Philippa Kaur

After months of wrangling, the US Senate has finally passed Joe Biden’s US$95 billion (£75 billion) foreign aid package. Ukraine is the destination for almost two-thirds of the aid, with US$14 billion set aside to assist Israel’s war against Hamas, and US$10 billion destined for humanitarian aid in conflict areas, such as Gaza.

The bill passed the Senate by 70 votes to 29, with 22 Republicans joining the Democrat majority. But two Democrats and Bernie Sanders, the independent senator for Vermont, voted against the bill because of its support of Israel.

The split in the Senate illustrates the divisions among both parties on the subject.

Republican senators originally voted against a much larger bill (US$118 billion). They demanded that any foreign aid package must be dependent on increased funding for security on the US southern border with Mexico, and declared the proposed bill was insufficient to address concerns there.

But when former president Donald Trump came out against the bill, even with the financial support for border control measures, Republicans were divided. Trump called the bill a “horrible, open borders betrayal of America,” and vowed that he would “fight it all the way”.

Republican support for the bill was led by Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell. McConnell has always been supportive of Ukraine, claiming it is in the US interest to support Ukraine. After passing the bill, McConnell argued: “We equip our friends to face our shared adversaries so we’re less likely to have to spend American lives to defeat them.”

McConnell’s advocacy was enough to get the bill through the Senate, although his position as leader has been severely weakened by the number of GOP senators who defied him on the aid package.

McConnell’s support for Ukraine puts him in direct opposition to Trump. Last year, Trump said he could end the war in Ukraine in just one day if he was reelected, indicating he would push the US towards a more isolationist position.

The former president doubled down on this with a statement at a rally in South Carolina on February 11, where he declared he would refuse to support Nato members who failed to pay their way, and that he would encourage invading nations “to do whatever the hell they want”.

This is not a new position for Trump, who has regularly talked about pulling US support for Nato. But, as with his position on the Ukraine aid package, not all Republicans support his views.

Senator Josh Hawley, a staunch supporter of the former president, said that Trump was right to criticise those nations that did not pay 2% of their GDP towards the upkeep of Nato. But he added that the US should live up to its commitments and that if Russia “invaded a Nato country, we’d have to defend them”.

Unsurprisingly, Utah’s Republican Senator Mitt Romney, a long-time Trump critic, said on the Senate floor: “If we fail to help Ukraine, we will abandon our word and our commitment, proving to our friends a view that America cannot be trusted.”

It is too early to know whether – and to what extent – Trump is losing the support of some of the Republican party. But there definitely appears to be a division along foreign policy between the former president and some Senate Republicans.

What is clear is that the majority of those opposed to abandoning Ukraine – and who supported the bill through the Senate – are made up primarily of national security hawks and former veterans.

Now for the House

Even though the bill has passed the Democrat-controlled Senate, it will have an extremely tough time in getting through the GOP-controlled House of Representatives. McConnell has already reached out to the House speaker, Mike Johnson, to ensure that it will get a fair hearing, but there are questions about whether the bill will even reach the floor.

In an interview with US politics website Politico, McConnell asked Johnson to “allow the House to work its will on the issue of Ukraine aid”.

At loggerheads: House speaker Mike Johnson (right) and Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell (centre) are at odds over sending aid to Ukraine.
AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein

House Republicans have called the bill a “waste of time” and “dead on arrival” in the lower chamber. House support for the war in the Ukraine has fallen, especially as Republicans have begun to scrutinise the details of US assistance to Kyiv.

Johnson has declared that the bill will not even get a reading without sufficient provisions for security on the US southern border. “National security begins with border security,” he said. “We have said that all along. That has been my comment since late October, it is my comment today.”

Johnson’s refusal to get the bill on the floor of the House is understandable. House Republicans that oppose the bill believe that if it does get a reading then there is enough of a majority among moderates in both parties for it to pass. Republican representative Andy Biggs, a member of the Trump-supporting Freedom Caucus, told one talk radio host: “If it were to get to the floor, it would pass.”

This is a not a sign that Trump’s influence on House Republicans is dwindling. But it shows there is still just enough bipartisan support for Ukraine for bills such as this to pass Congress.

Johnson is now at the centre of what will be a parliamentary issue. If he refuses to allow the bill to be read, then it may make it onto the floor through a “discharge petition” brought about by a bipartisan majority.

This is a mechanism by which matters can be brought before the House without the sponsorship of the majority leadership. It would undermine Johnson’s position as leader of the House and deeply divide the Republicans in an election year.

The Senate passing the bill is a small victory for the pro-Ukraine lobby – but there could be many twists and turns before it gets voted on in the House, if it does at all. More

In certain circles, the 2020 presidential election isn’t over – and that seems to be at least a little bit true. In recent weeks, official reviews of election records and processes from the 2020 presidential election have reported findings that might be used to spread rumors about voting integrity.

