New Delhi: The global order has been shifting across the world for years. But it took US President Donald Trump’s triumphant (and disruptive) return to office for this to sink in. Coupled with the rise of the Right and a return to global conservatism, traditional power alliances and diplomacy are now going through a painful realignment.
But Trump can’t be read in isolation, Michael Kimmage, director of the Wilson Center’s Kennan Institute, writes in the Foreign Affairs magazine. In the essay, titled ‘The World Trump Wants,’ analysing the balance between globalism and nationalism, and the eventual shift between the two, Kimmage writes that by “learning to harness the tools of this century, a cadre of charismatic figures revived the archetypes of the previous one: the strong leader, the great nation, the proud civilisation”.
He lists these figures: Trump, Russia’s Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping, Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Turkey, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
“With Trump in power, conventional wisdom in Ankara, Beijing, Moscow, New Delhi, and Washington (and many other capitals) will decree that there is no one system and no agreed-on set of rules,” writes Kimmage.
The essay is an analysis of the way the US, Russia, China, Turkey and India have changed under these leaders, leaning more heavily on the idea of civilisational glory. But this isn’t following the typical script laid out by seminal works like Samuel Huntington’s ‘Clash of Civilisations.’
Kimmage writes that it is “the clash of civilizations lite: a series of gestures and a style of leadership that can reconfigure competition over (and cooperation on) economic and geopolitical interests as a contest among crusading civilization-states.”
And in the years to come, he writes, the kind of order these leaders fashion will depend on the way that Trump’s second term unfolds. Kimmage seems unwilling to deviate from the notion that the US will always remain the centre of the world, setting the terms on which the global order operates—a necessary function of American exceptionalism. But he does accurately point out that the current geopolitical environment will force the “already tenuous idea” of ‘the West’ to recede even further.
“Trump’s dislike of universalistic internationalism aligns him with Putin, Xi, Modi, and Erdogan,” writes Kimmage. “These five leaders share an appreciation of foreign-policy limits and a nervous inability to stand still. They are all pressing for change while operating within certain self-imposed parameters. Putin is not trying to Russify the Middle East. Xi is not trying to remake Africa, Latin America, or the Middle East in China’s image. Modi is not attempting to construct ersatz Indias abroad. And Erdogan is not pushing Iran or the Arab world to be more Turkish.”
Kimmage is right when he says this new brand of nationalism is distinctly inward looking, but he doesn’t seem to capture the nuances of the civilisational projects that countries like India and China are engaging in. Much later in the essay, he touches upon how India is balancing itself in the region.
“Although India does not sit beside a global flash point like Taiwan, it continues to litigate its borders with China and Pakistan, which have been unresolved since India achieved independence in 1947. India ends wherever Modi says it ends,” he writes.
Still, Kimmage is committed to the idea that the Trump administration “has the potential to succeed in a revised international order that has been years in the making. But the United States will thrive only if Washington recognises the danger of so many intersecting national fault lines and neutralises these risks through patient and open-ended diplomacy.”
“Trump and his team should regard conflict management as a prerequisite for American greatness, not as an impediment to it,” he adds.
Ultimately, “none of the usual descriptors of world order apply anymore: the international system is not unipolar or bipolar or multipolar,” concludes Kimmage. “But even in a world without a stable structure, the Trump administration can still use American power, alliances, and economic statecraft to defuse tension, minimise conflict, and furnish a baseline of cooperation among countries big and small.”
Bringing things to the current moment, the BBC reports that ‘US tariffs on India will be a bitter pill to swallow.’ It’s not the kind of patient diplomacy Kimmage’s essay is advocating for.
Americans will have to brace for steeper medical bills, something that feels inconceivable given the already high costs of American healthcare. And it’s all because of potential tax increases on India’s critical export industry, medicinal drugs.
