President Joe Biden took office with an ambitious U.S. foreign policy agenda summed up by his favorite campaign tagline: “America is back.” Above all, that meant repairing the damage done to America’s global standing by his predecessor, former President Donald Trump. During his four years in office, Trump strained ties with America’s allies in Europe and Asia, raised tensions with adversaries like Iran and Venezuela, and engaged in a trade war with China that left bilateral relations in their worst state in decades.
In principle, Biden’s agenda was rooted in a repudiation of Trump’s “America First” legacy and the restoration of the multilateral order. That was reflected in his early moves to rejoin the Paris Climate Accords and the World Health Organization, and to reestablish U.S. leadership on climate diplomacy. The COVID-19 pandemic also offered Biden an opportunity to reassert America’s global leadership role and begin repairing ties that began to fray under Trump.
But in practice, some of Biden’s priorities have borne a close resemblance to Trump’s agenda. His “foreign policy for the middle class,” which ties U.S. diplomacy to peace, security and prosperity at home, has been described as a dressed-up version of Trump’s emphasis on putting U.S. interests above its global commitments. Biden also followed through on Trump’s deal to withdraw from Afghanistan without consulting or coordinating with Washington’s NATO allies—and paid a political cost for the collapse of the Afghan government and chaotic evacuation that ensued. And on other issues, like his approach to immigration and border policies, Biden initially demonstrated little urgency to make immediate changes. Similarly, he only belatedly lifted controversial tariffs on European steel and aluminum imports as well as the most draconian of Trump’s sanctions on Cuba.
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Despite the rhetorical commitment to repudiating Trump, Biden may find it difficult to fully restore a pre-Trump status quo. Countries may no longer be willing to follow the U.S. lead on democracy promotion after the erosion of America’s democratic norms during the Trump era. And Europe, in particular, has recalibrated its relationship with the United States and may no longer be willing to align with America’s approach, particularly the hardening of relations with China. Nevertheless, as the war in Ukraine has highlighted, there is still high demand among allies, partners and other countries around the world for decisive U.S. leadership in times of crisis.
WPR has covered U.S. foreign policy in detail and continues to examine key questions about will happen next. Will Biden maintain a tough approach on China, and at what cost? How will his administration handle ties with Iran in the likely event the nuclear deal is not revived? And will the war in Ukraine prevent Biden from shifting the geographic focus of U.S. foreign policy to the likely centers of global challenges and opportunities in Asia and Africa? Below are some of the highlights of WPR’s coverage.
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Biden Is Right to Keep the U.S. Engaged in the World
Amid the debates over U.S. President Joe Biden’s foreign policy, one thing is clear: Biden is an internationalist trying to keep the U.S. engaged globally actor. But should he be? More broadly, is it the United States’ place to be highly engaged in the world? Or would the U.S. and the world be better off if Washington sat some things out?
Diplomacy and Multilateralism
Biden took office pledging to pursue a foreign policy rooted in a renewed commitment to values such as democracy, human rights, the rule of law and international cooperation. In practice, though, that has mainly amounted to a narrative framing, with little real effect on his conduct of foreign policy. At the same time, Biden has recognized how intertwined U.S. foreign policy is with domestic growth. So while he has disavowed Trump’s “America First” approach, Biden’s promise to rebuild at home still ultimately guides his multilateral engagements.
- What Biden’s democracy rhetoric masks about his foreign policy, in Biden’s ‘Defending Democracy’ Agenda Is All Talk
- How the new limits of U.S. power are shaping Biden’s foreign policy, in Don’t Blame a Lack of Will for the United States’ Waning Hegemony
- Why Biden’s delinking of human rights from climate diplomacy will prove costly, in Biden’s Climate Diplomacy Has a Human Rights Blind Spot
- How Republican obstructionism in Congress is hobbling Biden’s foreign policy, in Biden’s ‘Do It All’ Foreign Policy Has a Major Weakness
Alliances and Partnerships
One of Biden’s first tasks was to begin rebuilding trans-Atlantic relations. While his early efforts to shore up the partnership suffered from an apparent divergence in geopolitical ambitions—particularly when it came to articulating a collective approach to China—Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has catalyzed consensus and cohesion within NATO not seen since the end of the Cold War. Meanwhile, repairing relations with Washington’s existing Asian allies, as well as deepening new partnerships such as the so-called Quad, have proven to be easier tasks for Biden.
- Why the U.S. commitment to NATO is a historical outlier, with or without Trump, in Trump May Not Be NATO’s Biggest Challenge
- Why Washington’s assessment of the Abraham Accords is overly rosy, in The U.S. and Israel Are Deluding Themselves About the Abraham Accords
- Why it’s time for Washington to rethink its approach to EU defense, in To Strengthen NATO, the U.S. Should Embrace EU Defense
- Why it’s a mistake to consider the war on terror as solely in the past, in It’s Time for the U.S. to End the War on Terror
Strategic Competition and Rivals
Biden’s recent moves to choke off China’s access to high-end technology as well as his rapid and robust punitive sanctions over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine leave no room for doubt that he is willing to take a tough stance with Beijing and Moscow. But his determination to compete aggressively with U.S. rivals as well as his stated commitment to democracy promotion are certain to bump up against the need for practical cooperation to address shared global challenges, especially with regard to China.
- Why focusing on China’s influence in the Middle East is a red herring, in The U.S. Has Nothing to Fear From China in the Middle East
- What Biden’s latest summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping revealed about U.S.-China ties, in Biden’s Meeting With Xi Set a Very Low Bar for U.S.-China Relations
- Why the U.S. should think more strategically about cooperation with China, in The U.S. Can’t Afford a Science and Tech Decoupling From China
- How the green transition is becoming a casualty of the U.S.-China rivalry, in U.S.-China Competition Is Weaponizing the Green Transition
Bilateral and Regional Policy
Following the erratic and inconsistent foreign policy of the Trump administration, Biden was in a position to make some meaningful shifts in bilateral relations with a range of partners. But his administration continues to face some familiar limits. Though Biden has pledged to make human rights and democracy central planks of his foreign policy, in practice he has often continued to put U.S. interests first.
- How Biden can show rights activists in Africa that Washington cares, in Biden’s Africa Agenda Is Still Ignoring Human Rights
- Why Biden’s Middle East strategy needs an urgent rethink, in The Israel-Hamas War Has Torpedoed Biden’s Middle East Agenda
- Why Biden is looking the other way on rights abuses in Mauritania, in Biden Just Gave Mauritania a Pass on Slavery and Forced Labor
- Why it’s not too late for the U.S. to influence events on the ground in Sudan, in The U.S. Needs to Step Up in Sudan
Trade and Aid Policy
With his “foreign policy for the middle class,” Biden has promised to focus on how to reorient U.S. engagement abroad to address middle-class economic concerns back home. When it comes to trade, that means making sure U.S. policy contributes to domestic economic renewal. But that’s increasingly becoming a recipe for protectionism.
- Why the U.S. should rethink its approach to Argentina’s lithium sector, in The U.S. Needs Argentina’s Lithium. The IRA’s Getting in the Way
- How Mexico has become the big winner in Biden’s efforts to secure U.S. supply chains, in Friend-Shoring Is Already Reshaping Global Trade
- Why the Biden administration must avoid past mistakes in its effort to enlist labor unions in the battle between democracy and autocracy, in Biden’s Overseas Labor Union Initiative Has Troubling Cold War Precedents
- How the Biden administration’s attempt to address past imbalances in trade policy creates new problems, in Biden’s ‘New Washington Consensus’ Is Weaponizing Trade
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in June 2021 and is regularly updated.