Year XXXVIII, Number 3, November 2025

Romano Prodi 
Former President of the European Commission and former Prime Minister of Italy.

On more than one occasion I have expressed my concern about the deterioration of democratic systems in world politics. Initially, I drew attention to the fact that authoritarian countries, starting with China and Russia, were becoming increasingly more appealing, especially in Africa where democracy was younger and more fragile and where leaders, even if democratically elected, quickly abandoned the established rules and centralized all power in their hands, suspending or manipulating future elections.

I then became concerned about authoritarian tendencies that have slowly made inroads in Europe too, where some maintain that a victory in an election confers on governments a total and exclusive power over the whole of society, starting with Parliament, ultimately spreading to the judiciary and the media, and gradually controlling the economy. A change epitomized by Hungary, but which has long characterized Poland and has a growing number of supporters in other countries, including Italy.

However, I would never have thought that this development would become the dominant doctrine and program in the United States, a country where the balance of power (the so- called checks and balances) has always been the benchmark not only for America but for all democracies around the world.

Instead, this revolution was solemnly announced when Donald Trump, in taking on most important political role in the world, accompanied his oath of office with a speech
 
and a program based not on an equilibrium between institutions and the protection of individual rights, but instead on a power capable of legitimizing virtually unlimited influence not only within the United States but also in those countries where American interests are at stake. It is true that Trump will also have to reckon with the balances and checks on which the American system is based, but, if we take his words literally, we are seeing a change of policy and not just the mere transfer of power from a Democrat to a Republican president.

So it is not inappropriate to speak of a truly revolutionary project that aims to prevail over all obstacles not just as a result of the mandate received, but also because all the major players in the economy, including those who, until election day, had harshly opposed Trump’s policies, have immediately fallen into line with them.

Consequently, what we are seeing is a plan which, based as it is on the most important military power and the strongest economy in the world, is forcing us have a change of heart as American democracy and values had always been a guiding light for us..

China and Russia are certainly less concerned about this change. For China, American hostility was in fact a foregone conclusion regardless of whether a Democrat or a Republican won the election. Convinced that new trade barriers would be introduced, China 

had already taken steps to protect itself by increasing its exports to the rest of the world, reducing its admittedly gigantic exports to the United States to 2.8 percent of its GDP, and ramping up investment in new technologies. Where Russia is concerned, the threat of further sanctions appears to be more of a starting point for the negotiations on Ukraine rather than a real risk.

It is also true that Russia and China are pleased to see any rift develop in the West. The situation in Europe is more complicated as there are different positions varying from those who have limited themselves to expressing congratulations, those who are in favour of an “eye for an eye” approach and those who have travelled to Washington and shown an acritical adherence to the new American policy. However, at least as regards customs duties, the European strategy must be coordinated by the Union, given that trade policy is the responsibility of the EU, not of the individual States.

Trade between the United States and Europe is massive, accounting for 30 percent of all world trade with a $156 billion European surplus for goods and a $104 billion American surplus on services. Trump intends to balance these numbers out by imposing tariffs on our goods, increasing exports of liquefied gas, and boosting the US competitiveness by exploiting the low cost of the coal and hydrocarbons on which US industry relies.
 
On top of this, there has been a breakdown in the current negotiations which would have allowed the huge profits made in Europe by the major network companies (starting with Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft) to be taxed at least at the lowest rate. Besides all of this, the individual European States will have to buy even more weapons from the US before Europe can put a common policy of its own in place in this sector. Such a radical upheaval of transatlantic economic relations could only push the European Union to look for other markets elsewhere, thereby making Russia and China’s goal of breaking Western unity become a reality.

We are therefore facing economic problems which are fraught with consequences. Despite all of this, the measures that have already been announced and decided of suspending all international solidarity are far more serious: the end of all cooperation on environmental policy, the withdrawal of the United States from the World Health Organization, the threats to the territorial integrity of other countries and the creation of a cryptocurrency system that is beyond all control and does not comply with any rules.

What is most surprising and alarming about this return to the past which is being passed off as the future, is the reaction that prevails in the world today: no moral rebellion or even adequate political responses, but only resignation and weariness.

This comment has been originally published in the newspaper Il Messaggero on January, 25th 2025.