For instance, election officials in Virginia’s Prince William County announced on Jan. 11, 2024, that 4,000 votes from the 2020 presidential election had been miscounted. None of them changed the results. Those miscounts gave Donald Trump 2,327 more votes than he actually got, and Joe Biden 1,648 votes fewer. Errors in counting turned up in other races, too, with both parties’ candidates for U.S. Senate being given fewer votes than they actually received, and a Republican who won a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives actually won by a slightly larger margin than previously reported.

An audit of South Carolina’s 2020 voting records released in mid-January found no fraud and no indication any election results could have been different with the errors that were identified. But the report did recommend election officials cross-check lists of registered voters with other state lists more frequently than they have done in the past. Death reports and prison inmate rolls can help them determine who should remain eligible to voter and who should be removed from voting lists, the report said.

The Conversation U.S. has published several articles about the systems protecting election integrity. Here are four examples from our archives.

A Trump campaign poll watcher films the counting of ballots at the Allegheny County, Penn., elections warehouse in 2020 in Pittsburgh.
Jeff Swensen/Getty Images

1. Changing numbers are evidence of transparency, not fraud

The news reports of election audits came, originally, from election officials themselves, who specified they were below the small margins that would have triggered recounts. The reports also offered explanations for what had happened and how to fix it in the future – and included statements that at least some of the problems had already been fixed for upcoming elections.

That’s an example of what Kristin Kanthak, a political scientist at the University of Pittsburgh, was talking about when she explained that election results that change over time aren’t inherently a problem:

“(T)his doesn’t mean the system is ‘rigged.’ Actually, it means the system is transparent to a fault,” she wrote.

Read more:
How votes are counted in Pennsylvania: Changing numbers are a sign of transparency, not fraud, during an ongoing process

2. Easier voting is not a threat to election integrity

Erecting obstacles to voting will not prevent the problems that do exist in the election system, for the simple reason that the flaws are not a result of easier voting methods, such as early voting and voting by mail.

Grinnell College political scientist Douglas R. Hess observed that the COVID-19 pandemic was a massive test of whether a secure election could be held with a lot of accommodations that made voting easier, and safer from the spread of disease.

As he wrote,

“(E)arly voting and voting by mail are targeted for restrictions in many states, even though both reforms are popular with the public, worked securely in 2020 and have been expanded in many states for years without increases in fraud. Likewise, the collection of absentee ballots – a necessity for some voters – can be implemented securely.”

Read more:
Making it easier to vote does not threaten election integrity

3. It’s possible for election workers to be both partisan and fair-minded

For many years, elections have been run by people who were members of one political party or the other but behaved in good faith to run fair elections, wrote Thom Reilly, a scholar at Arizona State University’s School of Public Affairs.

But both the facts and the rhetoric have changed, he explained, noting that a significant share of the electorate is not a member of either party – so the people who supervise elections, who are typically party members, are “an increasingly partisan set of officials.”

Even so, many of them work hard to conduct fair elections. Yet, he wrote,

“(W)idespread misinformation and disinformation on election administration is hobbling the ability of election officials to do their job and has created fertile ground for mistrust.”

Read more:
Good faith and the honor of partisan election officials used to be enough to ensure trust in voting results – but not anymore

A poll worker helps a voter cast a ballot in the Kansas primary election at Merriam Christian Church on Aug. 2, 2022, in Merriam, Kan.
Kyle Rivas/Getty Images

4. Beware those who aim to confuse or mislead

Political disinformation efforts are particularly intense around elections, warn scholars of information warfare Kate Starbird and
Jevin West at the University of Washington and Renee DiResta at Stanford University.

Situations to watch out for are those in which “lack of understanding and certainty can fuel doubt, fan misinformation and provide opportunities for those seeking to delegitimize the results,” they wrote.

Specifically, look out for:

“Politically motivated individuals (who) are likely to cherry-pick and assemble these pieces of digital “evidence” to fit narratives that seek to undermine trust in the results. Much of this evidence is likely to be derived from real events, though taken out of context and exaggerated.“

They provide a reminder to keep your wits about you and be sure to double-check any claims before believing or sharing them.

Read more:
5 types of misinformation to watch out for while ballots are being counted – and after

This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives. More

Conservative outrage over the presence of a female pop star at professional football games is a sign of how many parts of American life and culture have taken on a partisan political flavor.

Partisanship doesn’t just apply to opinions about the dating lives of Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce. Food, too, is another aspect of the latest set of not-quite-political conflicts – including beverage brands and main courses. What you serve at your Super Bowl party, or what the host serves at the event you attend, can now be interpreted, or twisted, through a partisan lens.

