Where Is America Headed? --- The Transformation of America’s Global Standing and Europe’s Path to Self-Reliance
美国向何处去 ---美国全球地位的变迁与欧洲自强之路
By Ma Siwei (马四维)
【Editor’s Note: Ma Siwei’s analysis examines the decline of America’s global leadership, driven by what Francis Fukuyama calls “repatrimonialization”—a regression toward a system where personal and family interests override public good. Under Trumpism, transparency and institutional accountability have eroded, and political alliances are increasingly built on personal loyalty and financial exchanges. This shift weakens the United States' global influence, leading to declining trust from its allies, particularly in Europe. As the U.S. retreats from international commitments, Fukuyama argues that global politics now resembles a contest between “criminal syndicates” vying for power. Nations prioritize strategic and economic gains over ideological alignment. In response to U.S. unpredictability, Europe is seeking greater defense and economic autonomy, reducing reliance on American military and financial systems. This shift accelerates multipolarity, with Europe, China, and Russia emerging as competing power centers. The article warns that without a return to institutional governance, the U.S. risks further decline, ceding strategic ground to its global rivals.】
In today’s global political arena, the proposition that the United States is drifting back toward a form of “hereditary rule” has been gaining ever more traction. Francis Fukuyama (弗朗西斯·福山), in his latest commentary, observes that the rise of Trumpism, along with profound shifts in both domestic and international politics, is steering a nation once defined by liberal democracy and the rule of law toward a path of “repatrimonialization” (再世袭化)—a system driven by private interests, in which family and trusted associates outrank public good. The familiar mechanisms of modern governance—transparency, accountability, and citizenship-based equality—seem to be eroding under the pressure of elite networks and political alliances that exploit the system for their own advantage. Meanwhile, Europe’s trust in America’s leadership continues to decline, its concern over Washington’s “abandonment” in matters of security and international public goods spurring a search for more autonomous, independent defense and strategic alternatives. As the world becomes increasingly fractured and reorganized by “criminal-style” horse-trading, we are compelled to ask: Who exactly is shaping this world, and where might it be headed?
America’s “Repatrimonialization” and Its Global Impact
Max Weber (马克斯·韦伯), a classical sociologist, defined “patrimonialism” as a premodern model of political power. In such a system, there is no strict division between the public and private spheres. Rulers treat the resources of the state—its territory, revenue streams, and even population—as personal assets to be transferred or granted at will. During traditional feudal dynasties, a monarch might “pack up” a province’s tax revenues to reward a family member or present a territory as a dowry. In modern times, establishing a depersonalized government based on the rule of law and citizenship has come to be seen as the bedrock of social progress and economic prosperity. Yet, humanity’s inherent social instincts make people susceptible to “inbreeding,” allowing familiar networks or cliques to seize control. Under certain conditions, the modern state may regress—what Fukuyama terms “repatrimonialization.”
Observing American politics in recent years, one finds many signs that break from the past. During his term—and as he and his allies seek to remain in power—Donald Trump (特朗普) has displayed pronounced hostility toward legal oversight mechanisms: he dismissed inspectors general tasked with monitoring corruption in the executive branch, refused to enforce the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, and wielded executive orders to extend selective favors to allies and corporations. Business magnates such as Elon Musk (埃隆·马斯克), Mark Zuckerberg (马克·扎克伯格), and Jeff Bezos (杰夫·贝佐斯) have offered massive donations and lobbied for preferential treatment in tariffs and government contracts, hoping for what resembles “royal benevolence.” This under-the-table exchange of benefits and money—quintessential hallmarks of patrimonial corruption—allows politicians to treat public authority as private property, securing political alliances and co-opting elite groups through the granting of privileges.
By contrast, historical fascism often entwined extreme nationalism with total mobilization and slid toward genocide and totalitarianism. The Trump phenomenon more closely resembles a retrograde hybrid of autocracy plus family-based oligarchy—lacking a genuine ideological doctrine, yet driven by disdain for institutions and the public interest, alongside an obsessive emphasis on personal loyalty and narrow clique-driven priorities.
From “Protection Fees” to “Criminal Syndicates”: A Fractured International System
Fukuyama’s argument goes further. When a superpower in possession of the world’s principal resources and authority starts down the road of repatrimonialization, the global political map can be expected to crack. During the Cold War, the world was torn apart by ideological division: socialist and capitalist blocs confronted each other militarily, economically, and ideologically. Today, the United States has abandoned much of its role in supplying the public goods that sustain the international order, weakened or exited various international treaties, and even disregarded the security needs of its allies. In this environment, the competition for territory and “protection fees” increasingly resembles conflict among “criminal syndicates.” Countries and regions are more likely to choose alliances based on tangible gain and military-economic prowess rather than on grand concepts such as “democracy versus authoritarianism.”
