After Trump, the world in 2028

Given how different the world is in mid-March compared to mid-January, it is foolish to gaze into the future. But there is a value to thought experiments based on current trendlines. And in that spirit, in the week of the Raisina Dialogue, it is worth posing a set of macro questions about the post-Trumpian world in 2028.

The first question is if Donald Trump’s Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement is a fleeting or an enduring political feature of the US. Beyond personalities, this politics is marked by hostility to the federal administrative State; a belief that the America-led international political and economic liberal order has harmed America; contempt for dependent allies and outreach to strong adversaries; White racial anger against America’s changing demography and diversity; suspicion of elite institutions, scientific establishment and the knowledge infrastructure; disdain for climate science; and Christian fundamentalism and social conservatism on the question of race, gender and sexuality and the pedagogy around it.

Just like 2014 marked the arrival of a new BJP on the Indian political stage, 2024 has marked the arrival of a new Republican Party which is carefully creating its own ideological ecosystem, grooming a second and third rung of leadership at all levels, removing constraints on power, and changing the norms and common sense that governed America. And, so, irrespective of electoral ebbs and flows, at least for the next decade or two, one pole of American national public life will be represented by this far-right stream of politics.

The second question is if, after four years of Trump, America will be stronger or weaker. For all the talk of bipolarity and multipolarity, Trump’s raw exercise of power has reminded the world how powerful the US still is on hard power metrics. A statement or a signature from a small room on 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington DC can change European, West Asian and Indo-Pacific security, reverse climate action, redefine the global financial architecture and development paradigm, or even legitimise misinformation and hate speech globally. All of this is because America contributes over 25% of the global Gross Domestic Product (GDP), is home to the tech giants who determine how we live, boasts a currency that is the world’s reserve one, and has a lethal military responsible for the security of dozens of countries.

We do not know if Trump’s relentless drive to bring manufacturing back to the US, empower American tech and finance, remove regulatory guardrails, extract resources globally, enhance American war-fighting abilities, perhaps even expand territory will make the country stronger or if his obsession with tariffs, unilateralism, hollowing out of the State, and hostility to liberal education and immigration will actually make it weaker.

But what is clear is America will be less free. Just see the assault on academic freedom, free press, and institutional checks and balances. America will also have fewer friends. Yes, Europe may have relied on American security (a quick crash course on the first 45 years of the 20th century will help contextualise why the US itself wanted this outcome that it now disowns). But it also resulted in Europe toeing the American line for most part. Trump’s ideological, strategic and economic assault on Europe has left it with no choice but to get its act together. If the continent turns relatively more capable over time, it will also become relatively more autonomous.

American ultra-nationalism in the western hemisphere is already producing strong currents of local nationalisms in Canada, Mexico, Panama, and Greenland. And in the Indo-Pacific, even treaty allies know that depending on the US to come to their rescue is no longer a rational bet and keeping America in good humour while building one’s own capabilities is imperative. Beyond the bilateral dynamics, American retreat from multilateral institutions will erode its role as the power shaping norms and standards in a variety of domains. Its ability to sustain a wide network of political relationships in almost every country in the world will diminish. America First may well mean America Alone, the classic fate of imperialist, coercive and domineering powers.

The third question is if China, in 2028, will be stronger or weaker than it was at the end of 2024. We again do not know, but there are indications that if China was relatively weaker vis-a-vis the US in 2024 than it was in 2020 largely due to its economic downturn and the coming together of a vast number of American partners and allies against it, it may well succeed in reversing the trend in the near-term.

The Chinese political system is more stable and resilient than the American political system at the moment. The Chinese State retains a higher degree of control and arguably even legitimacy among its citizens than the American State does among its own citizens. And China’s behaviour is more predictable than America’s.

All these features may make others more comfortable working with Beijing than Washington DC, or at least aspire for better ties with China even if Beijing’s long-term intent remains suspect. Add to it the vacuum that the US is leaving across the global south with its withdrawal from development, climate, health, civil society and political engagement with the developing world’s elites, a vacuum that no other power but China can fill. And even the most ardent advocates of export control restrictions on China in the US admit that it will only slow down China’s tech progress by a few years rather than decades. To be sure, it isn’t clear how the American tariffs will end up impacting China’s economy. But all other policy trends suggest that China may be better off in 2028 both in its positioning relative to the US and to the world than it is today.

Indian conservatives can’t stop celebrating MAGA’s rise because they believe an international ideological obstacle to their politics has broken down with the death of liberal internationalism. But New Delhi must think through the implications of an angry US, a US in retreat, a US with fewer friends, a less open US and a potentially stronger China for Indian strategic and economic interests.

The views expressed are personal