This is the ninth and final article in a nine-part series examining the principles that guide the Centercratic Party and the conditions that make American self-government possible. The eight principles examined before this one have addressed the structural guardrails of democracy, how elections and courts and institutions are supposed to function, and the norms of principled leadership: governing honestly, defending freedom, building consensus. Principle #9 is the capstone. That principle rests on two foundational pillars of democratic theory: the shared commitment to democracy that gives America’s role in the world its moral authority, and the vibrant civil society and independent information that define the version of America the world either admires or doubts.3
Principle 9: Demonstrate American and democratic values through dignified, restrained, and humane leadership at home and abroad.2
In the spring of 1947, the United States faced a choice. Europe lay in ruins after six years of war. The Soviet Union was extending its influence westward. The temptation to pull back, to let Europe solve its own problems, to concentrate American resources at home, was real and politically popular. Instead, Secretary of State George Marshall stood before the graduating class at Harvard University and proposed something historically unprecedented: that the wealthiest nation on earth would spend roughly $13 billion, the equivalent of about $140 billion today, to rebuild the economies of the nations it had just helped defeat, not as a condition of surrender, but as an act of strategic generosity grounded in the belief that stable, prosperous democracies were better neighbors than desperate, unstable ones.1 The Marshall Plan worked. It rebuilt Western Europe, created the architecture of transatlantic cooperation that endures today, and generated more goodwill toward the United States than any military victory in the preceding century. It worked not because America was the most powerful country in the world, but because it chose to use that power in a way that others found worth following.
What Democratic Theory Says About Leading by Example
Political scientists who study how democracy spreads and survives, have reached a consistent finding: democratic values do not travel primarily through military force. They travel through demonstration. Harvard political scientist Joseph Nye coined the term “soft power” to describe the ability to attract and persuade rather than coerce, and he identified three sources of it: a nation’s culture, its political values as it actually practices them, and its foreign policy when it is seen as legitimate and morally consistent.4 When any of those three sources is undermined, soft power erodes, and the burden shifts to harder and more expensive instruments.
Pillar 9 of the nine-pillar framework for democratic governance holds that a consolidated democracy requires the overwhelming majority of citizens, elites, and organized groups to genuinely accept democratic procedures as the only legitimate path to power.3 Linz and Stepan’s formulation is precise: democracy is only truly consolidated when it has become “the only game in town,” not merely as a legal fact but as a behavioral and attitudinal reality. The relevance to global leadership is direct. The United States cannot credibly argue that democracy is the best form of governance while simultaneously undermining the democratic norms at home that give that argument its force. Pillar 6, which covers vibrant civil society and independent information, identifies freedom of expression and access to alternative information as procedural prerequisites for democracy, not optional additions.3 When the United States restricts those freedoms domestically, or tolerates their restriction, it weakens the claim that it stands for anything other than the interests of whoever holds power.
The Data on Where Things Stand
The Brand Finance Global Soft Power Index 2026, which measures the soft power of 193 nation brands across 100 countries, recorded the steepest overall score decline of any nation for the United States.5 The U.S. score fell 4.6 points to 74.9 out of 100, with declines across every metric except familiarity. The reputation subcategory fell 11 ranks. Specific attribute scores dropped sharply: generosity fell 68 points, good relations with other countries fell 50 points, friendliness fell 32 points, human rights and rule of law fell 10 points.5
The Gallup World Poll for 2025 added a specific data point that had not been recorded in nearly 20 years: China surpassed the United States in global leadership approval.6 China’s median global approval was 36 percent; the United States stood at 31 percent. U.S. approval had fallen eight points in a single year, from 39 percent in 2024 to 31 percent in 2025. U.S. disapproval of global leadership reached a record high of 48 percent.6 Approval of U.S. leadership declined by 10 points or more in 44 countries between 2024 and 2025. The declines were concentrated among U.S. allies. The Democracy Perception Index for 2025, which surveyed more than 110,000 respondents across 100 countries, found that 55 percent of surveyed nations now hold negative views of the United States.7
The foreign aid picture is equally stark. The OECD’s preliminary findings for 2025 document that international development assistance from member nations declined by approximately 23 percent in a single year, the largest annual decline since the OECD began tracking these figures. The United States accounted for three-quarters of that decline. U.S. official development assistance fell from approximately $63 billion in 2024 to just under $29 billion in 2025, a 57 percent drop, following the dismantling of USAID.8 The Lancet study that accompanied these findings estimated that current trends in development funding could be associated with more than 9.4 million additional deaths by 2030.9
It is also necessary to say plainly that the problem predates any single administration. The Obama administration’s failure to close Guantanamo, despite a public commitment to do so, handed adversaries a decade of ready-made propaganda. The Bush administration’s decision to authorize enhanced interrogation techniques, later documented by the Senate Intelligence Committee, damaged American credibility on human rights in ways that persisted long after the policy ended. The Democratic Party’s tendency to use foreign policy language about values while supporting transactional relationships with authoritarian governments undermines the very argument it claims to make. These are not partisan failures. They are institutional failures that Principle 9 is specifically designed to address.
