Each American President in this century, by virtue of his actions, and in some cases, inaction, left an imprint which will resonate for decades.
George W Bush invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, strengthened the American national security state at the cost of civil liberties and launched the most successful healthcare programme for the prevention, care and treatment of AIDS. He also emboldened the Christian Right, strengthening the ideological foundations of the Right-wing.
Barack Obama helped the country recover from the worst economic crisis since 1929, reformed America’s health care system, got out of Iraq, killed Osama bin Laden, backed the Arab Spring, and did a deal with Iran. By his very presence in the White House, he represented the deepening of American democracy.
Through his presence, rhetoric and actions, Donald Trump challenged all conventional norms of American democracy. He inaugurated the period of America-China competition, changed the old Washington consensus on globalisation and trade by recognising the crisis of manufacturing in the United States (US) and leveraging economic anxieties, forged an unlikely accord between rivals in West Asia, and scared most neighbours, allies and partners by telling them not to rely on the US. He also packed the Supreme Court with ultra-conservatives and showed that peaceful transfer of power was no longer a given in the world’s oldest democracy.
The 46th American president has been in office for a little over 30 months. The very nature of the office, and the power of the US, means that any occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue ends up making decisions with tremendous consequences, for good or bad. But on balance, Joe Biden may well go down as the most clear-headed, effective and transformative American president in the first quarter of this century.
Here is why.
Take politics first. Biden’s most important contribution is rescuing American democracy and government. Whether this will last or not is a different matter altogether. But after the 2016-2020 interregnum which saw the hollowing out of government departments, arbitrary decision-making, explicit conflict of interest, blurring of lines between politics and business, and an attempt at a coup by subverting election results, Biden has restored a certain discipline in governance and brought back decency in politics. He has packed his senior team and cabinet with experienced and competent officials, adopted a careful and deliberative mode of decision-making, ensured relative financial transparency, nurtured institutions back to health, and respected the checks and balances of the American system even if it has gone against his interests and views, worked with Congress in passing historic legislations, embraced American diversity symbolically and substantively, and been inclusive in his rhetoric. These may sound abstract and boring, especially in the backdrop of Trump’s more entertaining style of politics, but when destructive spectacle is the order of the day, boring can be good.
Take the economy. To be sure, Biden went overboard with the fiscal stimulus after taking over and underestimated the inflationary consequences of infusing so much liquidity into the system. The ongoing interest rate hikes are at least partially due to the administration’s error in judgment, though one must not forget that the pandemic-induced distress triggered the stimulus in the first place. And to Biden’s credit, employment is at record levels, inflation has dipped, the prospects of a recession are receding, and America’s economic foundations are getting stronger.
The most visible example of Bidenomics— as the President’s rejection of trickle-down economics and embrace of the philosophy of helping the economy grow “middle out and bottom-up” has come to be known — is the boom in American manufacturing. If Trump diagnosed the problem of growing joblessness and hollowing out of the American mid-west correctly, Biden has brought a method to address it. Massive public investment in infrastructure and huge public subsidies as a part of a new industrial policy is crowding in private investment. In two years, private sector players have committed to investing $490 billion in the US. Out of 13 million jobs created since Biden took office, 800,000 are manufacturing jobs. The growth in factory construction is the highest it has been in decades. The US is ramping up its investment in research and development. It is bringing supply chains home. It is strengthening its renewable energy, semiconductors, electronics sectors. And it is integrating allies and partners in this new vision, while systematically eroding the competitive advantages of adversaries and competitors.
And take foreign policy. Once again, Trump diagnosed the China threat correctly. But Biden has brought a whole of government approach to dealing with it. He has invested in alliances and partnerships and strengthened deterrence across the Indo-Pacific through Aukus, encouraging Japan’s military modernisation and the Japan-South Korea rapprochement, securing additional military presence in the Philippines, and investing in ties with India. Biden has adopted a careful approach to China, unapologetic about taking it on while remaining sensitive to the need to avoid a conflict. He is, as Thomas Friedman reported in New York Times, contemplating a historic Saudi-Israel deal in West Asia. He has revived NATO, cemented the transatlantic alliance and pushed Russia into a corner after its invasion of Ukraine. And he hasn’t done “stupid s***”, as Obama once described his own approach to foreign policy.
To be sure, it hasn’t been all bright. Biden’s exit from Afghanistan was a disgraceful episode, he remains caught between pragmatic and idealist impulses in a range of theatres, and he hasn’t been able to allay the scepticism of the global South about American intent on a range of issues including climate. Despite a deeply polarised domestic political climate and a fragile international environment, Biden has been a smart president. Whether he gets another term is up to American voters next year. But his low approval ratings don’t do justice to his impressive record. In a job where judgment is everything, Biden’s record shows that age can bring wisdom.
The views expressed are personal