Our public-opinion research shows that almost nothing today is free of partisanship – whether the item in question has anything to do with government action, political ideology or public policy, or not. At times, the issues that erupt into political skirmishes are the result of fanciful conspiratorial thinking, blatant misinformation or just the personal preferences of political leaders.

We have found that these developments, in which polarization invades parts of Americans’ lives that really aren’t political, deepen existing divides in society. These conflicts also make it harder to have fun in mixed political company, and harder to steer clear of accidentally offending someone at your Super Bowl party.

It’s an official sponsor of the Super Bowl, but Bud Light has been part of political controversy.
Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images

An eye on Bud Light

Bud Light has long been one of the nation’s most popular beers. Politics has changed that.

In April 2023, transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney posted a video to Instagram promoting a Bud Light contest. The anti-trans backlash was swift, with calls for boycotts of the beer coming from Republicans, including former President Donald Trump, U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee and U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw of Texas.

By June 2023, Bud Light was no longer the nation’s best-selling beer, falling behind Modelo Especial. The company that makes Bud Light, Anheuser-Busch, saw a 10% drop in revenue in the second quarter of 2023, which it attributed primarily to the conservative objections to a trans person being associated with the brand.

Would you like this dish less if you knew Barack Obama liked it?
LauriPatterson/E+ via Getty Images

Making the nonpolitical political

In our book, “The Power of Partisanship,” we document that partisanship – psychological attachments to one of the two major political parties – in America has drastically increased since the 1950s.

We have found that more Americans identify as strong partisans than ever. We have also found that people’s political preferences are increasingly driven by negative emotions about the other party.

As a result of this increased partisanship, political leaders have more power than ever to introduce new issues and ideas into the public discussion, and use them divisively – even topics that have nothing to do with politics. And leaders’ views affect those of the public.

We found that this partisan phenomenon extends to food. For instance, Donald Trump likes meatloaf and Barack Obama likes chili. We surveyed people and asked them about their political views and their food preferences. Some of them we told of Trump’s and Obama’s preferences, and some we did not.

Democrats whom we told that Trump likes meatloaf rated that dish significantly lower than Democrats whom we had not told of his preference. Likewise, Republicans we told about Obama’s preference for chili rated it less favorably than Republicans from whom we kept that information.

Would you like this meal less if you knew Donald Trump liked it?
bhofack2/iStock/Getty Images Plus

Menu planning

So, when it comes to planning your menu, our research offers some advice.

For a party of Democrats, chili – possibly with an arugula salad on the side – is a safe bet. But meatloaf would be a better choice for a party of Republicans. You could reinforce those choices by accompanying the dishes with photos of the politicians with their favorite dishes.

Other foods also divide Americans. Consider steering clear of Coca-Cola if you are having Republicans over: The company criticized Georgia’s 2021 law that shortened early voting and made it more difficult to vote by mail.

If you order takeout, some Democrats might be reluctant to eat Chick-fil-A because of company leaders’ past opposition to LGBTQ rights and marriage equality. But more recently, it’s Republicans who have criticized the fast-food chain for hiring an executive focused on diversity, equity and inclusion – and for shifting the company’s donations to be less political.

In general, we recommend doing a quick online search to make sure you are up on your social network’s preferences of the day. That’s the best way, though not guaranteed, to avoid serving up something that has recently become politicized by partisan media or party elites.

You might not be up for that much work. Or perhaps you are one of the few Americans left with friends who identify with both political parties.

A safe bet: People of all partisan stripes like lasagna.
JoeGough/iStock/Getty Images Plus

In that case, based on the research in our book, we suggest serving salmon or lasagna. Both are foods that appear to be resistant to partisan cues and are well-liked by members of both parties. Or maybe just throw a potluck, hope for the best, and you may even learn something new about your guests’ political views. Perhaps your guests will rise above partisanship and just enjoy the event.

The old advice to avoid talking about politics and religion in mixed company is evolving. For Americans, almost anything can be political now – from what’s on the table to what’s in the dresser or closet, and even what music we’re listening to.

When elites take positions, partisans follow their leaders. That means every cultural gathering, from the Thanksgiving table to the Super Bowl couch, can be invaded by political conflict. We don’t know about you, but we just want to watch the game. More

Rightwing populists appear to be enjoying a surge across the western world. For those who don’t support these parties, their appeal can be baffling and unsettling. They appear to play on people’s fears and offer somewhat trivial answers to difficult issues.

But the mathematics of human inference and cognition can help us understand what makes this a winning formula.

Because politics largely boils down to communication, the mathematics of communication theory can help us understand why voters are drawn to parties that use simple, loud messaging in their campaigning – as well as how they get away with using highly questionable messaging. Traditionally, this is the theory that enables us to listen to radio broadcasts and make telephone calls. But American mathematician Norbert Wiener went so far as to argue that social phenomena can only be understood via the theory of communication.

