From Jérôme Fenoglio (Director of Le Monde)

Editorial du « Monde » Anger has won the day, populist rage has triumphed. A billionaire of dubious character who has not paid his taxes for 20 years ; who lies through his teeth and flirts openly with racism, xenophobia and sexism; who has never held public or elected office of any kind; crystallised this sentiment brilliantly. The Republican Donald Trump will become the 45th president of the United States and move into the White House on January 20th.

The country that elected Barack Obama in 2008 and in 2012, the first African American in the White House and a Harvard graduate, has just crowned an property magnate ridden with flaws and who flaunts his ’good’ European genes. This is the mood today in America, and also in the rest of the Western World. Hillary Clinton is not the only loser in this election. A great wave of protest is unfurling over the traditional elites on both sides of the Atlantic.

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump speaks at a campaign event in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, U.S., July 25, 2016. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY - RTSJMG1 | Carlo Allegri / Reuters

Donald Trump’s election is an earthquake, a game changer for Western democracy. Like the fall of the Berlin Wall and 9/11, this event marks the beginning of a new world where only one thing is certain: in this new place, everything that was once thought impossible, or unrealistic, is now conceivable. Each country is different, but the anger common in every one is rooted in a broad fear of globalisation that focuses on two themes: immigration control and income inequality. The British cast their Brexit votes with those in mind. Trump predicted his victory would be a ’Brexit times ten’. He was right. And this is also a way of saying that Europe is not protected from the seismic shift that has just shaken Washington to the core.

Obama failed to unite a divided country

One could say the result of the US election on November 8^th - after which the Republicains keep control of the Congress - is first and foremost an American issue. During his two terms in office, Barack Obama achieved good results with his domestic policy. He inherited a disastrous economy from his predecessor George W. Bush, and he improved it: unemployment has slipped to below 5%, economic growth is higher than the European average, the country’s public finances are healthier, public healthcare has been considerably expanded, the motor industry has been resuscitated and the High Tech industry is more dominant that ever. Strange as though it may seem on this triumphant day for the Republicans, Barack Obama is popular among the Amercian people. But his achievements and high popularity ratings appear to have given him no hold on what is going on in the country.

Obama failed to do the one thing that was expected of him: unite a divided nation. He was unable - or did not no how – to mend the old racial fracture. Black voters did not turn out en masse to vote for Clinton. Nor did he allay new fears over growing inequality born out of the globalisation of trade and the technological revolution. On this point, Trump was right. He said fighting this the challenge would take a generation and not just two presidential terms.

In this context, Trump has shown diabolically intelligent political. He was able to embody a new kind of leader to go against his own party, then against his democratic opponent. He was able to take on the role of a new man who was not part of the political elites who have been discredited by two catastrophes that deeply marked the American people: the war in Iraq and the financial crisis in 2008. Never mind that these were largely a result of Republican policies.

Before Trump and Bernie Sanders - Hillary Clinton’s unsuccessful opponent - nobody spoke for those who have been left behind by globalisation. Nobody was punished for the devastation created by Wall Street. Nobody foresaw the consequences of a type of growth that hurts the middle class in so many ways. Donald Trump did, by choosing three scapegoats: immigrants, free-trade and the elites. He knew exactly how to channel the worries of the white American population which may soon be overtaken by the country’s total ethnic minorities.

Unfortunately for her, Hillary Cinton embodied perfectly the quintessence of the American political elite. Rightly or wrongly, her image reflected the status quo – despite her having the most solid and achievable programme. There are many lessons to be learned from this election. Traditional political parties must take heed. So must the media and the pollsters, who for the most part, did not predict this outcome and no longer know how to gauge public opinion. These lessons are all the more vital because those who represent the voices of protest anger, whether it be Trump or his European clones, have no idea how to solve these complex problems. They sell illusions, and Trump is the master illusionnist. They live off simplistic arguments which threaten our democracies. From Paris, Trump’s victory coming after Brexit is another prescient warning. In this new post-election world everything is possible. The prospect that we in France are still unable to look at in the eye looms: the rise to power of the far right.

(Traduit du français par Emilie King)