Moderating the panel on “the upcoming US elections - geopolitics and foreign policy” on the opening morning of the AIM Summit in Dubai last week was an invaluable experience.

Great insights were imparted by three highly eminent experts: Kevin McCarthy, 55th Speaker of the US House of Representatives, Charles Myers, Chairman of Signum Global Advisors, and Michael Singh, Managing Director and Senior Fellow at the Washington Institute.

To open our discussion, we contrasted the overall foreign policy approaches of Kamala Harris and Donald Trump: Harris would most probably continue many of Biden’s policies focusing on collaboration with allies and a balanced approach whilst Trump would likely emphasis more unilateral policies and rely heavily on American military strength and sanctions to manage adversaries.

This would certainly lead to widely contrasting approaches to policy in Ukraine and the Middle East. With respect to China, however, we agreed that both candidates would likely maintain a hard stance, strongly supporting Taiwan’s defense whilst, at the same time, continuing with the strategic ambiguity of the “One China” policy.

We also all concurred that the rise of China to great-power status and the US’s ability to transition from a unipolar to a multipolar world is perhaps the central geopolitical issue of our time.

We took a deep dive into each candidate's perspectives on multilateral organizations such as NATO and the UN as well as the potential implications of Trump’s highly protectionist trade policies and confrontational tactics. We explored the likely consequences of the candidates’ differing approach to immigration, a highly divisive issue with respect to both domestic and foreign policy.

In conclusion, we felt that, depending on its outcome, this election could well radically redefine the future direction of US foreign policy. America goes to the polls on November 5th and the whole world is holding its breath as we approach this critical date.

#geopolitics #aimsummit #uselections2024 #foreignpolicy #uspolitics #middleeast