What do we know of Kenya first and America first rallying calls?

President Donald Trump is back. With him is the America First Doctrine. While the notion of America First did not originate with Trump, its present incarnation justifies recognising it as the Trump Doctrine.

The construct of America First is a perfect philosophical antinomy. It is at once a constructive policy and dangerous dogma.

Weaned off the trappings of xenophobia, the thought captures the spirit of what everyone who is privileged to lead their nation ought to embrace.

You are elected to serve your people. They come first. In every consideration, both at home and away. They especially come ahead of your own interests. That is why in Kenya the notion of Kenya Kwanza (Kenya First) was successfully sold in 2022.

But would it appear those who carried the message did not fully grasp its significance? Have they got lost in their own agendas, far from over 50 charters they signed with Kenyans? Or did they just not understand the meaning of Kenya Kwanza?  

Carried to the realms of xenophobia and isolationism, the Trump Doctrine is perilous. It is isolationist and unnecessarily protectionist.

It is the irony of history that Woodrow Wilson (US President, 1913–1921), was the leader who popularised American isolationism, dressed up in the integuments of “America First.”

Separated from Europe by an odd 8,248 kilometres, Americans under this Princeton academic believed they had no stake in the war. They kept off – at first. 

First elected in 1912 on the Democratic Party ticket, Wilson was re-elected in 1916. This was squarely in the middle of the atrocious conflict. He had pledged, during the campaigns, to keep the US out of the war. Unrelenting German sinking of American merchant ships in the Atlantic, however, saw Wilson join the war in April 1917.

“Know Nothings”

He mobilised 4.7 million American soldiers, who helped Britain and France win the war over Germany and Austria–Hungary.

Close to 118,000 Americans were killed. US isolationist lobbies used this to justify American self-seclusion from world affairs, in the period between World War I and World War II.  

It is instructive that while Wilson’s “Fourteen Points for a Peaceful World” in the post-World War I situation led to the founding of the League of Nations, the US did not become a member. This was typical “America First” at work. But “America First” as a political ideology is traceable back to the 1850s.

Then, the Protestant American Nativist Party used this slogan in an attempt to lock Catholics out of political power. Their leaders claimed that Catholics had been visited by Satan. That Satan’s intention was to destroy their traditional religious and political values.

Therefore, Catholicism should be resisted. Ironically, the Nativists’ massive following did not understand the complicated arguments put forward by their religious and civic captains. But, the leaders advised the followers to answer, “I know nothing,” whenever outsiders should ask them anything about their movement.

Hence, the Nativist Party also got to be known as “the Know Nothing Party.” The people became “the Know Nothings.” The “Know Nothings” followed the Nativist leaders for at least two years, anyway.

That was until the campaign fell apart, for a cocktail of reasons. We could sum these up as a comedy of misleading confusion.  All through these periods (and even before), the Ku Klux Klan, a White supremacist group, has embraced the “America First” ideology, with atrocious racist outcomes.

It is to be hoped that the Trump Doctrine does not take America and the rest of the world that way. History teaches us that societies that will thrive do not lock themselves up in isolationist strongrooms. For, while they do so, others come up to take those places. China and Russia are looking gleefully at the prospect of US withdrawing from the WHO.

They hope Trump will withdraw from global climate accords. They are ready to take over the budgets and other roles the US has had in these forums. Without a doubt, they know what is in it for them. This is their way of putting their countries first. 

You can always place your society first without antagonising everyone else, or embracing blatant isolationism. But, you must really know what your being first is all about. If not, you become one more of “the Know Nothings.”

Does President Trump risk making his followers latter-day “Know Nothings”? Here in Kenya, do those who were given the mandate to say “Kenya First” in 2022, know what Kenya Kwanza was about? Are they our own version of “Know Nothings”?