If elected, Joe Biden has pledged to change the course of U.S. foreign policy. What should such a shift entail?

If elected, Joe Biden has pledged to change the course of U.S. foreign policy. What should such a shift entail after four years of Donald Trump’s leadership? “A Biden victory in November would offer the temptation of seeking to restore the United States’ post–Cold War image of itself as a virtuous hegemon. But that would badly underestimate the country’s current predicament,” writes Ben Rhodes, who served as U.S. deputy national security adviser from 2009 to 2017. A Democratic administration “has an opportunity to shape what emerges from the collapse of the American superpower during the COVID-19 crisis. . . . That effort should include a different kind of world order, one in which the United States leads without dictating the terms, lives by the standards it seeks for others, and combats global inequality instead of fueling it.” This special election coverage is made possible in part by a grant from Carnegie Corporation of New York. Subscribe Today and Save 55% New Subscribers Get a Free eBook |