Great Power Imperialism or Democratic Global Governance?

Lawrence Wittner

December 19, 2025

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Image by Javier Miranda.

Pundits frequently remark on the warm and friendly relationship between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. In explanation, some suggest that Putin possesses compromising material on Trump. Others point to their autocratic style and their rightwing agendas.

But another factor plays a role in the Putin-Trump bromance: their embrace of great power imperialism.

For example, their aggressive policies toward Ukraine and Venezuela are remarkably similar. Putin began his takeover of Ukraine by charging that its government was controlled by “fascists” and, moreover, that its closer relations with Western Europe would irreparably damage Russian national security. Similarly, Trump has sought to overturn the Venezuelan government, arguing that it is controlled by drug traffickers and represents a significant menace to U.S. national security.

In fact, both national leaders seem to be driven by more traditional concerns. Before Ukraine’s recent independence, that land, for centuries, had been part of the Russian empire, and, through reconquest, Putin has sought to restore Russia’s imperial glory. As for Trump, the flimsiness of the drug trafficking charges and his obsession with military power and fossil fuels suggest that he is primarily concerned with using military power to oust a stubbornly independent regime and, thereby, gain control of Venezuela’s oil reserves, the largest in the world.

Both Putin and Trump began gradually with a display of vast military might, hoping to intimidate these smaller nations and secure their goals. When Ukraine resisted capitulation, a full-scale invasion ensued. The same pattern appears to be playing out in U.S. relations with Venezuela.

Meanwhile, like sophisticated mob bosses, Trump and Putin are attempting to avoid conflict with one another by staking out different territory.

In accord with this approach, the Trump administration’s official National Security Strategy, released on December 4, promotes an arrangement for the two great powers to focus on separate imperial spheres. Avoiding any suggestion that Russia is a threat to the United States, the document instead criticizes European officials for blocking U.S. efforts to end the Ukraine War on terms advanced by Putin. It also prioritizes reestablishing “strategic stability with Russia.” Europeans, it adds disparagingly, face “civilizational erasure” thanks to the immigration of non-white people, and should support Europe’s rightwing, “patriotic” parties, which follow the Russian line on European affairs.

Having more or less abandoned Europe to the Russian imperium, the Trump National Security Strategy allocates Latin America to the United States. Invoking what it calls the “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine, the document declares that “the United States must be preeminent in the Western Hemisphere as a condition of our security and prosperity―a condition that allows us to assert ourselves confidently where and when we need to in the region.” This assertion, the document explains, includes the use of “lethal force.”

Naturally, the Russian government is pleased by Trump’s new National Security Strategy. “The adjustments we’re seeing . . . are largely consistent with our vision,” declared the Russian regime’s official spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov. “We consider this a positive step.”

Thus far, the Venezuelan conflict, like its Ukrainian counterpart, is being managed within this collaborative framework. Although the Russian government has provided substantial military aid to the Maduro government in the past, it has rejected Maduro’s more recent and pressing request for military hardware to fend off a U.S. military invasion. Instead, Russian support for the embattled regime has been reduced to statements, by lower-level officials, expressing alarm and concern. “We hope that the Trump administration will refrain from further escalating the situation,” observed Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister on December 7, and “we urge it to do so.”

The tepid nature of this support for Venezuela might reflect Russia’s preoccupation with the demands of its military invasion of Ukraine. But it might also result from Putin’s acceptance of the Trump administration’s proposal that, when it comes to empire, the Western Hemisphere belongs to the United States, while Europe belongs to Russia.

Of course, this relapse into the crude great power imperialism of the past comes as a shock to a world that has witnessed the gradual development of international law and attempts at its enforcement. Are we really condemned to live on a planet where military might makes right?

Not necessarily, for there is an alternative for coping with the stormy world of international relations: democratic global governance.

Nations have been working to develop a less violent, more equitable world for more than a century and, as a result, there are now international institutions in existence that have begun the slow, painstaking process of building it. These include the United Nations, the International Court of Justice, and the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Now, given the revival of retrograde behavior, it’s necessary to empower them further.

A key measure along these lines would be to break the disproportionate influence of the great powers in the UN Security Council. Article 109 of the UN Charter provides a procedure for amendments through convening a Charter Review Conference. This conference could democratize international security operations by ending or modifying the veto in the Security Council. Or it could simply abolish the Security Council and transfer its responsibilities to the General Assembly, where majority rule prevails.

Other reform measures include adding a UN Parliamentary Assembly, with representatives chosen by the people rather than by governments, and increasing the jurisdiction and use of the International Court of Justice.

