Analysis: The president went from skeptic to evangelist on global democracy. But over the past year, his ambitions have collided repeatedly—and uncomfortably—with reality
a nonresident fellow at New York University’s Center on International Cooperation, and author of the bookJoe Biden has never put much stock in America’s self-assigned mission of fostering democracy abroad. As a freshman senator half a century ago, he opposed the Vietnam War not because he regarded it as immoral but because he didn’t think the United States could reform the autocratic regime in Saigon. Years later, he did not expect much of similar efforts in Iraq or Afghanistan.
But will it? Do summits achieve such heights? Certainly the Glasgow climate summit which concluded last month did not. After conducting dozens of interviews with officials and experts in and out of the Biden administration over the last eight months, I fear the administration will have labored mightily and brought forth a Glaswegian mouse.
The language of “American exceptionalism” now has a nostalgic ring, because the United States is arguably no longer either the world’s most powerful country or its most effective democracy. Indeed, one stated premise of the summit, too plainly true to be dismissed as mere rhetoric, is that America has as much to gain from the experience of other countries as they do from that of the United States.
Officials were always careful to explain this decision in the language of inclusivity: In such an egalitarian setting, everyone would learn from everyone, as Blinken said in his cable. But the big tent also satisfied a geopolitical calculus. Nobody wanted to tell important allies like India, Poland or Brazil that they weren't welcome or could come only as part of the B team. India was a crucial ally against China, and Poland against Russia.
The anti-authoritarian agenda proposed that states stand up to Russia and China on issues like electoral interference and targeting dissidents abroad—something that would no doubt be difficult for those countries’ neighbors. On the other hand, suggestions to "oppose Internet shutdowns" or "enshrine protections for civil society" required a change of heart within countries that routinely turn off the Internet and harass journalists and activists.
National security adviser Jake Sullivan established a new NSC position, coordinator for democracy and human rights. | Susan Walsh/AP Photo The civil society leaders and scholars to whom I had been talking were growing skeptical. When we first spoke, Douglas Rutzen, president of the International Center for Non-Profit Law and a key organizer of the civil society groups working with the administration, talked with guarded enthusiasm about extensive exchanges with the White House and State Department about the role of civil society in helping formulate meaningful commitments both for the United States and for invitees.
Administration officials are hardly blithe in the face of this reality, but they do their best to come up with second-best justifications. Blinken put the case this way: “The fact that we acknowledge our own challenges and don’t run away from them or hide them gives us real credibility. That in and of itself can be a source of strength and progress.
But what about the nations where democratic preservation and political self-interest do not coincide, to paraphrase India’s Menon? That group is growing, and includes several very important countries. A number of administration officials said to me that the very fact that such countries had agreed to attend demonstrated their wish to be accepted as members of the club of democracies—and thus, perhaps, their willingness to take difficult measures to reap the associated prestige. That may be true.
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