Wiener tried to explain different aspects of society by evoking a concept in science known as the second law of thermodynamics. In essence, this law says that over time, order will turn into disorder, or, in the present context, reliable information will be overwhelmed by confusion, uncertainties and noise. In mathematics, the degree of disorder is often measured by a quantity called entropy, so the second law can be rephrased by saying that over time, and on average, entropy will increase.

One of Wiener’s arguments is that as technologies for communication advance, people will circulate more and more inessential “noisy” information (think Twitter, Instagram and so on), which will overshadow facts and important ideas. This is becoming more pronounced with AI-generated disinformation.

The effect of the second law is significant in predicting the future form of society over a period of decades. But another aspect of communication theory also comes into play in the more immediate term.

When we analyse information about a topic of interest, we will reach a conclusion that leaves us, on average, with the smallest uncertainty about that topic. In other words, our thought process attempts to minimise entropy. This means, for instance, when two people with opposing views on a topic are presented with an article on that subject, they will often take away different interpretations of the same article, with each confirming the validity of their own initial view. The reason is simple: interpreting the article as questioning one’s opinion will inevitably raise uncertainty.

In psychology, this effect is known as confirmation bias. It is often interpreted as an irrational or illogical trait of our behaviour, but we now understand the science behind it by borrowing concepts from communication theory. I call this a “tenacious Bayesian” behaviour because it follows from the Bayes theorem of probability theory, which tells us how we should update our perspectives of the world as we digest noisy or uncertain information.

A corollary of this is that if someone has a strong belief in one scenario which happens to represent a false reality, then even if factual information is in circulation, it will take a long time for that person to change their belief. This is because a conversion from one certainty to another typically (but not always) requires a path that traverses uncertainties we instinctively try to avoid.

Polarised society

When the tenacious Bayesian effect is combined with Wiener’s second law, we can understand how society becomes polarised. The second law says there will be a lot of diverging information and noise around us, creating confusion and uncertainty. We are drawn to information that offers greater certainty, even if it is flawed.

Farage and Trump have hit on a winning formula.
Alamy/AP

For a binary issue, the greatest uncertainty happens when the two alternatives seem equally likely – and are therefore difficult to choose between. But for an individual person who believes in one of the two alternatives, the path of least uncertainty is to hold steady on that belief. So in a world in which any information can easily be disseminated far and wide but in which people are also immovable, society can easily be polarised.

Where are the leftwing populists?

If a society is maximally polarised, then we should find populists surging on both the left and right of the political spectrum. And yet that is not the case at the moment. The right is more dominant. The reason for this is, in part, that the left is not well-positioned to offer certainty. Why? Historically, socialism has rarely been implemented in running a country – not even the Soviet Union or China managed to implement it.

At least for now, the left (or centrists, for that matter) also seem a lot more cautious about knowingly offering unrealistic answers to complex problems. In contrast, the right offers (often false) certainty with confidence. It is not difficult to see that in a noisy environment, the loudest are heard the most.

Read more:
Why have authoritarianism and libertarianism merged? A political psychologist on ‘the vulnerability of the modern self’

Today’s politics plays out against a backdrop of uncertainties that include wars in Ukraine and Gaza with little prospect of exit strategies in sight; the continued cost of living crisis; energy, food and water insecurity; migration; and so on. Above all, the impact of the climate crisis.

The answer to this uncertainty, according to rightwing populists, is to blame everything on outsiders. Remove migrants and all problems will be solved – and all uncertainties eradicated. True or false, the message is simple and clear.

In conveying this message, it is important to instil in the public an exaggerated fear of the impact of migration, so their message will give people a false sense of certainty. What if there are no outsiders? Then create one. Use the culture war to label the “experts” (judges, scholars, etc.) as the enemy of the people.

For populists to thrive, society needs to be divided so that people can feel certain about where they belong – and so that those on the opposing side of the argument can be ignored.

The problem, of course, is that there are rarely simple solutions to complex issues. Indeed, a political party campaigning for a tough migration policy but weak climate measures is arguably enabling mass migration on a scale unseen in modern history, because climate change will make many parts of the world uninhabitable.

Wiener was already arguing in 1950 that we will pay the price for our actions at a time when it is most inconvenient to do so. Whatever needs to be done to solve complex societal issues, those who wish to implement what they believe are the right measures need to be aware that they have to win an election to do that – and that voters respond to simple and positive messages that will reduce the uncertainties hanging over their thoughts. More

Former US president George W Bush’s concept of an “axis of evil”, introduced in his 2002 State of the Union address, came to define the flawed foreign policy decisions of his years in power.

