President Trump’s visit to Britain was designed to flatter with imperial imagery: Windsor Castle, a carriage ride, flyovers, a glimpse at the Churchill archives at Chequers, the prime minister’s country estate. This pageantry veiled the reality that Britain is no longer the superpower of these symbols, and that Mr. Trump is widely disliked in the country.
Of course, the nostalgia diplomacy serves a purpose. For Mr. Trump, it sates his thirst for validation as the predominant Western leader, with the British establishment genuflecting before him as so many powerful American institutions have done since his re-election. For Prime Minister Keir Starmer, it continues a careful strategy of avoiding worse outcomes on tariffs and the war in Ukraine while showing that Britain has a foot in the door on technologies such as artificial intelligence.
Yet underneath the surface, both the United States and Britain are suffering through crises of identity. For two centuries, London and Washington were the seats of empire, the vanguard of the West, the proselytizers of liberal democracy. Our leaders used to meet to shape the direction of world events; now the balance of global power is shifting to the East. Our leaders used to reaffirm a story of shared democratic values; now the United States has taken an authoritarian turn, and Mr. Starmer is struggling to prevent Britain from doing the same.
As our nations go through a crucible of change, it is no wonder that our people are anxious and unmoored, our politics destabilized. What was it all about? What will our nations become?
These questions are not new. One hundred and twenty-six years ago, in Joseph Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness,” Charlie Marlow begins his story in the heart of the British Empire, London’s River Thames. “What greatness had not floated on the ebb of that river into the mystery of an unknown earth!” he declares. “The dreams of men, the seed of commonwealths, the germs of empires.” This soaring vision of power and glory flowing outward from the center was laced with a cruder experience: “They grabbed what they could get for the sake of what was to be got.”
The grabbing tended to concentrate wealth and power among the few while calling upon the sacrifices of the many. But the titans of government and industry buttressed their empire with loftier stories. For the British, it was a story of imperial might spreading commerce, laws, institutions and common purpose. For Americans forging their own empire in the 20th century, it was a story of freedom, opportunity, justice and common aspiration. Of course, British and American leaders adhered to these stories only selectively, but they did offer a sense of meaning and belonging, an identity connected to a broader project. They served simultaneously as a justification for supremacy and a source of accountability, as citizens in our countries and abroad used them to call out hypocrisy and demand reform.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access.
Already a subscriber? Log in.
Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
The post The Imperial Nostalgia of Donald Trump appeared first on New York Times.