Democratic global governance could also be enhanced by increasing the number of countries ratifying the Rome Statute of the ICC. At present, only 125 nations are parties to the ICC, with some of the most powerful, such as the United States, Russia, China, India, and Israel, remaining holdouts―one additional illustration of how the great powers manage to operate with impunity in the realm of international affairs.

Great power imperialism can be ended. But it will take a major effort on the part of people and nations.

Dr. Lawrence Wittner is Professor of History emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press.)

Even With Trump’s Support, Coal Power Remains Expensive and Dangerous

Hannah Wiseman – Seth Blumsack

December 19, 2025

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Clifty Coal Power Plant, Madison, Indiana. Photo: Jeffrey St. Clair.

As projections of U.S. electricity demand rise sharply, President Donald Trump is looking to coal – historically a dominant force in the U.S. energy economy – as a key part of the solution.

In an April 2025 executive order, for instance, Trump used emergency powers to direct the Department of Energy to order the owners of coal-fired power plants that were slated to be shut down to keep the plants running.

He also directed federal agencies to “identify coal resources on Federal lands” and ease the process for leasing and mining coal on those lands. In addition, he issued orders to exclude coal-related projects from environmental reviews, promote coal exports and potentially subsidize the production of coal as a national security resource.

But there remain limits to the president’s power to slow the declining use of coal in the U.S. And while efforts continue to overcome these limits and prop up coal, mining coal remains an ongoing danger to workers: In 2025, there have been five coal-mining deaths in West Virginia and at least two others elsewhere in the U.S.

A long legacy

Until 2015, coal-fired power plants generated more electricity than any other type of fuel in the U.S. But with the rapid expansion of a new type of hydraulic fracturing, natural gas became a cheap and stable source for power generation. The prices of solar and wind power also dropped steadily. These alternatives ultimately overcame coal in the U.S. power supply.

Before this change, coal mining defined the economy and culture of many U.S. towns – and some states and regions, such as Wyoming and Appalachia – for decades. And in many small towns, coal-related businesses, including power plants, were key employers.

Coal has both benefits and drawbacks. It provides a reliable fuel source for electricity that can be piled up on-site at power plants without needing a tank or underground facility for storage.

But it’s dirty: Thousands of coal miners developed a disease called black lung. The federal government pays for medical care for some sick miners and makes monthly payments to family members of miners who die prematurely. Burning coal also emits multiple air pollutants, prematurely killing half a million people in the United States from 1999 through 2020.

Coal is dangerous for workers, too. Some coal-mining companies have had abysmal safety records, leading to miner deaths, such as the recent drowning of a miner in a sudden flood in a West Virginia mine. Safety reforms have been implemented since the Big Branch Mine explosion in 2010, and coal miner deaths in the U.S. have since declined. But coal mining remains a hazardous job.

A champion of coal

In both of his terms, Trump has championed the revival of coal. In 2017, for example, Trump’s Department of Energy asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to pay coal and nuclear plants higher rates than the competitive market would pay, saying they were key to keeping the U.S. electricity grid running. The commission declined.

In his second term, Trump is more broadly using powers granted to the president in emergencies, and he is seeking to subsidize coal across the board – in mining, power plants and exports.

At least some of the urgency is coming from the rapid construction of data centers for artificial intelligence, which the Trump administration champions. Many individual data centers use as much power as a small or medium city. There’s enough generation capacity to power them, though only by activating power plants that are idle most of the time and that operate only during peak demand periods. Using those plants would require data centers to reduce their electricity use during those peaks – which it’s not clear they would agree to do.

So many data centers, desperate for 24/7 electricity, are relying on old coal-fired power plants – buying electricity from plants that otherwise would be shutting down.

Limits remain

Despite the Trump adminstration’s efforts to rapidly expand data centers and coal to power them, coal is more expensive than most other fuels for power generation, with costs still rising.

Half of U.S. coal mines have closed within the past two decades, and productivity at the remaining mines is declining due to a variety of factors, such as rising mining costs, environmental regulation and competition from cheaper sources. Coal exports have also seen declines in the midst of the tariff wars.

The U.S. Department of the Interior’s recent effort to follow Trump’s orders and lease more coal on federal lands received only one bid – at a historically low price of less than a penny per ton. But in fact, even if the government gave its coal away for free, it would still make more economic sense for utilities to build power plants that use other fuels. This is due to the high cost of running old coal plants as compared to new natural gas and renewable infrastructure.

Natural gas is cheaper – and, in some places, so are renewable energy and battery storage. Government efforts to prevent the retirement of coal-fired power plants and boost the demand for coal may slow coal’s decline in the short term. In the long term, however, coal faces a very uncertain future as a part of the U.S. electricity mix.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Hannah Wiseman is Professor of Law at Penn State. Seth Blumsack is Professor of Energy and Environmental Economics and International Affairs at Penn State.