“At what moment, then, can we expect the arrival of danger?
I answer that if it ever comes to us, it will come from among us.
It cannot come from outside.
If destruction is our lot, we ourselves will be its author and finisher."
This is how Abraham Lincoln predicted, in his famous 1838 speech entitled
The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions,
that, if it were to happen, the decline of the United States would not come as a consequence of a threat from abroad, but because of internal dysfunctions.
In moments of historic gravity, the concerns of great American leaders often permeate the rhetoric of US politics. After months of preparation, Joe Biden expressed the same concern for American democracy in a recent high-profile speech at
Independence Hall
in Philadelphia, the place where the Declaration of Independence was debated and adopted in 1776. The title of the speech —
The Continuing Battle for the Soul of the Nation
— is not misleading as to the historical moment in which American society is passing.
The political health of the world's leading power is essential for global stability.
In this sense, one does not have to go back very far in time to realize that what happens in the domestic politics of the United States —for better or for worse— ends up conditioning international stability as a whole to a great extent.
Put in the clearest possible terms, none of the major global problems we face can be effectively addressed in multilateral organizations without the political stability of the United States.
The first time I set foot on American soil was in 1965, during the presidency of Lyndon B. Johnson, and I did so with a Fulbright scholarship.
I stayed there for five years.
I found a country in turmoil that was mired in the Vietnam War, its domestic consequences and the movement for the extension of civil rights to the African-American population.
Today, American society is going through a worrying situation, but qualitatively different from that of the sixties.
Although the social conflict that defined that decade in the United States revolved around unacceptable injustices for a modern society, they did not call into question the founding institutions of the American republic.
Now, the existential problem facing American society can be summed up in the lack of legitimacy of its main democratic institutions, and, among them, its electoral system.
In other words, in 1965, no one questioned the fact that Johnson was the president of the United States.
Sixty years after that crucial decade of the Cold War, we find ourselves in an uncertain and fragmented world.
After a global pandemic from which we have not yet recovered, the world is suffering the economic and social consequences of a war on European soil, which we did not count on either.
To aggravate the situation, the multilateral institutions created to manage globalization, its opportunities and its risks, are being overwhelmed by the growing division of the world into geopolitical blocs and the danger of a
decoupling
—decoupling— between its two main powers.
After Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin's joint statement on the eve of the Winter Olympics in Beijing, declaring they had "boundless friendship", it was to be expected that China would not condemn the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
However, it was surprising that a number of countries equivalent to half the world's population did not condemn the Russian invasion of Ukraine in the United Nations General Assembly.
In the West, we should draw some lesson from it.
The US is facing a decisive electoral period for its own citizens and for the world.
A few weeks before the midterm legislative elections
, Americans and the world have a lot at
stake .
Above all, because one of the parties that has supported American democracy has succumbed to the populist drift of Donald Trump.
Of all the candidates who received the support of the former president (208 specifically), 95% have won in the Republican primaries for the elections to the House of Representatives and the Senate.
It is worrying that Trumpism will become a permanent fixture in American politics, given the degree of political power it has been able to amass in recent years.
Trumpism could not have been consolidated without the previous success of the Republican Party in taking control of the most accessible centers of political power during a time of electoral decline for American conservatism.
Following the electoral victory of Democrat Barack Obama in 2008, the Republican Party changed the political color of 13 state lower houses in 2010, while the Democrats were focused on carrying out their domestic and international agenda in Washington.
As a consequence of its dominance over the legislative chambers of the States, the Republican Party has been able to change the drawing of the American electoral map in its favor —which affects the elections at the federal or national level— through the manipulation of constituencies. elections for their own benefit, a process known as
gerrymandering
.
Although Trump has managed to largely co-opt the Republican Party, Trumpism does not always have everything to win.
Even in staunchly Republican states, populism can be defeated, as we have seen with Democratic candidate Mary Peltola's recent victory over Sarah Palin in the race for the Alaska State House seat.
For the coming electoral calendar, President Joe Biden has the historic task of uniting Democrats and moderate Republicans in a common front.
Sometimes building democratic majorities is not enough to preserve democracy.
Fortunately, one of the strengths of the democratic system is its institutional architecture, which separates state power into branches —executive, legislative, and judicial— to prevent the abuses that each of these branches may incur.
Beyond the content of the decisions of the US Supreme Court, the legitimacy of the American judiciary is being questioned.
Far from being a uniquely American phenomenon, if judges are seen as politicians, the legitimacy of courts upholding the rule of law can only diminish, as the last Supreme Court justice to step down, Stephan Breyer, pointed out.
History, and its scholars, are invaluable sources for analyzing the current situation and being in the best conditions to manage it.
A few weeks ago, President Biden decided to summon a group of historians from the most prestigious universities in the country to the White House to analyze the current situation that American society is going through.
The main message of that meeting was resounding: political polarization is bringing American democracy to the brink of collapse.
In 1863, Abraham Lincoln began his speech with a question and a resounding answer about the future of American democracy.
Today, Lincoln's words about the dangers facing American society are of sad relevance, for Americans themselves and for international stability.
Javier Solana
was High Representative of the EU for the Common Foreign and Security Policy, Secretary General of NATO and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Spain, and is President of EsadeGeo-Center for Global Economy and Geopolitics and distinguished member of the Brookings Institution.
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