Fukuyama’s phrase “a world made safe for criminals” is no mere rhetorical flourish. It highlights the clandestine nature of many current international dealings. Venezuela, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, North Korea, and other nondemocratic or quasi-dictatorial regimes are morphing into ruling cliques that place personal or small-group interests first, engaging in drug trafficking, arms smuggling, and extortion—transnational criminal endeavors, in effect. As America has pulled back from its long-standing role in global governance, and as the vacuum created by Trumpism widens, these forces find more room to maneuver. This, in turn, raises the specter of international violence and instability.
Once “benefiting the world” degenerates into the pursuit of private gain, and once international rules become tools for mutual denunciation and blackmail, trust among nations is bound to collapse. Treaties and commitments may come to be viewed as mere scraps of paper, prompting more countries to turn to self-help in security or even to an arms race. In Fukuyama’s view, this is repatrimonialization at the global level: an unraveling of collective norms, a descent into factionalism where the world is carved up by interest groups.
Europe’s Turn toward Self-Reliance: The Transatlantic Rift Grows
America’s retreat on global security has dealt a particularly serious shock to Europe. For decades, the United States poured some $600–700 billion annually into global security, extending military and nuclear protection to its allies and thereby cementing its own leadership. Thanks to this military and economic predominance, the U.S. also reaped extensive rewards in finance, trade, and technology—manifest in dollar hegemony, capital investment, and the flow of top-tier talent.
However, once Trump took office, he repeatedly disparaged and questioned NATO allies, demanded higher defense contributions from various countries, and even threatened to withdraw from NATO or insist that “protected nations” pay steeper “protection fees.” This stance aligns with the logic of repatrimonialization: Washington has come to view its vast authority over global security as personal property, to be sold or leveraged for profit, rather than as a global public good. Worse yet, the United States halted military aid to Ukraine and froze intelligence sharing, effectively sidelining the security concerns of its onetime partners. This perceived abandonment has spurred enormous anxiety in Europe.
Confronted with America’s changed attitude, major European countries have begun overhauling their defense strategies—spending more on national security, speeding up joint development of military equipment, and devising more robust independent defense plans. Surging stock values for defense firms in France, Germany, Italy, and the UK attest to Europe’s all-out effort to shore up its military shortfalls. With regard to American-made systems like the F-35, many countries are considering canceling purchases or switching to domestically produced European weapons, a move reflective of their eroding confidence in both U.S. arms and policy. More fundamentally, Europe has resolved to reduce its overreliance on the United States in the key strategic domains of security, diplomacy, and information technology—fearing that in a crisis, Washington might “lock them out” with a single command or refuse to provide critical intelligence.
As some analysts note, the transatlantic alliance was once the bedrock of the global democratic order. It may not yet be on the brink of irreparable collapse, but any semblance of its former absolute trust and dependence has long since vanished. Even if a new American administration takes office someday, hoping to repair the breach with Europe, the post–World War II paradigm of “U.S. leadership, European followership” seems irretrievable. On issues from Ukraine to Russia policy and China’s rise, Europe is showing greater independence. By framing its security role as a negotiable commodity, America has effectively forced Europe to become self-reliant.
The Splintering of Globalization and the Emergence of Multipolarity
Under the onslaught of Trumpism and repatrimonialization, the established order of globalization is also disintegrating at a faster pace. Over the past few decades, the U.S. leveraged its network of allies and a commitment to multilateralism to reap tremendous economic benefits while keeping major powers in relative balance. Yet, once the United States began treating its allies as adversaries—extending trade and tariff wars to Europe, Canada, and Japan—its legitimacy and moral authority swiftly deteriorated.
Exasperated by being hemmed in both militarily and economically, Europeans, Canadians, and others are not unaware that the U.S. needs to address its economic and fiscal challenges. But they also see Trumpism as driven by populist slogans and shortsighted tactics. One inevitable outcome is that Russia will rush to fill the vacuum while China gains greater strategic leverage. Under these geopolitical pressures, Europe is more inclined to diversify its partnerships rather than remain beholden to Washington alone.
Such developments help reinforce a multipolar global order. With an economic output of $17–18 trillion, the EU—together with the UK, whose economy, finance, and technology remain closely intertwined with the continent—has the potential to emerge as a world power bloc in its own right. Although Russia lags behind the U.S., Europe, China, and Japan in total economic scale, its nuclear and military capabilities are formidable. Furthermore, the evolution of the Russo-Ukrainian War and Russia’s leverage in energy and food have altered Europe’s geopolitical landscape. China, for its part, possesses ample resources in finance, technology, and human capital. Its flexible diplomatic posture and vast market present a new option for Europe. With the U.S. proving unreliable—or even casting Europe as a competitor—European nations are, at the very least, more open to hearing what Beijing has to say on certain matters.
Nonetheless, Europe remains highly wary of both China and Russia on moral and ideological grounds. Russia’s very real aggression in Ukraine makes it nearly impossible for Europe to join forces with Moscow. China has maintained a low-profile position on Russia, yet it cannot escape its differences with the EU in terms of values and political systems. Thus, a more likely scenario would see Europe steadily cultivating its own defense capabilities while keeping its economic and diplomatic options open. It is unwilling to be dominated by any single actor. In other words, Europe is poised to function increasingly as an independent pole. No longer do we see a bipolar Cold War or a U.S.-dominated unipolar moment; instead, a world with three or more cores of competing power is coming into view.
