Good Morning Biden, the world is a new place now!
Now that the hand recount from Georgia is over, the winner is clearly Joe Biden, unless a sabotage or a coup is underway. With Georgia in Joe Biden’s plate, the validity of the count is much reinforced. That is the reason, why I feel this is a fresh morning for Joe, the President Elect.
What’s in store for the future?
We all know Joe was a Vice President under President Obama. Of course, that eight years tenure was remarkable in achievements and misses. However, it carries the risk of bringing the same mind set as earlier and the key concern with problem space, is that if you try to solve the problems with the same fervor and approach as earlier, it is bound for failure. Unless President Elect consciously makes a choice to select his options, and unless enough time is spent in understanding the changed realities on the new world, he is unlikely to make significant dent to resolution of existing scenarios. In fact, there is a potential for situations going downhill and precipitating the Trump phenomenon. Understandable, four years are not enough for a significant change to happen, but four years are enough for laying a foundation for the future global and national engagement.
The last decade saw major populists taking over several democracies. A quick revisit will help us understand, democracy has given way to demagogy, that’s barring Putins Russia and Xi’s China. The rise of Duterte in the Philippines, Bolsonaro in Brazil, Johnson in the UK, Modi in India, Erdogan in Turkey are just few handful examples. Of course, I am not counting Pakistan, which has a democratic face to the military dictatorship.
Added to these are more spicy stuff happening in the Middle East. Syria, and Iran are consolidating their grip, whereas, feudalist and autocrats are advancing their handshake to those espousing the values and torch bearer of democracies, such as France and Germany.
Even those countries who are deeply committed to democratic ideals are leaning on China for economic support. Spain and a few more western European nation are leading that trend.
Given this heady mix of toxic cocktail, the ideas of yesteryears, such as replacing democracy, world politically and militarily dominated by the US, unilateral wars etc are unlikely to be productive.
Biden is taking the mantle of leadership under such circumstances. A fresh and distinct mindset is required. Can this be achieved by adding yesteryears bureaucrats? It’s needs deep introspection and reflection of the events that have unfurled on the global stage. Just accepting the populist leaders and offering a collaborative handshake is not enough.
The world has to understand the phenomenon called Trumpism (not related with Donald Trump), and see why we left behind such a huge swath of population, that such populist and radical nationalists have evolved?
This is a rude reality that Biden will awaken to while taking charge of the US on Jan 20, 2021.
Shashank Heda,
Dallas, Texas
mymilieu.org 