While there are many factors, Trump's success is due largely to the fact that Republicans and their supporters have successfully and simultaneously heightened the fears - especially among working class white voters - and undermined faith in most important institutions that might address those fears.
There are a number of real changes happening in the US and many voters, particularly the older, white and less educated, feel threatened.
Immigration, especially illegal immigration, increased dramatically in the 1990s, changing the demographic character of the US. Income inequality has increased, and the middle class has been shrinking. With technology and globalisation, along with the decimation of the economy by the GFC, angst about economic opportunities has been heightened considerably.
Cultural norms have been changing rapidly. Attitudes to LGBT rights in particular have been prominent, with the Supreme Court making gay marriage legal in 2015. With the US being far more religious than New Zealand or most other Western countries, such changes in cultural norms threaten the world views of many.
Terrorism, especially from Islamist groups such as Al Qaeda and Isis, has increased anxiety, with the memory of 9/11 still very vivid in the public consciousness. We normally depend on major societal institutions to guard against such threats and fears. However, many Americans have lost faith in such institutions, and Republicans have played a role in undermining their faith.
Let's start with the Office of the President. Republicans have spent eight years convincing their base that the US has been taken over by a foreign-born, socialist, Muslim president. He is constantly portrayed as "other" - not like us, and opposed to our way of life.
Then there is the Government. Republicans have argued consistently that Government is the problem, not the solution. One well-known activist famously stated that the goal should be to have a Government so small "you can drown it in a bathtub".
The last two congresses were the least productive in history in terms of number of bills enacted into law. Instead of passing meaningful legislation, they spent their time voting more than 60 times to repeal "Obamacare" the president's healthcare law designed to (and succeeding in) increasing access to healthcare.
Ted Cruz, the runner-up to Trump in the Republican primary, is best known for succeeding in shutting down the Government - again, in an effort to repeal Obamacare. The threat of shutting down the Government has been a near constant feature of the past eight years. No wonder the constant refrain is that the "Government is broken".
The undermining of institutions is not limited to government. From climate science to evolution, Republicans have questioned scientific findings even when the evidence is overwhelming. The Republican chair of the Senate Committee on Environment is infamous for bringing a snowball to the Senate floor last year as "proof" that global warming is a hoax. Many Republicans, especially at the state and local level, have moved to introduce "creationism" into the science curriculum in schools as a credible alternative to evolution.
The right wing in the US has also worked hard to undermine the credibility of the press, constantly referring to its so-called liberal bias. Former vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin regularly refers to the "lame-stream media". Even fact-checkers are dismissed as biased and not to be trusted.
Trump has played on these fears, constantly raising the spectre of illegal immigrants and foreign threats, while denigrating the President, the competence of the Government, and the press.
The Republicans have created and unleashed this monster. Unfortunately it may be the rest of the world that has to figure out what to do with him.
- Professor Ted Zorn is the dean of the Massey Business School and a specialist in management communication.
- Views expressed here are the writer's opinion and not the newspaper's. Email: editor@hbtoday.co.nz.