He used it to legitimise both the invasion of Iraq and the ensuing “war on terror”. Bush’s axis of evil included Iraq, Iran and North Korea. They were bound together as long-standing US adversaries, rendered as actively seeking weapons of mass destruction (WMD), and who, he argued, collectively posed a “grave and growing danger” as antagonist regimes capable of attacking the US and its allies.

Rolling into 2024, with a US presidential election on one side, and continuing geopolitical volatility from Ukraine to east Asia on the other, Republicans, in particular, have recently revived the term to explain concurrently the machinations of China, Russia, Iran and North Korea.

Clear and present danger?

The new “axis” however, operates on different principles, and its links to US policy are more tenuous.

First, the distinction between original axis countries, including long-standing US adversaries North Korea and Iran, and new additions China and Russia.

During the cold war, Russia and China were of great concern to the US. But during the Bush era, neither was regarded as constituting either the remote or proximate threat of that first axis. Grouping the four suggests that some in Washington feel that both China and Russia pose a significant enough challenge to both US and global systems to add them to a renewed axis of evil, rather than categorising them separately as individual belligerents.

Second, the perceived threat to the US arising from associations between each of the four members is uneven. Russia’s connections with Iran are long-standing and have been, mostly, tolerated by the US.

These links only become unpalatable, and worthy of including in an axis, when nations step over a particular line. Iran did so by helping Hamas plan the October 7 attack in Israel.

Russia and China are being included in the new definition of the axis of evil.
UPI/Alamy

Russia has been added to the axis list – after undertaking expansionist adventures so significant (by invading Ukraine) that it cannot be ignored. So for both Iran and Russia, magnitude of ambitions counts.

Neither Russia’s invasion of Georgia in 2008 nor Crimea in 2014 saw it consigned to a newfound axis of evil. It merely consolidated its status as a potential Eurasian rogue state.

It appears to be the risk of concerted collaboration between two or more axis members, and the combined threat that they represent that worries Washington. For example, former governor of South Carolina and presidential candidate Nikki Haley argued that “a win for Russia is a win for China”.

Third, the complexities of what the four have in common with each other remain unclear. What currently binds China and Russia together is their expansionist intent. But this differs from the historic willingness to stir up regional volatility exhibited by Iran and North Korea.

China stands opposed to such sabre-rattling from North Korea, while simultaneously undertaking plenty of its own regional expansion.

More interesting perhaps are the immense natural resources wielded by Russia and China, and to a lesser extent Iran. Russia and China make up enormous sections of Eurasia in terms of landmass, population and trading links binding their economies.

Does this suggest that the size, finances and natural resources of the new axis and its friends may allow it to become a semi-insulated trade and economic block? Probably not, but only while Russia’s current expansionist efforts remain at a standstill.

A post-conflict situation in Europe (assuming an end to the Ukraine war) will ultimately reset the sanctions regime against Russia, and – depending on Beijing’s peace-maker intentions – could facilitate warmer east-west relations.

Why revive the axis?

There are both drawbacks and benefits to resurrecting the idea of an “axis”. For supporters of the approach, the new axis provides policymakers with a convenient who’s who of adversaries. Assuming all four present a similar danger to the US, it gives a likely challenger for the presidency the chance to point at President Joe Biden’s foreign policy shortcomings.

While, unlike in Bush’s era, military interventions are probably not on the agenda, a more regionally targeted protectionist approach to “not try to do business with them” is more probable.

There is little of real value for US foreign policy in taking this approach. This uneven grab basket of anti-American villainy is reductivist at best, and cartoonish at worst. It suggests equivalences of power whether there are none, imagined ideological symmetry, and coordination incapable of surviving the short-term twists of four separate foreign policies.

The revival of the “axis” appears to be largely coming from Republicans, currently in charge of Congress, rather than the White House. But much may change in 2024 if they take over the presidency.

Like the original axis, the new grouping conflates power and ambition across states, muddies domestic objectives with regional support between two or more of the members, and suggests the need for a new global fistfight to defend democracy.

Rather than superficial attempts at suggesting basic enmity across four disparate nations, more important for the US ought to be a concern about Russia, China, Iran and North Korea’s long-standing preference for authoritarianism, and the ominous implications for their neighbouring states and regions. Alignment and agreements come and go. Entrenched authoritarianism, however, is hell to shift. More

Declarations of the end of an era are made only in exceptional circumstances. Henry Kissinger’s death is one of them.

Kissinger was born into a Jewish family in Germany, and fled to the US in 1938 after the Nazis seized power. He rose to one of the highest offices in the US government, and became the first person to serve as both secretary of state and national security adviser.

The 1973 Nobel Peace prize, which Kissinger shared with his North Vietnamese counterpart Le Duc Tho, recognised his contribution to the negotiations that ended the Vietnam war.

