Transatlantic Traumas

Recent developments in transatlantic relations have challenged the common interests of long-standing transatlantic allies. This book examines how these developments may affect the very future of the West and its leading institutions, NATO and the European Union. In 2016-17 three shocks to the transatlantic community raised widespread concern: Brexit - the British referendum in which a slim majority of voters supported leaving the European Union; the US election of Donald Trump - a president critical of NATO and the EU; and the strengthening of illiberal tendencies in Turkey under President Erdogan - raising questions about Turkey's democratic credentials and position as a NATO member. Transatlantic traumas examines the corrosive interaction between internal challenges, such as the growing illiberalism seen in the rise of radical right populist parties, and external threats from Russia and the Islamic State. It looks at the political, economic and security foundations of the transatlantic community and asks whether the West can recover from the blows of recent years. It concludes by suggesting that the West can be reinvigorated if the political centres in Europe and the United States will reassert themselves in an approach the author calls 'radical centrist populism'.