European capitals have welcomed Joe Biden’s proposed foreign policy team — but despite widespread relief at President Donald Trump’s impending departure, the EU is already gearing up for further transatlantic battles.
While European officials look forward to better relations on issues such as world health and global warming, they are braced for tough talks on contentious subjects including data protection, tech companies’ power and trade.
Even as Europeans look forward to less abrasive rhetoric and a greater appetite for co-operation in Washington, many observers point to structural tensions in the alliance they think are bigger than Mr Trump.
“There will be a number of easy wins and enhanced co-operation on climate, the pandemic and remedying some of the offences of the past four years,” said Kristine Berzina, a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. “But there are real dangers that disagreements on issues like data privacy and digital taxation will make it more difficult to get agreements on other issues that are very important for both the US and Europe — particularly China.”
Mr Biden this week announced big proposed foreign policy appointments including, as his nominee for secretary of state, Antony Blinken, a former deputy national security adviser who speaks excellent French. John Kerry, who dealt closely with the Europeans as President Barack Obama’s secretary of state and speaks good French, is nominated special presidential envoy on climate.
Gérard Araud, who was Paris’s ambassador to Washington until last year, proclaimed on Twitter that it was set to be “the most French-speaking administration in history”.
On the economic front, Janet Yellen, Mr Biden’s likely nominee for Treasury secretary, has deep experience with international bodies such as the Basel Committee via her participation as a former Federal Reserve chair and governor.
But beneath the prospect of more multilateralism and better mood music emanating from Washington, there is also an acknowledgment in Europe that areas of fundamental disagreement exist. Longstanding US pressure for the EU to take more responsibility for its own security and crises in regions surrounding the bloc are unlikely to let up.
EU foreign ministers are due to discuss transatlantic relations at a meeting on December 7 and it may also make it on to the agenda of leaders at their regular summit planned for later that week.
“It’s good that we will have a more professional and predictable president and team around him,” said one EU diplomat. “But we should be under no illusions that this will be an easy ride.”
Top EU officials have publicly outlined what they see as likely pressure points after the change of US administration.
In a speech to EU ambassadors this month Ursula von der Leyen, European Commission president, warned that “some shifts in priorities and perceptions run much deeper than one politician or administration” and would not “disappear because of one election”.
She called for the EU to “take the initiative” and partner with the US and others to write a “rule book for the digital economy and society covering everything, from Big Tech to data use and privacy, from infrastructure to security”.
Ms von der Leyen also urged “global partners” to “raise their standards” to deal with the economic power of tech companies. While the EU would continue to push for a “consensus-based solution at the OECD and G20 level” on fair tech company taxation, Europe would “act” if one was not reached by the deadline of mid-2021, she said.
Brussels also wants to reduce trade tensions that, during the Trump era, have led to imports of European steel being branded a national security threat and to sabre-rattling about EU-made cars potentially being hit with additional duties.
But the EU has yet to find common ground with Washington on how to reform the World Trade Organization’s dispute-settlement system in a way that would address US concerns about activist judges. A US policy of blocking judicial appointments has led to the partial shutdown of the system.
The EU is also still locked in a 16-year legal dispute with the US over aircraft subsidies that has led to products as varied as French wine and US ornamental fish being hit with punitive tariffs — although both sides have said they want to resolve the matter.
China will also be a potential point of contention as the EU tries to reconcile a generally hawkish US approach that crosses the political spectrum with its own more shaded strategy of co-operation, competition and rivalry with Beijing.
Josep Borrell, the EU’s foreign policy chief, acknowledged this month the bipartisan support in Washington for a “coherent and robust China stance”. He pointed to a new US-EU dialogue on China launched last month as the vehicle to discuss “with renewed energy” matters such as allegedly unfair trade practices and security risks.
David O’Sullivan, a former top EU official who was ambassador to the US from 2014-19, said Beijing’s growing power should bring needed focus to a sense of shared interests on both sides of the Atlantic.
“Deep differences with the Trump administration led almost inevitably to confrontation,” he added. “Deep differences with the Biden administration will create tension but people will always be conscious of the bigger context: that we have more in common with each other than with anybody else.”