Kissinger advised a dozen US presidents, from Richard Nixon to Joe Biden. For advocates of realpolitik – a quintessentially pragmatic, utilitarian approach to foreign affairs – Kissinger was both author and master.

Across many years, his viewpoint remained largely unchanged: national security is the centrepiece of sovereignty, as both a means, and end in itself. From this perspective, Kissinger’s transformative diplomatic involvement in seminal events in the 20th century, and iconic insights in the 21st have shaped swathes of western geopolitics.

His fierce ambition was a key part of his vision, namely to rework the bipolar structure of the cold war, bent on establishing both US power, and arguably his own role in it.

Kissinger had no qualms backing the military dictatorship behind Indonesia’s invasion of East Timor in the 1970s. He supported the CIA in overthrowing president Salvador Allende of Chile in 1970, advocated sustained bombing in areas of North Vietnam, and encouraged the wiretapping of journalists critical of his Vietnam policy. He prioritised security over human rights, and commercial control over self-determination.

None of this was surprising. Kissinger’s entire approach to foreign policy was unsentimental at best, and brutish at worst. Peace, and the power to conclude a peace, could only be hewn coarsely from the unforgiving fibre of state relations, he believed.

To his critics, Kissinger’s actions in Vietnam, Chile, Indonesia and beyond significantly challenged his legacy of negotiation and diplomacy, and – in the eyes of some – were tantamount to war crimes.

Peacemaker or polariser?

Kissinger’s legacy will remain a mixed one. It incorporated truly ground-breaking efforts in opening up talks between the US with China and the Soviet Union, alongside visibly polarising outcomes for US foreign policy in its relations with South America and south-east Asia.

As secretary of state to presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, Kissinger’s geopolitical achievements established him as an elder statesman of the Republican Party. This rested on a trinity of endeavours: pulling the US out of the Vietnam War, establishing a host of new diplomatic connections between the US and China, and cultivating the first stages of détente (improved relations) with the Soviet Union.

Vietnam remains the most contentious of these areas, with accusations that Kissinger blithely applied bombing and destruction in Cambodia to extract the US from the Vietnam war. The peace was fragile and hostilities continued for years afterwards without the Americans.

Read more:
Henry Kissinger’s bombing campaign likely killed hundreds of thousands of Cambodians − and set path for the ravages of the Khmer Rouge

Nixon and China

Kissinger’s reputation is on sturdier grounds with the grand strategy to permanently open relations between the US and both China and the Soviet Union. This facilitated a reduction in east-west tensions that materially benefited the US. It also saw Kissinger effectively playing the two communist powers against each other.

Concentrated through the lens of the cold war, the majority of Kissinger’s interactions were based on an approach that balanced caution with aggression, and pragmatism with the acquisition of power.

This was sometimes directly, but often through the use of proxy wars, including Vietnam and the 1973 Yom Kippur War between Israel and Arab states, which descended into a power play with the Soviets, as did the 1971 India-Pakistan war. The image of Kissinger entirely comfortable with the high-stakes poker game between superpowers is an arresting one.

Post-cold war geopolitics did not diminish Kissinger’s overall approach. He counselled generations of US decision-makers to remember the virtues of allying with smaller states as well as superpowers for reasons of power and commerce, and a commitment to retain lethal force in the US foreign policy toolbox.

For scholars of international relations, Kissinger’s numerous books, from the iconic Diplomacy and Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy, to Leadership: Six Studies in World Strategy are an inventory of hard-headed views on the unrelenting demands of classic and modern statecraft and the challenges of crafting not just foreign policy, but grand strategy.

They are also a masterclass in European history, with a powerful message regarding sovereignty and the supreme role of the national interests in foreign policy, regionally and globally.

President Gerald Ford and Henry Kissinger in the grounds of the White House, Washington DC, August 16 1975.
Everett Collection/Alamy

Kissinger’s relentless dedication to realpolitik as the fiercest approach to managing international affairs is at odds with the many elements of his personality. Nowhere is this more evident than in his writing, with “characteristics ranging from brilliance and wit to sensitivity, melancholy, abrasiveness and savagery”.

Kissinger’s final impact is on the hardware and software of global diplomacy: guns versus ideas. A pragmatic, even cynical approach tackling the imbalance of power between states impelled Kissinger to promote seemingly paradoxical approaches: ground-breaking diplomatic approaches to ensure peace, easily reconciled with a ruthless reliance on military power.

This, in turn, gave his counterparts little option other than to cooperate, which they generally did, from the North Vietnamese to Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev, to China’s prime minister Zhou Enlai.

In his later years, seemingly immune to his foreign policy bungles, Kissinger’s celebrity diplomat status remained undimmed, somehow confirming the sense that international relations routinely transcends domestic politics, and in doing so, remains both a high stakes game, and a distinctive area of practice. His passion for foreign affairs never dimmed, commenting on the October 7 Hamas attack just a few weeks before his death.

