Tony Abbott: How Anglosphere conservatives can thrive in the age of Trump
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As a consequence of the Trump tariff wars, Canada's conservative opposition leader went from being 20 points ahead in the polls to a narrow loss in April's election. And Australia's conservative opposition leader went from being competitive in the polls to a massive defeat last month. Despite Pierre Poilievre's fierce repudiation of the insults against Canada, and despite Peter Dutton's insistence that he would prevent U.S. tariffs against Australia, voters saw both as guilty by association. Donald Trump was a right-winger, many voters' reasoning ran; Poilievre and Dutton were right-wingers, therefore both were somehow 'mini-Trumps' who might be just as erratic should they gain office. Naturally, the Liberals in Canada, and Labor in Australia, revelled in attacking their 'Trump-like' opponents.
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Conservative leaders' best response to the president's 'America first,' verging on 'everyone else last,' foreign policy is to declare that their first duty, likewise, is to their own country. After all, seeing one's own country as a 'shining city on a hill' and even as 'the last best hope of mankind,' to use Ronald Reagan's rhetoric, is the hallmark of conservative leaders. A deep patriotism is at the heart of all conservative thinking.
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A key difference between this president and his predecessors is that his love of America does not so readily extend to an embrace of America's like-minded allies; or to using American soft and hard power to extend American values throughout the world. Loyalty, sentiment, high-mindedness, and a 'love that pays the price' count for little with a transactional administration, even though it's America's readiness, up till now, to keep the world safe for democracy that's made it so widely admired.
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A smart move by conservatives would be to push for much deeper cooperation between the other members of the Anglosphere. After all, Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand (the CANZUK countries) are all members of the Five Eyes security partnership and are all now members of the Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade deal. If America's security guarantees are weakening, there's a strong argument for Britain, supported by Canada and Australia, to step up; especially if the wider world is to continue to reflect the long Anglo-American ascendancy rather than a new Chinese one. And there's every reason to think that the current centre-left British, Canadian and Australian governments would be amenable to working more closely together on global issues if Trump's America is starting to go missing.
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It was always a mistake to see Reagan-Thatcher conservatism as exclusively, or even mainly, economic. Those two conservative titans respected freer markets as the best means of securing individual prosperity and national strength, not as ends in themselves. They supported smaller government and greater freedom because it's strong citizens rather than a nanny state that creates the best society. They saw love of country, a commitment to excellence, and personal responsibility as the key to a strong social fabric; much more so than 'equalizing' taxes and over-generous, incentive-sapping social welfare. Their record was freer trade with like-minded democracies, rather than with geo-political rivals; and of boosting local industry via robust competition and domestic deregulation rather than government subsidy.
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Whether it's Trump Derangement Syndrome or the almost equally prevalent Trump Fascination Syndrome, the U.S. president's out-sized political personality is denying oxygen to everyone and everything that's not referencing him. Because America matters, and because the president has so much sway over what America does, the wild ride will continue. But what counts, in the end, is less what someone else does, that's up to him; and more what we do, that's up to us. Conservatives should respectfully dissent from any rogue actions by the current administration, while remembering that there will be a new one within four years. Donald Trump is just one manifestation of American conservatism, not the embodiment of it. And in the meantime, conservative leaders should get on with devising a credible policy agenda for their own countries and relentlessly making the case for change with their own voters.
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