DONALD TRUMP AND THE POLITICAL POWER THEORY

Talcott Parson analyzed in detail what political power means and implies, and Trump seems to partially have taken note. For Parson, power means that one actor has to rule the performance of other actors aimed to create a legitimated system where all of them are unequally integrate. Power should have the capacity to impose sanctions if obstinacy is finding in the fulfillment of obligations. In that sense Parson contemplated two types of sanctions; the positive and the negative. Positive are exercised through persuasion and induction towards positions advantageous to the actor holding power. Negative were coercive measures that implied a disadvantage for the subordinated actor. The US president has a bet to impose negative sanctions according to Parson's theory of political power. Trump had that bet willing to enforce the obligations that the United States unilaterally imposes. However, in practice, the sanctions have also affected Trump's political power; the sanctions have affected the domestic economy of the United States and the US relations with its allies. When Trump tried to punish China, he has also managed to punish the United States as well. When Parsons was analyzing sanctions stated that an escalation in the application of coercive measures always meant rushing into a confrontation. Trump's movements in both political and economic matters involve convulsive situations in which many actors have to adapt to the new circumstances. The trade war started by the US president is pushing many global actors to an escalation on defensive positions.

To exercise power, intelligence, decision, and wisdom are necessary. In a world transiting from unipolar to multipolar, the US had only one option to maintain the control; to abandon the multiple alliances and to retake bilateral relations. Trade war has caused a global trade readjustment. Many analysts have seen Trump running the economy as if it were a poker game; they saw the American president forcing a desperate response from China, or forcing the Asian country to leave the game-board. Many analysts thought that Trump was playing a bluff in that poker game and that sooner or later everything would return to normality. In the end, neither China has left the game-board, nor has Trump left his bluff body. It is hard to measure to what extent intelligence, decision, and wisdom has been applied in Trump´s power exercise, for sure time will tell. The conflict between the US and China is not something temporary; it is not an economic war, it is a holistic war to preserve the prominent presence in the new world order. This war has begun with hostilities in trade relations, and now the war has entered into financial hostilities. The next step would involve hostilities in the shipment routes of both countries. Trump´s power performance is not a poker game; it is a game changer.

Trump has lost many advantages by just playing to impose tariffs on Chinese products. The Chinese decision of devaluing the Yuan has touched the waterline of the American economy and has left China in an advantage position in global trade; this will be positive for Chinese exportations and will strength the relationships with many Chinese-dependent American companies. The American president should have meditate about the use of positive sanctions instead negative ones. Parson have seen power as a flow between economic and political actors, his idea of power was dynamic. Thus, Chinese and Americans goals could found a meeting point. However, Trump's vision of power implies that if one actor acquires power, necessarily another one loses it; power is a zero-sum game. For the American president power is static and remains only in one actor. Parson argued that the institutionalization of the normative order should be understood within the concept of authority, and the authority for Parson is the institutional code to legitimize power. Trump has legitimated institutional power in the US and is acting accordingly like this to defend some investors' interest, but the unilateral US's authority power is not legitimated abroad anymore. The president has bet everything on the same number to remain the actor capable of making global rules and imposing global sanctions, there is not another solution for him. The game must level up, or one of the two players must leave the game table.

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Nuño Rodríguez - Political Scientist

Nuno Rodríguez is Political Scientist and Analyst. Founder and Director of Quixote Communications Consultancy, dedicated to Political, Strategy, and Public Diplomacy.

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