A Shattering Blow to America’s Troubled Democratic Image

PARIS — The choreography was uncommon: President Emmanuel Macron of France, standing earlier than the Stars and Stripes, declaring in English that “We believe in the strength of our democracies. We believe in the strength of American democracy.”

And so the presidency of Donald Trump attracts to a detailed with a French chief obliged to declare his religion within the resilience of American democracy, a exceptional growth. Mr. Macron’s wider level was clear sufficient: The mob of Trump loyalists in Washington trying to disrupt the peaceable transition of American energy additionally posed a menace to all democracies.

The fame of the United States could also be tarnished, however its identification with the worldwide protection of democracy stays singular. So, when an indignant horde, incited by President Trump himself, was seen taking on the Capitol, defiling its sacred chambers with swaggering contempt as lawmakers gathered to certify President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s victory, the fragility of freedom felt palpable in Paris and the world over.

“A universal idea — that of ‘one person, one vote’ — is undermined,” Mr. Macron stated in an handle than started in French and resulted in English. It was the “temple of American democracy” that had been attacked.

The establishments of democracy prevailed within the early hours of the next morning, however the photographs of mob rule in Washington touched a selected nerve in fractured Western societies. They have been confronted with the emergence of an intolerant authoritarian mannequin in Hungary and Poland, and the rise of rightist political forces from Italy to Germany. They have additionally confronted the truculence of leaders like President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, who has declared liberalism “obsolete,” or Xi Jinping, China’s prime chief, who has provided his nation’s surveillance-state mannequin to the world as he crushed democratic protest in Hong Kong.

“For European societies, these were shattering images,” stated Jacques Rupnik, a political scientist. “Even if America was no longer the beacon on a hill, it was still the pillar that sustained European democracy and extended it eastward after the Cold War.”

Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany stated she was “angry and sad.” She blamed Mr. Trump unequivocally for the storming of the Capitol that left one girl lifeless. “Doubts about the election outcome were stoked and created the atmosphere that made the events of last night possible,” she stated.

Germans, for whom the United States was postwar savior, protector and liberal democratic mannequin, have noticed Mr. Trump’s makes an attempt to subvert the democratic course of and rule of legislation with specific dismay.

Their anxiousness has been accentuated lately as a result of the fraying of democracy via polarization, violence, social breakdown and financial hardship has not been confined to the United States. The coronavirus pandemic has sharpened anxieties and distrust of presidency. In this context, the mob stampeding via the Capitol appeared to replicate disruptive forces lurking in lots of elements of the Western world.

If it might occur at democracy’s coronary heart, it might occur anyplace.

Last yr, as battles over racial justice raged in a number of American cities, the German weekly journal Der Spiegel portrayed Mr. Trump within the Oval Office with a lighted match and referred to as him “Der Feuerteufel,” or actually, “The Fire Devil.”

The message was clear: The American president was taking part in with hearth. This might solely stir German recollections of the Reichstag hearth of 1933 that enabled Hitler and the Nazis to scrap the delicate Weimar democracy that introduced them to energy.

Painful reminiscence has not been confined to Germany. Throughout a lot of Europe — a continent the place totalitarian rule will not be some distant specter, however one thing folks alive immediately have lived — Mr. Trump’s assaults on an unbiased judiciary, a free press and the sanctity of the poll have been lengthy seen as ominous.

Ms. Merkel herself began life in Communist East Germany. She has watched because the post-1989 euphoria over the inevitability of a free democratic world has evaporated, deflated by the rise of authoritarian governments. Mr. Trump, attacking foundations of that world like NATO or the European Union, usually appeared to wish to tilt the world in the identical intolerant path.

He has been defeated. American establishments have withstood the mayhem. Mr. Biden’s victory was duly licensed by Congress as soon as order was restored.

Vice President Mike Pence, whom Mr. Trump had tried to enlist in his effort to overturn the November election end result, affirmed Mr. Biden because the winner. Mr. Trump issued an announcement saying, for the primary time, that there shall be “an orderly transition on January 20th.” Two victories in Senate races in Georgia ensured that Democrats will management the Senate, a stinging closing rebuke to Mr. Trump that opens the way in which for the brand new president to pursue his agenda.

So, all is effectively in spite of everything? Not actually. The American concept and American values — democracy, the rule of legislation, the protection of human rights — have suffered a sustained assault throughout Mr. Trump’s presidency. Mr. Rupnik recommended it will be “very difficult” for Mr. Biden to challenge America as “the convener of a community of democracies,” an concept the incoming administration has aired to sign a return to America’s core ideas.

For a while, the remainder of the world will look on the United States with skepticism when it seeks to advertise democratic values. The photographs of the overrun Capitol shall be there, for individuals who wish to use them, to make the purpose that America can be finest suggested to keep away from giving classes within the train of freedom. Dictators of the onerous and smooth selection have new and potent ammunition.

“Democracy Fractured,” was the banner headline within the French each day Le Figaro, above {a photograph} of the Capitol below siege. An editorial recommended that Mr. Trump may need left workplace with “a contested but not negligible balance sheet.” Instead, “his narcissism having overcome any dignity, he manhandled institutions, trampled on democracy, divided his own camp and ends his presidency in a ditch.”

There have been indicators that Mr. Trump’s magnetism is already ebbing. The Czech prime minister, Andrej Babis, a supporter of Mr. Trump, promptly modified his Twitter profile image from one displaying him carrying a MAGA-style pink baseball cap with the phrases ‘Silné Česko’ (Strong Czech Republic), to 1 that exhibits him carrying a face masks with the Czech flag.

The Washington turmoil illustrated in the long run that the United States is larger than one man, some extent Mr. Macron appeared intent on making. He alluded to joint American and French help for freedom and democracy because the 18th century. He talked about Alexis de Tocqueville’s reward of American democracy. He spoke of American protection of French freedom throughout two World Wars.

Mr. Macron’s message appeared clear. The America of “We the People,” the America that held it self-evident at its creation that “all men are created equal,” was nonetheless wanted, and urgently, for “our common struggle to ensure that our democracies emerge from this moment that we are all living through even stronger.”