What the 45 Percent Are Saying
The data on what American voters, and particularly independent voters, actually believe about global leadership is more consistent than the political debate suggests. A 2024 U.S. Global Leadership Coalition poll found that at least 8 in 10 Americans say the United States should play a leading or major role on the global stage.10 More than 8 in 10 say the U.S. should invest in a smart balance of diplomacy and global development alongside a strong defense.10
On foreign aid specifically, the Pew Research Center survey from 2025 found that 83 percent of Americans support providing medicine and medical supplies to people in developing countries, and 78 percent support providing food and clothing.11 An Oxfam America survey from the same year found that 2 out of 3 Americans do not support the Trump administration’s 85 percent cuts to aid programs, and more than 95 percent of respondents identified a level of foreign aid spending higher than the administration’s current budget as appropriate.12 A University of Maryland Program for Public Consultation survey found that solid majorities of Americans, after being informed about specific programs and hearing arguments both for and against, wanted to maintain or increase aid for humanitarian relief (56 percent), global health (64 percent), the environment (65 percent), and democracy and human rights (60 percent).11
Independent voters hold these views with particular consistency. What distinguishes independent sentiment on global leadership from the positions of either party is a specific frustration: they want the country to lead, but they want it to lead in a way they are not embarrassed by. The Independent Center’s 2025 survey found that 77 percent of respondents held a favorable view of politicians willing to work with both sides.13 That same instinct applies internationally. They do not want unilateralism or isolation. They want credibility.
The Centercratic Position
Principle 9 commits to a specific, practical approach to global leadership that is grounded in the same standard applied throughout this series: behavior evaluated against evidence, not against ideology.
First, the values demonstrated at home and the values claimed abroad must be consistent. This is not idealism. It is strategic coherence. A country that argues for an independent judiciary while its executive officials publicly attack judicial rulings cannot simultaneously argue that independent judiciaries are a universal good. A country that restricts press access and threatens journalists cannot credibly hold authoritarian governments to account for restricting press access. The Centercratic position is that the domestic and international faces of American democratic governance must be the same face.
Second, humanitarian assistance is a strategic investment, not charity. The original architects of the Marshall Plan understood this precisely: Secretary of Defense James Mattis put it in contemporary terms when he described U.S. foreign policy as resting on both “the power of intimidation” and “the power of inspiration.”14 Eliminating the instruments of the power of inspiration while expanding the instruments of intimidation is not a strengthened foreign policy. It is a more expensive one. The Centercratic position is that humanitarian and development assistance must be restored to a level consistent with America’s strategic interests and consistent with what the American public actually supports.
Third, diplomacy must be conducted with the professionalism and institutional memory that career foreign service officers provide. The hollowing out of the State Department, the replacement of professional diplomatic channels with personal envoys accountable to no institutional process, and the conduct of sensitive negotiations through informal back channels that bypass congressional oversight are not the practices of a country that expects its word to be trusted. The Centercratic position is that American diplomacy requires a professional, independent, fully staffed foreign service.
Fourth, leadership means accepting constraints on one’s own behavior as the price of asking others to accept those same constraints. The United States cannot expect adherence to international norms on the use of force, on trade, on the treatment of prisoners, or on press freedom while claiming exemptions for itself. The Centercratic position is that the United States should rejoin and lead the multilateral institutions it helped create, not as an act of deference to foreign governments, but as the most effective way to shape the rules of a world order it has an interest in maintaining.
The Stakes of Getting This Wrong
The V-Dem Institute’s 2025 data, which has provided the empirical spine of this entire series, documents that autocracies now outnumber democracies worldwide 91 to 88. Liberal democracies, at 29, remain the rarest form of governance on earth, with less than 12 percent of the world’s population living under what can reasonably be called liberal democracy.3 That ratio has been declining for nearly two decades. It does not decline because authoritarianism is winning arguments. It declines because democracies are failing to make them.
Joseph Nye’s framework is explicit on the mechanism: soft power fails when the product it is selling no longer reflects the reality of the seller.4 When the United States cuts aid to countries in crisis and simultaneously requests $200 billion for a military campaign, it is not projecting the image of a country whose power serves a larger purpose. It is projecting the image of a country that has confused force with leadership. China’s five-point advantage in global approval ratings is not primarily the result of China becoming more admirable. It is primarily the result of the United States becoming less so.6
The historical lesson is not complicated. The Marshall Plan succeeded because it was genuinely generous, genuinely multilateral, and genuinely tied to American values rather than solely to American interests. The countries it rebuilt became, for the remainder of the twentieth century, the most reliable partners the United States had. The cost was $140 billion in today’s dollars. The return was seventy years of transatlantic stability. That is not sentiment. That is a strategic calculation with a documented return on investment.
