Liberal world order is back, and ostensibly more inclusive than ever. As outgoing U.S. President Donald Trump’s team of grifters, conspiracy theorists, and would-be putschists torch Washington on their way out, incoming President Joe Biden continues to introduce his cabinet—most recently picking former United Nations Ambassador Samantha Power as head of the U.S. Agency for International Development. The new administration promises a revival of progressive foreign policy, signaled above all by the “racial and gender mix” of its leadership, as the New York Times described it. Yet, the relief at Trump’s exit risks obscuring the contest between a form of elite inclusion within the national security system and more radical challenges to that same order.
The incoming team is much-celebrated for the diversity of its membership, projecting a very different image of American power than the Trump administration’s “alpha male” nationalism. Many nominees are seasoned professionals and veterans of the Obama administration: Avril Haines as director of national intelligence, Lloyd Austin as secretary of defense, Linda Thomas-Greenfield as ambassador to the United Nations. Thomas-Greenfield in particular advocates a much less white and male State Department.
