Donald Trump is a polarizing figure in the United States. He has also succeeded in dividing the world. Particularly with the tariffs he instituted on “Liberation Day,” Trump has transformed the political landscape in countries around the world.

In the recent Canadian elections, for instance, the candidate most like Trump saw his popularity crater after the U.S. president started talking about annexing Canada and imposing punishing tariffs. Despite trailing in the polls by almost 30 percent only a few months earlier, the Liberal Party won a narrow victory, and the Canadian Trump even lost his own parliamentary seat.

A similar scenario unfolded in Australia, where Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was looking at record-low popularity ratings earlier in the year. But after Trump announced his Liberation Day tariffs, the fortunes of the liberal Albanese turned around. His Labor Party trounced its Trump-leaning opposition this month, and once again the leading right-wing candidate lost his own seat in parliament.

The far right is not exactly in retreat. An ultranationalist did unexpectedly well this month in the first round of the Romanian presidential elections. A right-wing president won reelection in Ecuador in April. And the far-right Alternative fur Deutschland had its best results yet in the German elections in February.

But with the recent election results in Canada and Australia, it’s possible to see the limits of Trump’s influence and the signs of a swing back to some semblance of normalcy.

In early June, South Koreans will go to the polls to elect a new president after the impeachment of the right-wing Yoon Suk-yeol and his foiled attempt to declare martial law. According to the polls, voters will likely defeat Yoon’s party and return a progressive to the presidency.

But like the rest of the world, South Korea is deeply divided. In the 2022 presidential election, Yoon won by less than one percent of the vote. Two years later, the opposition won the majority of seats in parliament, setting up a major duel between the executive and legislative branches. After Yoon’s impeachment, demonstrations for and against him filled the streets of Seoul, each with tens of thousands of frustrated people.

Korea is rife with division: rich versus poor, young versus old, men versus women. All-or-nothing thinking makes compromise not only difficult but, according to each camp, downright unpatriotic. With the country’s fertility rate dropping to one of the lowest levels in the world, few people have enough confidence in South Korea’s future to unite even on an individual basis to produce the children that can keep the country going.

Into this already divided society, the political program of Trumpism—a stew of misinformation, toxic nationalism and misogyny, and pervasive xenophobia—took over the Korean right-wing like a virus. South Korean conservatives questioned the legitimacy of the courts, developed conspiracy theories about “stolen elections,” and even rioted at a Seoul court in an eerie replay of the January 6 events at the U.S. capital.

Trumpism derives its popularity in the United States from its defense of a dwindling white majority that is worried about becoming a minority within the next two decades. South Korea is far more homogenous than the United States, so what explains the fervency of Trumpism among those who support the country’s conservative party? Why do some conservatives equate the normal processes of democracy—the conflicts within a divided government—as a “legislative dictatorship”? Why do they see the hand of North Korea and China manipulating progressive politicians?

The underlying reason is the Korean right wing’s anxiety about the country’s alliance with the United States. For more than 50 years, Washington has been firmly committed to South Korea: as a trade partner, a fellow democracy, and a key part of containing Chinese power.

Donald Trump, however, cares little about traditional alliances. He wants South Korea to pay more for its alliance obligations, to be sure, but the depth of his indifference to South Korea’s security runs much deeper.

During his first term, Trump treated North Korea with far greater respect and interest than he did South Korea. Trump was willing to undermine key elements of allied commitments to South Korea—by canceling joint military exercises and closing U.S. military bases—in order to secure a denuclearization agreement with Kim Jong Un.

If a progressive South Korean politician had offered such concessions to a North Korean leader, conservatives would have accused that politician of treason. But Korean conservatives did not openly split with Trump. They mostly grumbled in private.

Now, however, conservatives in Korea are reacting to the potential cracks in the alliance with the United States by talking about developing an independent military capacity, in this case their own nuclear deterrent.

Then there’s China. Although Trump and South Korean conservatives generally agree about a “Chinese threat,” they have divergent strategies for dealing with Beijing. Trump has always been open to a close working relationship with Xi Jinping, whom he sees as an effective autocrat. In his first term, after some back and forth, Trump and Xi signed a trade and investment deal. In his second term, Trump might go much further.

Trump complains about the cost of maintaining a U.S. military footprint in the Pacific, so giving China control of its own sphere of influence might appeal to an American president who is much more focused on North America, perhaps with the addition of Greenland. But this plan would effectively place South Korea in China’s sphere of influence.

No wonder South Korean conservatives are anxious. When they accuse the opposition of being pro-North Korean or pro-Chinese, they are actually displacing their fear of abandonment by Trump onto their “unpatriotic” adversaries.

Whoever wins in June will face a divided populace. Here’s one way to overcome political divisions: focus on the environment.

In a recent South Korean poll, “climate change and environmental issues” ranked number one among the greatest threats facing South Korea. Although associated with progressive causes, environmentalism is an inherently conservative approach—the conservation of nature, the preservation of traditional values—so it can serve as a bridge between political tribes.

As a new president prepares to deal with the twin challenges of Pyongyang and Washington, finding a path out of polarization at home must be a priority. That path is paved with emeralds. A peninsula, a region, a world united on Green principles can defeat the forces of polarization.

Originally published in Hankyoreh.

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