginning, a new deal.” Rahul Gandhi, a senior leader of India’s main opposition Congress party, said he was confident Biden would “unite America and provide it with a strong sense of direction.” Canada’s leader Justin Trudeau said “our two countries are close friends and allies,” while in France’s capital where church bells rang to celebrate Biden’s victory, Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo spoke for many around the world when she tweeted: “Welcome back, America.”
The world had watched with unease, transfixed as Trump claimed premature victory in the hours after the election, made unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud and launched legal fights. Trump has yet to formally concede the race.
Still, as world leaders and diplomats reflected on what a Biden administration could mean for their engagement with the U.S., some global foreign policy voices cautioned the former vice president’s biggest asset may be that he’s not Trump.
“We expect a more practical approach to China from Biden, without all the constant China-bashing,” said Huiyao Wang, a senior adviser to China’s Vice Premier Liu He. Wang also directs the Center for China and Globalization, a Beijing tank think.
“If Biden is serious about improving the U.S. economy and finding a way out of its coronavirus mess then he needs to collaborate with China, not fight with it,” Wang said, noting that “large structural differences” between how Beijing and Washington viewed the world on issues from markets to governance should not preclude working relations.
Biden “will certainly change the style of US foreign policy but will hardly be able/willing to reverse some of the its key trends, including confrontations w/ China, Russia, and Iran,” tweeted Dmitri Trenin, the director of the Carnegie Moscow Center, a foreign affairs think tank based in Russia’s capital.
For some, Trump’s defeat came with an assumption: Biden would set a foreign policy course that eschews a fanboy approach to dictators, avoids zerosum game trade wars and restores dignity to America’s battered global image that poll after poll has shown dropped precipitously during Trump’s watch, and that has emboldened authoritarian leaders from Brazil to Saudi Arabia to look to Trump for favor and friendship.
“Biden will bring decency back to world politics,” predicted Abdulsalam Kamara, an economist and business professor at the University of Sierra Leone, in West Africa.
With the exception of authorizing the Pentagon to assist African militaries fighting extremists, Trump’s foreign policy mostly ignored Africa and Kamara said he believes a Biden administration will lead to increased foreign investment on a continent that has long struggled to shed an “aid syndrome” image and other negative stereotypes.
Biden is expected to reenter international agreements abandoned by Trump, such as the Iran nuclear accord. In fact, just hours after the U.S. officially withdrew from Paris Climate Agreement on Wednesday at Trump’s insistence, Biden vowed to rejoin the global pact to reduce emissions on “Day One” of his presidency.
“The world sort of survived four years with a somewhat restrained Trump,” the former Swedish prime minister, Carl Bildt, said on Twitter on Nov. 4 when it first became clear that Biden was on track to overtake Trump’s lead in key battleground states.
“A world with a triumphant Trump could well (have been) a different thing,” Bildt added, echoing concern across Europe that another Trump term would have put considerable strain on the NATO military alliance and other priorities of the transatlantic partnership.
However, there were also fears the vote leaves the U.S. a bitterly – and dangerously, evenly – divided country where the appeal of Trump’s populist, insular and xenophobic remarks and policy have caused lasting damage not easily reversed.
“OK, America, so what the hell happens now?” read a headline in Britain’s The Guardian newspaper.
“Biden will bring decency back to world politics.” Abdulsalam Kamara Economist and business professor at the University of Sierra Leone