The nine principles that this series has examined are not nine separate arguments. They are one argument, made nine ways. Democracy requires structure, accountability, honest deliberation, capable governance, and the willingness to defend it. Principle 9 is the principle that asks whether the United States is willing to be the thing it asks the rest of the world to become.
Notes
Brookings Institution, “Applying the Lessons of the Marshall Plan to U.S. Global Leadership Today,” March 8, 2022. The Marshall Plan provided $13 billion from 1948 to 1952, roughly $140 billion in current dollars, through multilateral European-designed recovery programs. Documents five lessons for contemporary U.S. global development engagement.
Centercratic Party, Centercratic Party Principles, Version 13, 2026. Principle 9: “Demonstrate American and democratic values through dignified, restrained, and humane leadership at home and abroad.”
Paul J. Chapman, The Nine Pillars of a Working Democratic Republic, 2025. Pillar 9 (Shared Commitment to Democracy) and Pillar 6 (Vibrant Civil Society and Independent Information) are the primary pillars for Principle 9. V-Dem 2025 data: autocracies outnumber democracies 91 to 88; liberal democracies total 29; less than 12 percent of world population lives under liberal democracy.
Joseph S. Nye Jr., Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics (New York: PublicAffairs, 2004). Nye defines soft power as the ability to attract and persuade through culture, political values as genuinely practiced, and foreign policy perceived as legitimate and morally consistent. Referenced in The Hill, “The World Is Watching America Lose Its Moral Compass,” March 5, 2026.
Brand Finance, “Global Soft Power Index 2026,” January 19, 2026. The United States recorded the steepest overall soft power score decline of all 193 nation brands measured. U.S. score fell 4.6 points to 74.9 out of 100, with declines in reputation (-11 ranks), generosity (-68 points), good relations with other countries (-50 points), friendliness (-32 points), and human rights and rule of law (-10 points).
Gallup, “China Edges Past U.S. in Global Approval Ratings,” April 3, 2026. China’s median global leadership approval was 36 percent in 2025 compared to 31 percent for the United States, the widest gap in nearly 20 years. U.S. approval fell from 39 percent in 2024 to 31 percent in 2025. U.S. disapproval reached a record high 48 percent. Approval declined by 10 points or more in 44 countries.
KKRVA Analysis, “The Shifting Sands of Global Perception: America’s Declining Soft Power and China’s Rising Influence,” May 29, 2025. Citing the 2025 Democracy Perception Index (110,000+ respondents, 100 countries): 55 percent of surveyed nations hold negative views of the United States; Trump rated negatively in 82 percent of countries surveyed.
Al Jazeera, “US Led ‘Historic’ Foreign Aid Decline in 2025 Amid Trump Cuts: OECD,” April 9, 2026. OECD data: international development assistance declined 23 percent in 2025, the largest annual decline on record. U.S. aid fell from approximately $63 billion in 2024 to just under $29 billion in 2025, a 57 percent drop. The U.S. accounted for three-quarters of the total global decline.
CNN, “One Year On From Dismantling of USAID, Study Projects That Global Aid Cuts Could Lead to 9.4 Million Deaths by 2030,” February 4, 2026. Citing The Lancet study on projected mortality from continued aid funding reductions. The Center for Global Development estimated 500,000 to 1,000,000 additional deaths attributable to USAID cuts in 2025 alone.
U.S. Global Leadership Coalition, “New Public Opinion Poll Shows Overwhelming Majority of Voters Want U.S. to Lead Globally,” September 24, 2024. At least 8 in 10 Americans say the U.S. should play a leading or major role on the global stage. More than 8 in 10 say the U.S. should invest in a smart balance of diplomacy and global development alongside a strong defense.
Pew Research Center, “Majorities of Americans Support Several, But Not All Types of Foreign Aid,” May 1, 2025. 83 percent of Americans support medical assistance; 78 percent support food and clothing aid. University of Maryland Program for Public Consultation survey: solid majorities supported maintaining or increasing aid for humanitarian relief (56 percent), global health (64 percent), the environment (65 percent), and democracy and human rights (60 percent) after hearing balanced arguments.
Oxfam America polling, cited in Oxfam America, “Aid Funding: Opinion Polling Shows Strong Support for Foreign Aid,” July 8, 2025. Two out of three Americans do not support the Trump administration’s 85 percent cuts to aid programs. More than 95 percent of polling respondents identified a level of foreign aid spending higher than the administration’s current budget as appropriate.
Independent Center, “2025 Nationwide Online Governmental Sentiment Survey,” October 16, 2025. Survey of 1,200 adults (margin of error plus or minus 2.8 percent). 77 percent of respondents hold a favorable view of politicians willing to work with both sides. 31 percent identify as moderates or centrists, the largest single political self-identification group.
Secretary of Defense James Mattis, quoted in Brookings Institution, “Applying the Lessons of the Marshall Plan to U.S. Global Leadership Today,” March 8, 2022. Mattis described U.S. foreign policy as resting on the “power of intimidation” and the “power of inspiration,” with USAID and diplomatic engagement as essential components of the latter.