Comparison of the US Foreign Policy Approach to the World Order during Obama’s and Trump’s Presidency Based on the Theories of Offensive and Defensive Realism

Obama’s announced policies and approacheshad realistic consequences despite  his emphasis  on economic cooperation, new regional and international capacity building, democracy, human rights, multilateralism, and smart power, whereas the focus in  Trump’s unilateral and offensive  policies was on American values. Trump’s administration regarded national interest as the most influential factor in foreign policy.This descriptive-analytical study aimed to examine its hypothesis using the data collected from printed and online sources together with  the propositions of the theories of defensive and offensive realism, and to answer the following question: “How can the United States’approachtoward the world order under Obama and Trump’s administrationsbe explained using the theories of offensive and defensive realism?” According to the findings, Obama’s foreign policy improved the functional capacities of the international organizations and institutions despite observing the principles of realism by paying special and intelligent attention to national interests, military power, and the importance of diplomacy and soft power. Incontrast, Trump’s foreign policy increased the importance of hard power, decreased the importance of diplomacy and negotiation, reduced the importance of international institutions, facilitated the trend of moving towards a multipolar world order, and increased pessimism about security trends, occurrence of new regional and international arms races and, finally, the level of differences.