The Trump Doctrine is only as effective if politicians or political groups cower at the antics of a bully, and those in the world who are beguiled by his policies, says the writer
Image: AFP
Mushtak Parker
CALL it what you want, the so-called ‘incumbency curse’ in democracies around the world. Whether it’s the figment of the stunted imagination of a political hack or activists most likely in support of populist far right movements and phenomena, the reality is far from the rhetoric of aspirations and actual outcomes.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Labor government was re-elected to a second term just a few days ago in a landslide victory defying not only the so-called "incumbency curse" (if ever there is one) but also making a mockery of the fickleness of the so-called mainstream media in talking up the Trump effect, which the BBC said loomed large over the election.
The fact that the leader of the Opposition conservative (read Trumpian) Liberal-National coalition Peter Dutton lost his deposit and seat, let alone his coalition suffering a thumping defeat nationwide, illustrates that the ‘incumbency curse’ is really a Trumpian hex or jinx which should make any far right and centre right populist politician think twice about embracing the vanities of the governance and policy insanities of the Donald, let alone of his personality defects which include two recent picture postings of him dressed as the King of America and a few days ago as the new Pope.
Albanese had called out Trump’s tariff tantrums when they were announced in early April as “not the act of a friend." But he got his cue from another newly-elected Prime Minister Mark Carney of Canada, who only two weeks ago reversed a massive 22% poll disadvantage, to return the centre left Liberal Party to a fourth consecutive term in office in a stunning election victory and casting the Opposition Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre, another Trumpian clone, into the political doldrums for at least another four years.
Carney, urbane and softspoken, and former Bank of England Governor and respected economist, took over from the unpopular incumbent Pierre Trudeau whose resignation like Trump’s tariff diatribes against Canada and threatening to annex the country as the 51st state of the US contributed much to the reversal of the Liberal Party’s electoral fortunes. Carney was one of the few global leaders to call out the Trump madness for what it is and to push back with reciprocal tariffs.
The moral of the above two instances is that the Trump Doctrine is only as effective if politicians or political groups cower at the antics of a bully, and those in the world who are beguiled by his policies and style and feign to exploit them in their own home countries such as the likes of AfriForum and Solidarity in South Africa, do so at their peril.
Some maintain that there is a method in the Trumpian madness. While we tend to focus and be entertained by the madness, the real direction of travel behind the US tariffs and trade policies is from hegemony to domination, from soft persuasive power to hard power. Others such as Professor Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University, an outspoken critic of Trump, speaking at the Antalya Diplomatic Forum in April, strongly warned against normalising this “rogue” behaviour by trying to figure out “its rationale or how to negotiate or what to do.
The US has been fundamental to building up a multilateral trade system since the ruins of World War II for 80 years and has led the establishment and development of the World Trade Organisation for the last 31 years. The United States is a rogue nation right now on many things, not just on trade but on making Gaza into a US Riviera. It is for the world to say that we are not going down this crazy route and downward spiral. We’re going to be responsible and go to the UN and WTO to resolve any trade disputes. Because if we normalise craziness there is no way out.”
The only thing that can salvage anything is blowback, whether from the stock markets, farmers in the US, China, or if the multilateral system accelerates. This has already led to some changes in nuance including the infamous “three months pause” on the tariffs, and in the case of South Africa, according to one South African official, has made recent negotiations “more palatable.”
That remains to be seen, Trump has singled out South Africa as “one of the worst offenders” and because “they have got some bad things going on in South Africa,” and has slapped an initial 30% tariff. Ramaphosa appointed Mcebisi Jonas, an ex-Deputy Finance Minister, as his Special Envoy to the US to mend fences and pre-empt the outcome of the pause with the Trump administration.
His task is daunting given that the US President did not disappoint with his unpredictability posting a few days later his intention to boycott the 2025 G20 Summit scheduled to take place under the South Africa Presidency in Johannesburg in November, citing the adoption of the controversial land reform Expropriation Act as the main reason.
The utter contempt and disrespect Trump cabinet officials have for South Africa is implicit. Having boycotted the First Meeting of the G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (FMCBG) in South Africa earlier this year, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, a former hedge fund manager, made a fleeting appearance at the last session of the Second Meeting of the FMCBG on the sidelines of the IMF/World Bank Spring Meetings in Washington, DC at end April, which itself had descended into a mini maze of Finance Tracks and Sherpas, sometimes even overlapping in their subject matters with the process and with parallel initiatives at the UN whether on sovereign debt, financial stability, the role of the informal sector, and fostering GDP growth.
The fact that there was neither a final communique nor a Statement from the Chair, Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana, resulted in a seemingly subdued rendition of "We'll meet Again” at the next FMCBG scheduled in Durban in July. Whether Scott Bessent will attend is not clear.
Whether the Treasury Secretary would have been amused or bemused by the broad consensus of the earlier sessions from which he was absent, that “on the central role of the G20 in fostering stability and strategic direction during this period of global economic turbulence,” is not clear.
His boss on the other hand on past performance would have been outraged by the fact that many of the G20 ministers and governors at the meeting “urged the need to reaffirm our commitment to multilateralism and a rules-based global trading system and renewed efforts to restore cooperation,” which of course is anathema to the isolationist and fragmented Trump doctrine of Making America Great Again – at the expense of all other countries.
For the minority Trumpian torchbearers and the Fifth Columnists within our own ranks at home, as we marked Freedom Day on April 27, when 31 years ago the dignity of South Africa’s people – both black and white – was restored, the blowback should be equally robust and united.
President Ramaphosa in his Freedom Day address in Ermelo, read out on his behalf by Minister of Mineral and Petroleum Resources, Gwede Mantashe warned about people “who seek to rekindle the embers of racial bitterness for political gain.
We are seeing attempts being made to rewrite history. We are seeing efforts to cast one race in the position of the oppressed and the black majority, who were oppressed for centuries, in the role of oppressor. Our apartheid wounds are being exploited to serve the agendas of others. We must reject any attempts to divide us along racial lines.” Ramaphosa invoked the spirit of Ubuntu - “You are because I am” - the bedrock upon which the nation was formed. Let us hope that Godongwana is blessed with this very spirit when he presents the rescheduled National Budget to Parliament on 21 May.
Parker is an economist and writer based in London
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