“Nearly half of all medicines taken in the US come from India alone. Generic drugs – which are cheaper versions of brand-name medications—imported from countries like India make up nine out of 10 prescriptions in the US,” Archana Shukla and Nikhil Inamdar report for the BBC. “This saves Washington billions in healthcare costs. In 2022 alone, the savings from Indian generics amounted to a staggering $219bn (£169bn).”
Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal is currently trying to strike a trade deal with the US to avoid high reciprocal tariffs, because without a trade deal, “Trump’s tariffs could make some Indian generics unviable, forcing companies to exit part of the market and exacerbating existing drug shortages”.
Trump essentially wants companies to shift manufacturing to the US to avoid his tariffs, but the economics for low-value drugs don’t add up, BBC reports. Manufacturing in India is at least 3-4 times cheaper than in the US, and any quick relocation will be hard to pull off.
What’s more is that tariffs would be a brutal blow to local pharmaceutical players in India, too. “India exports some $12.7bn worth of drugs to the US annually, paying virtually no tax. US drugs coming into India, however, pay 10.91% in duties. This leaves a ‘trade differential’ of 10.9%. Any reciprocal tariffs by the US would increase the costs for both generic medicines and specialty drugs,” the BBC reports.
Pharmaceuticals will therefore be one of the sectors most vulnerable to price increases.
“Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government recently added 36 life-saving drugs to the list of medicines fully exempted from a basic customs duty in the budget, and President Trump dropped a hint last week that India could be yielding to his pressure,” the BBC reports. “Delhi has not responded yet, but pharma players in both countries are nervously waiting to see the specifics of a trade deal that could have a bearing on lives and livelihoods.”
Meanwhile, the sports world is still not over the Champions Trophy. The Guardian’s weekly newsletter on cricket, The Spin, writes about how all sporting dynasties share common traits—they might not be loved by other fanbases but are certainly respected, especially if they’re bringing in the big wins.
But “Rohit Sharma’s India are slightly different,” The Guardian’s Daniel Gallan writes in ‘We should love this India team but Champions Trophy felt a hollow triumph.’
“They have all the right ingredients, and their record of 23 wins from their previous 24 matches in ICC events puts them in the conversation for the greatest white-ball outfit of all time,” Gallan notes.
“But rather than elicit admiration, their latest conquest has been largely met with shrugs of indifference. The loaded dice, the gerrymandering of the tournament’s schedule, the endless riches, the stadium announcer acting as a cheerleader at a venue that was ostensibly neutral; this all combined to bleach the romance from their achievement.”
The fact that India now effectively runs global cricket is just stating the obvious, according to The Guardian.
“Worst of all was the sight of Jay Shah, the chair of the International Cricket Council and the most powerful man in the game, winking at the cameras after dishing out hugs and high-fives to the victorious players after their four-wicket win,” Gallan says scathingly.
“Shah is evidently a proud Indian, was the secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India for five years and is the son of Narendra Modi’s right hand man, but this smacked of naked favouritism.”
It’s hard to imagine the head of Fifa, Gianni Infantino, “acting with the same lack of self-awareness if Switzerland were to win the European Championship,” the newsletter says.
India is too important a part of the cricket ecosystem now. But does this give India the right to call the shots? The Guardian isn’t sure.
“Empires don’t tend to treat rebels with leniency and any board that stands up to India alone would probably find themselves alienated and destitute. But what if every other board, including England and Australia, collectively drew a line in the sand?” the newsletter asks.
The suggestion Gallan and The Guardian put forward is a slightly more democratic approach to international cricket, one in which India could be told to play fair. But this is a pipe dream, the article concedes, because India’s current squad truly is at the top of the table.
“And why should India give up what they’ve created? For most of cricket’s history,, they lived under English and Australian influence. Now they’re calling the shots. Market forces are in their favour. They win tournaments without Jasprit Bumrah. Their batters are artists. Their spinners are warlocks. We should be in love with them. It’s a pity we’re not,” the article finishes.
(Edited by Sanya Mathur)
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