We May Be Allies, But We’re Not Friends: Using Image Theory to Study European Perceptions of the Trump-Biden Leadership Transition

Under the leadership of President Donald Trump, the United States became increasingly disinterested and even antagonistic towards NATO and the transatlantic alliance (Aggestam & Hyde-Price, 2019). In addition to disrupting the liberal international order and stoking distrust in the American commitment to European security, Trump contributed to a moment in which the EU-US alliance grew more and more unstable. However, the subsequent mission of President Joe Biden to restore trust in the transatlantic partnership may have caused European perceptions of the United States to change. The Trump-Biden leadership transition highlights an interesting puzzle through which the external perceptions of alliance partners can be investigated and better understood. This paper applies image theory to the transatlantic relationship to study how European perceptions of the US may have changed during the Trump-Biden leadership transition. It contributes to external perceptions literature by spotlighting the citizen image and exploring public perceptions of the United States and its leadership. This paper also addresses gaps in past scholarship by investigating the potential inadequacy of image theory for understanding alliances. Just as Herrmann & Fischerkeller (1995) argued that the enemy image is insufficient for understanding the nature of negative external perceptions, applying image theory to EU-US relations may indicate that we need more than a one-dimensional ally image to make sense of the transatlantic partnership.