American hegemony in a turbulent world: The Trump administration’s intervention in Venezuela and its threats against Iran are presented as demonstrations of restored American resolve. The reasoning is predictable: project strength, deter challengers, reassure allies. History offers little support for that claim. Nor do current power balances or the condition of American institutions. These actions do not shore up dominance. They expose its limits.
The US is no longer acting from a position of unquestioned authority. Fiscal strain is visible, institutional credibility has weakened, and consent abroad is thinner than it once was. In such circumstances, coercion becomes attractive. It also becomes less effective.
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Power without consent does not endure
At its height, American hegemony relied less on force than on acceptance. Alliances endured because they worked. Markets stayed open because rules were broadly trusted. Institutions built after 1945 created predictability, and Washington benefited precisely because it restrained itself within that framework.
That order began to loosen after the Cold War. The use of force against Venezuela, justified through unilateral legal claims and revived hemispheric doctrines, marks a further departure. It signals that sovereignty is negotiable and that rules apply selectively. Smaller states may respond cautiously, but caution should not be misread as endorsement.
Many governments have already adapted to this shift. Faced with tariff threats and withdrawals from multilateral arrangements, they did not retaliate. They adjusted. Trade was diversified. Financial exposure was reduced. Alternative channels were built quietly. The United States’ share of global exports has fallen below a tenth. India’s recent trade data shows a deliberate effort to spread risk rather than absorb shocks. Hegemony rests on choice. Fear can delay exit. It cannot prevent it.
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Venezuela exposes limits of coercive success
Venezuela illustrates the limits of coercive success. The country’s collapse owes more to institutional decay, sanctions errors, and political fragmentation than to any single external action. Removing a leader does not reconstruct a state. Tactical clarity does not translate into strategic gain.
The US has learned this before. Iraq and Afghanistan demonstrated how regime change creates vacuums that absorb resources and corrode legitimacy. There is no obvious reason Venezuela should prove an exception.
Leadership removal leaves the oil sector politicised, armed groups entrenched, and governance unresolved. External rivals may lose assets, but they gain something more durable: a narrative in which American hegemony appears extractive rather than stabilising. That story finds receptive audiences across the Global South, where memory of past interventions remains intact.
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Threatening Iran raises costs
Iran poses a different problem, but Washington’s method is familiar. Military threats are intended to coerce restraint on nuclear and regional behaviour. They have not done so in the past.
Iranian policy is shaped by regime survival. External pressure strengthens hardliners and validates escalation through proxies. The collapse of the nuclear agreement did not produce compliance. Enrichment expanded. Regional tensions sharpened. Diplomatic leverage narrowed.
The costs extend beyond the immediate theatre. Energy markets now transmit geopolitical risk faster and with greater volatility. Conflict threats raise oil premiums without offering a credible route back to stability. Allies bear those costs despite having little influence over the decisions that generate them. That is not how leadership is sustained.
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American hegemony amid policy uncertainty
External power depends on domestic foundations. Here, the United States is constrained. Public debt exceeds 120 per cent of GDP. Interest payments now outstrip defence spending. Fiscal projections show limited room for manoeuvre. Policy uncertainty has increased as tariffs are imposed and reversed with little notice.
Unpredictability weakens investment and strains alliances. Long-term influence rests on institutions and the rule of law. When foreign policy becomes transactional and coercive, confidence erodes on both fronts.
The global response has been adjustment rather than alignment. Trade integration outside US-centric frameworks continues. Regional agreements deepen. Payment systems diversify. Energy supply chains are reworked. This is not opposition. It is insurance.
Countries are learning to deal with a powerful but unreliable United States. That condition does not describe hegemony. It describes managed distance. Empires rarely decline because they lose battles. They decline when others quietly plan around them.
The US still possesses formidable assets: military reach, technological depth, financial scale. These can support leadership. They cannot replace legitimacy. Washington’s choices are narrowing, shaped as much by domestic constraint as by external rivalry. It can rebuild influence through institutions, alliances, and predictability. Or it can continue with episodic displays of force that confirm fears of arbitrariness. The distinction matters. The outcome follows.