Searching for Equilibrium amid Uncertainty
Trump’s apparent hope to see Volodymyr Zelensky (泽连斯基) ousted, thus enabling a territorial settlement with Moscow, if realized, would effectively hand Europe’s entire defensive front to Russia. In that scenario, hundreds of thousands of battle-hardened Ukrainian soldiers might become part of the Russian forces—a power so large that no single European country, or even several combined, could rival it. Such an upheaval in Europe’s security architecture would ignite profound fears on the Continent and undoubtedly compel Europe to pursue large-scale military self-reliance. Coupled with America’s inward turn under the “autocracy + hereditary rule” spiral, these seismic shifts in great-power relations would only heighten global instability, including the risk of nuclear proliferation.
Throughout modern history, international leadership has never been secured merely by pouring funds into defense or collecting taxes. Rather, it also demands mutual trust, rational rules, fair institutions, and a commitment to global public interests. America’s enduring supremacy after the Cold War hinged, in no small part, on sustained investment in free trade, globalization, technological innovation, and human rights—on creating and maintaining a framework that benefited not only itself but much of the world. If “Make America Great Again” translates mainly into browbeating allies and dismantling the international order, a backlash is inevitable. Even a powerful United States will struggle to maintain global leadership if it alienates its partners, effectively handing strategic advantages to Russia or other competitors.
In the long run, Europe’s response may produce a more independent and resilient center of global power. Outrage at America’s betrayal—evidenced by Ukraine’s predicament—has galvanized European nations to pursue irreversible defense autonomy. Economically and financially, Europe is formulating new joint strategies to reduce dependence on the dollar-based system and to increase its clout through tighter internal markets and coordination by the European Central Bank.
Still, Europe cannot break free of American military and intelligence technologies overnight. In the near term, it will require time to develop substitutes for NATO’s communications infrastructure and certain critical components. While France, Germany, and Italy have some industrial and R&D capacity, bridging the technological gap in areas like military communications, satellite navigation, and advanced intelligence remains an uphill climb. Further complicating matters are the cultural and policy differences among EU members and their general caution about military spending. Yet history often shows that major external threats spur Europe to unite and reform. When security and survival are directly imperiled, the likelihood of shared action and consensus among European nations increases.
Whither the United States?
Fukuyama bluntly concludes that global politics is no longer neatly divided by the ideological chasms of previous decades; it now resembles a landscape of competing power blocs, each jostling over territory and protection fees, forming what he calls “criminal syndicates” for private advantage. Should the U.S. persist in sinking into the trap of repatrimonialization—treating public authority as a tool for personal or factional gain—the deterioration of America’s political system would inevitably produce greater mistrust, conflict, and arms races worldwide.
From a broader vantage point, the modern world order and economic prosperity, shaped by the Enlightenment, modernization, and the Industrial Revolution, were built on the progressive acceptance of impersonal state institutions and rules-based international cooperation. If the world’s biggest “village head” were to discard these principles in favor of short-term private gains, we would all pay a steep price. Yet, as Europe hastens on its path to self-reliance and other nations pursue more secure, diversified foreign policies, perhaps we have arrived at a historic turning point.
In this era, fraught with challenges and uncertainties, the “winners” among autocrats and political oligarchs typically triumph at the expense of the majority. Once the foundations of multilateralism crack, rebuilding them could demand far more time and effort. But there is no cause for undue despair: the structural imperatives of modern states and modern economies still favor reason, cooperation, and legality over the long term. NATO and the EU, for instance, have weathered adversity and continue to uphold regional peace and unity. And when private interests grow too extreme, public demand for fairness and justice can unleash potent calls for reform.
America’s future is not fated to be one of decline; if the nation can revitalize its rule of law and system of checks and balances—using robust democratic institutions to counterbalance personal and familial power—it might yet play a constructive role on the international stage. Meanwhile, Europe, tempered by numerous shocks, may gradually emerge as a more influential global actor with its own strategic vision. While a multipolar world inevitably carries risks and competition, it also permits more flexible avenues for international cooperation. One can hope that, amid the twists and turns of great-power rivalry, some nations and regions will still preserve their commitment to law, equity, and the public good, preventing our world from devolving into a dismal jungle that serves only “criminals.”
As Fukuyama puts it, “Like many societies before it, the United States is experiencing a process of repatrimonialization. The world was once torn by ideological divides, but now it increasingly resembles competing criminal gangs wrestling over turf and protection fees.” For humanity as a whole, learning to protect the hard-won achievements of modern states and international systems in the face of this “repatrimonialization” may well be our most formidable challenge for the next decade and beyond. Only by recognizing the dangers of regression can we keep the door to genuine progress open; only by maintaining clarity and resolve in a turbulent world can each society’s members find their way to a safer, brighter future.
This translation is an independent yet well-intentioned effort by the China Thought Express editorial team to bridge ideas between the Chinese and English-speaking worlds.