For every one of Kissinger’s brilliant moves, there was a bungling countermove. Students of foreign policy need therefore to consider both Kissinger’s scholarship and his practice.

They should look through examples of his work in which one side seizes upon anything resembling a diplomatic opportunity, and commandeers its potential to produce a win, and then calls that a victory. Such victories however could be fleeting and left behind tensions that frequently came home to roost. More

Henry Kissinger was the ultimate champion of the United States’ foreign policy battles.

The former US secretary of state died on November 29 2023 after living for a century.

The magnitude of his influence on the geopolitics of the free world cannot be overstated.

From world war two, when he was an enlisted soldier in the US Army, to the end of the cold war, and even into the 21st century, he had a significant, sustained impact on global affairs.

Read more:
Kissinger at 100: his legacy might be mixed but his importance has been enormous

From Germany to the US and back again

Born in Germany in 1923, he came to the United States at age 15 as a refugee. He learned English as a teenager and his heavy German accent stayed with him until his death.

He attended George Washington High School in New York City before being drafted into the army and serving in his native Germany. Working in the intelligence corps, he identified Gestapo officers and worked to rid the country of Nazis. He won a Bronze Star.

Kissinger returned to the US and studied at Harvard before joining the university’s faculty. He advised moderate Republican New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller – a presidential aspirant – and became a world authority on nuclear weapons strategy.

When Rockefeller’s chief rival Richard Nixon prevailed in the 1968 primaries, Kissinger quickly switched to Nixon’s team.

A powerful role in the White House

In the Nixon White House, he became national security advisor and later simultaneously held the office of secretary of state. No one has held both roles at the same time since.

For Nixon, Kissinger’s diplomacy arranged the end of the Vietnam war and the pivot to China: two related and crucial events in the resolution of the cold war.

He won the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize for his Vietnam diplomacy, but was also condemned by the left as a war criminal for perceived US excesses during the conflict, including the bombing campaign in Cambodia, which likely killed hundreds of thousands of people.

That criticism survives him.

The pivot to China not only rearranged the global chessboard, but it also almost immediately changed the global conversation from the US defeat in Vietnam to a reinvigorated anti-Soviet alliance.

US President Richard Nixon congratulates Henry Kissinger on being awarded the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize.
Jim Palmer/AP

After Nixon was compelled to resign by the Watergate scandal, Kissinger served as secretary of state under Nixon’s successor, Gerald Ford.

During that brief, two-year administration, Kissinger’s stature and experience overshadowed the beleaguered Ford. Ford gladly handed over US foreign policy to Kissinger so he could focus on politics and running for election to the office for which the people had never selected him.

During the turbulent 1970s, Kissinger also achieved a kind of cult status.

Not classically attractive, his comfort with global power gave him a charisma that was noticed by Hollywood actresses and other celebrities. His romantic life was the topic of many gossip columns. He’s even quoted as saying “power is the ultimate aphrodisiac”.

His legacy in US foreign policy continued to grow after the Ford administration. He advised corporations, politicians and many other global leaders, often behind closed doors but also in public, testifying before congress well into his 90s.

Read more:
The Nobel Peace Prize offers no guarantee its winners actually create peace, or make it last

Criticism and condemnation

Criticism of Kissinger was and is harsh. Rolling Stone magazine’s obituary of Kissinger is headlined “War Criminal Beloved by America’s Ruling Class, Finally Dies”.

His association with US foreign policy during the divisive Vietnam years is a near-obsession for some critics, who cannot forgive his role in what they see as a corrupt Nixon administration carrying out terrible acts of war against the innocent people of Vietnam.

Kissinger’s critics see him as the ultimate personification of US realpolitik – willing to do anything for personal power or to advance his country’s goals on the world stage.

Former US Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, leaves behind a controversial legacy.
Shutterstock

But in my opinion, this interpretation is wrong.

Niall Ferguson’s 2011 biography, Kissinger, tells a very different story. In more than 1,000 pages, Ferguson details the impact that world war two had on the young Kissinger.

First fleeing from, then returning to fight against, an immoral regime showed the future US secretary of state that global power must be well-managed and ultimately used to advance the causes of democracy and individual freedom.

Whether he was advising Nixon on Vietnam war policy to set up plausible peace negotiations, or arranging the details of the opening to China to put the Soviet Union in checkmate, Kissinger’s eye was always on preserving and advancing the liberal humanitarian values of the West – and against the forces of totalitarianism and hatred.

The way he saw it, the only way to do this was to work for the primacy of the United States and its allies.

No one did more to advance this goal than Henry Kissinger. For that he will be both lionised and condemned.

