What first strikes us about the US Presidential Elections-2016 is the stunning upset that Donald Trump has pulled off with his performance and along with it, the Republican control of the Congress, Senate and the House of Representatives.
The Supreme Court will be well on its way to reorganise its alignments based on political and ideological loyalties, revealing celebrated yet contested qualities of American electoral politics. This is not only a historical election because of the result but also in the manner in which the election campaign was held, the dark and divisive political strategies, politics of identity based on educational background, race, colour, gender and religion and all trapped in the dynamic wheels of uncertainty.
Politics is never sweet but the content of this election campaign is too bitter to swallow even for a distant spectator. America was caught in the trappings of divisive politics and in one of the most intensely fought elections in the recent memory of US Presidential elections. This is an incredible political feat for someone who came from behind and with no experience in governance to defeat another with more than four decades of public life including the roles of former senator, former first lady and former Secretary of State.
In defeat, Hillary Clinton deserves respect and acknowledgement as a great woman who almost made history as the first woman President of America. But in her success, in breaking the glass ceiling, by securing the nomination of the Democratic party she closed the gates on American spring and the bloom of a new politics was trampled with the defeat of Bernie Sanders. Donald Trump simply dragged America into its era of isolationism, racism, and aggressive nationalism.
This is precisely the ground upon which Donald Trump laid his arguments to rest. He called Hillary Clinton as corrupt, manipulative and being part of the American power coterie. He positioned himself as an anti-establishment and projected Hillary Clinton as a quasi-incumbent by attributing responsibilities to explain the policies of the Obama Administration at home and abroad and blamed the popular media as indifferent to the musings at the ground. In the process he defied the media forecasts and even redefined the popular imagination of an American presidential candidate with qualities, usage of language and application of standards unpalatable for public consumption.
Trump was appealing through his campaign style and contents to the basic instincts of white American average voter who was seen as neglected and redundant over the years. As Paul Ryan, Republican leader and former Speaker of the House of Representatives said that Donald Trump grasped something that others failed to do and in the process turned the American politics on its head.
There is a complete disbelief and above this shock defeat of the Democratic Party and its dissipated dreams is the resurgence of the Republican Government reminding the yesteryears of 1980s with its control spread across all three branches of the government - executive, legislature and judiciary. Given the nature and intensity of transition, the question before us is whether the celebrated provisions, the system of checks and balance, of the American Constitution as envisaged by the French political philosopher Montesquieu in his theory of separation of powers, will survive the ideological shift towards radical right and politically unified Republican government assault on the system.
There is more than one reason to believe that America is entering into a period of uncertainty as the results unfold with clear victory of Donald Trump, the Republican majority in the Congress and the complete control of the government. Donald Trump is seen as part of the ground shift at the bottom anchored on race, nationalism, islamophobia, immigration issues, corruption, vested interests, unemployment, call for jobs for American youth and the economic drain caused by military commitments abroad. His campaign was divisive, negative and rhetoric filled with hatred. In the process he drove home the message of "us" Versus "others" in a school boy debating style with little composure and much less refinement.
He caused an estrangement within all Americans with America itself. America was divided and ruing against itself. In the process different Americans heard him differently. In attacking Hillary Clinton he brought several public institutions under fire. He turned the traditional American politics upside down. Donald Trump not only conquered the battle ground states like Florida, Ohio and North Carolina but also breached the blue walls of the Democrat controlled states like Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
(The writer is Professor & Head, Department of Politics & Public Administration, School of Politics & International Studies, University of Madras)
