Revisionist powers would gain from Trump’s challenge to the rules‑based order

As during Trump’s first term, the United States would still look to the United Nations system opportunistically – whether to rally pressure on adversaries through the UN Security Council, or to invoke human rights where it aligns with political expediency.¹ But a piecemeal and inconsistent approach will undermine global cooperation, as well as the United States’ own credibility.²

Trump would take a hostile approach to the parts of the multilateral system most antithetical to his worldview, including the World Trade Organization (WTO), and may go further than during his first term in actively targeting institutions.

But he would also do damage through neglect — depriving multilateral bodies of funding, attention, and leadership. That includes withdrawing the United States from the UN Human Rights Council (once more) and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, reducing their global authority and effectiveness. This at a time when China and Russia are seeking to redefine global rules in their favour.

Three examples illustrate the threat.

Peace and security

Under Trump 2.0, the president’s permissive attitude towards Russia would present a central challenge to the rules-based order. While an internal debate within the Trump camp is still playing out, most signs — from Trump’s long-held admiration for Putin, and his assertion that he could end the Ukraine war in one day, to the views of some of his key advisors — point towards a re-elected Trump either halting or reducing US military assistance to Ukraine.³ A withdrawal of support to Ukraine would risk consolidating some of Russia’s territorial gains in Ukraine, while a hasty peace deal could legitimise them. That would create a dangerous precedent for the UN Charter’s fundamental prohibition on military aggression, and on respect for territorial integrity.

The repercussions would be far-reaching. An America that not only permits but facilitates a “might makes right” settlement would embolden authoritarian regimes from Iran to North Korea. Looking at Ukraine’s losses, Xi Jinping might also calculate that Trump was unwilling to impose meaningful costs on aggressors, raising the risk of a forceful Chinese takeover of Taiwan.

Human rights

Trump would likely attack major human rights institutions. A repeat withdrawal from the UN Human Rights Council would further weaken the key body for promoting human rights globally.⁴ Similarly, while America has never been party to the International Criminal Court, in office Trump went further by sanctioning ICC officials involved in investigating potential US war crimes in Afghanistan.⁵ Reflecting his administration’s broader scepticism of the United Nations, then-Attorney General William Barr described the ICC as “little more than a political tool employed by unaccountable international elites”.⁶

Similarly, Trump’s reverence for authoritarian strongmen, and his lack of regard for foreign human rights violations, would bolster global impunity.⁷ A second Trump administration would be less active in holding foreign human rights violators to account. Worse, the United States would likely be seen to be aligning with efforts underway by Russia and China to prioritise state sovereignty over universal human rights.

Free trade

Of all the multilateral institutions, the fate of the WTO hangs most precariously in the balance. In fairness, the paralysis and slow decline of the world trading body is a bipartisan US initiative. In office, both Presidents Trump and Biden refused to appoint judges to the WTO’s appellate body, crippling a key dispute settlement mechanism on trade.⁸ Whether Trump or Vice President Kamala Harris wins in November, both can be expected to maintain large-scale manufacturing subsidies and measures to extricate supply chains from China. Focused on competition with China, neither would champion the cause of the global free trading system.

But Trump would go further still. His promise of a 10 per cent tariff on all global imports coming to the United States would not only hurt US consumers but contravene one of the WTO’s founding pursuits — the removal of barriers to trade. Such a radical departure from rules-based trade could lead to a chain reaction of retaliatory protectionist policies, proving fatal to an already fractured WTO.⁹

The death of multilateralism?

Can multilateralism withstand a second Trump presidency? Many countries would no doubt remain invested in the benefits of the rules-based system, universal human rights, and open trade.

But in the absence of US leadership, they will need to bear a heavier burden in promoting, enforcing, and abiding by established global norms, even if it invites the ire of a second Trump administration.

One thing is clear. The world would be poorer and less secure for the United States disowning large parts of the global order it helped create.

Ryan Neelam is Director of the Public Opinion and Foreign Policy Program at the Lowy Institute.