Read more:
A tortured and deadly legacy: Kissinger and realpolitik in US foreign policy More

Hillary Clinton famously did not win the 2016 election and become the first female U.S. president. Yet Clinton’s presidential campaign still resonated with many women who have said it made them more likely to get involved in politics.

When women run for office, it can inspire other women and girls to become more politically active. Clinton, Vice President Kamala Harris, presidential candidate Nikki Haley and other high-profile female politicians have motivated women to follow in their footsteps and consider running for office.

It turns out that same sort of inspiration can happen when a female politician is not actually real, but instead is a character on a fictional TV show.

I am a scholar of political communication and media psychology. My research shows that when women watch a female lead character on a fictional political TV show, it can increase their interest in participating in politics and their belief that they can make a difference in the electoral process and results.

American women’s political engagement

Women run for office in the U.S. and serve in political positions less often than men. Only 28% of Congress and 24% of state governors are women. The U.S. ranks 86th among 152 countries when it comes to the number of women who serve in political office – and how long they hold those positions, according to the World Economic Forum.

With the exception of voting, women are less likely than men to participate in political activities. Compared with men, women often have less confidence in their abilities to understand politics.

The role model effect documents that women and girls become more encouraged to participate in politics when they see other women run for political office.

And my research team found that this role model effect can translate into fictional TV content as well.

When women see strong female lead characters in political TV shows, it can inspire them to vote or find other ways to get involved in politics.
Scott Olson/Getty Images

Connecting with TV characters

The fictional characters Alicia Florrick, Olivia Pope and Elizabeth McCord are examples of women whose political power exists only on TV.

Alicia Florrick, played by Julianna Margulies, worked as a Chicago-based lawyer before she eventually ran for Illinois state attorney general in CBS’s drama “The Good Wife,” which aired from 2009 until 2016.

Olivia Pope, played by Kerry Washington, worked as a high-profile political fixer and consultant on ABC’s political thriller series “Scandal,” which started in 2012 and ended in 2018.

Elizabeth McCord, played by Téa Leoni, regularly overcame political obstacles as U.S. secretary of state – and later as the first female U.S. president – on the CBS drama “Madam Secretary,” which ran from 2014 to 2019.

Each of these shows includes a woman lead character in a nonstereotypical role – a leader successfully tackling political problems.

When people watch these TV shows, they can feel a strong bond with their characters, a connection researchers call parasocial relationships. Viewers even use their attachments to TV characters to satisfy their need to feel connected with other people.

Sometimes, connecting with fictional characters – and seeing strong, female characters – can even spark viewers to become more involved in politics.

Inspiring political engagement

Two studies that I co-authored show how viewers’ connections with TV show characters influence their political engagement.

Political engagement can mean a range of things, including how closely someone follows news about the government and elections. Political engagement can also be someone feeling that they can make a difference in an election and that they have a say in what the government does. Political engagement can also include circulating a petition, attending a political rally or speech and, of course, voting.

We found that viewers formed strong bonds with these fictional women, and these connections persisted even after the credits rolled at the end of each episode.

In our first study on this topic in 2019, we surveyed people who watched one or more of three shows: “Madam Secretary,” “The Good Wife” and “Scandal.” When compared with individuals who watched less often, viewers who regularly watched one of these shows, who were mostly women, had particularly strong connections with that show’s lead female character. These bonds with the fictional character translated into viewers saying they had a growing interest in politics, feelings of making a difference in the election process and greater intentions to participate in politics.

In our second study from 2020, we collected data from people who were much less familiar with these shows. Participants in an experiment viewed a leading female character in “Madam Secretary,” or a leading male character in another show, with either a political- or family-focused plotline.

When compared with the other experimental conditions, participants who self-identified as more feminine, primarily women, experienced greater connections with the female lead character when she was shown in a plotline that addressed a political problem. That then increased their interest in politics, feelings of political self-efficacy and plans for political participation.

Importantly, our study concluded that merely seeing women as lead characters on TV is not enough to prompt women and girls to become more involved in politics. Instead, these women characters must be shown as a political leader.

A woman walks past a billboard promoting CBS’s ‘The Good Wife’ in 2009, shortly after the show’s release.
George Rose/Getty Images

More than just entertainment

Fictional television can influence viewers’ political attitudes and policy preferences. Political TV shows, in particular, can be both fun and thought-provoking for viewers.

Given the limited amount of nonstereotypical TV content featuring women, political TV shows with female lead characters may be particularly influential. Shows like “Madam Secretary,” “Scandal,” “The Good Wife” and, more recently, Netflix’s political drama “The Diplomat” all feature strong female characters with high-profile careers in politics, entertaining millions of viewers.

But these shows do more than just entertain their audiences. The power of a woman character leading a political TV show extends beyond viewership to real-world political engagement. More