Hello and welcome to our new readers, and high fives to everyone who's been reading for a while. Don't forget that if your colleagues and friends need the skinny on the latest public policy ideas, they can subscribe here. We love to hear from you, so send any scurrilous gossip, niche think tank sightings, and excellent signs from the Women's March to us at review@thinktankreview.co.uk.

Donald Trump, restrained?

“Contrary to popular belief, Trump does have a coherent worldview”, begins an LSE IDEAS briefing by Tim Oliver and Michael Williams. At its centre is a belief that it is no longer in the US national interest to support a liberal global order (See TTR 1 January 2016). However, how far Trump can travel towards a ‘transactional’ foreign policy may be curbed by advice from the more establishment members of his team - Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, for example, is closely tied to the Republican party, and seen to have a long-term perspective. The machinery of government is also a inertial force to be reckoned with for incoming presidents:

Whatever the campaign rhetoric, when they reach Washington DC they face a strangling combination of existing commitments, lags in defence spending, ingrained institutional habits and ideas, and a small, static community of officials and decision makers.

Perhaps counter-intuitively, in foreign policy terms the Trump administration may preside over a return to the status quo. Not that of Obama, Bush or Clinton - who, Oliver and Williams argue, in their own ways each “sought to rewrite the rules of the system”. Instead, what we might see emerge is foreign policy “restraint” and a multipolar international climate that resembles the 19th century - a situation that fits China and Russia’s preferences.

What happens to the special relationship? Many ties bind the UK and USA together, but Oliver and Williams believe three are most important - coordination over intelligence, nuclear weapons and special forces. Intelligence cooperation is already threatened by the moral and legal risks Britain has taken to stay in step with our ally - public opinion at home will not tolerate cooperating with an administration that discriminates in the name of security. While Trump’s nuclear policy is a bit contradictory at present, any expansion of UK nuclear capacity risks inflaming Scottish nationalism. Trump gave a bold inauguration promise to “unite the civilised world against radical Islamic terrorism which we will eradicate completely from the face of the earth”. But for the UK, the risks of appearing complicit with morally and legally dubious action that would limit intelligence cooperation will also limit adventures with special forces.

So what should the UK do? The Prime Minister has sprung into action, and will be the first foreign leader to pay a visit to the new President on Friday. But the “internationalist mindset” she cited in her Brexit speech on Tuesday depends on a reliable United States. Their cooperation underpins our minimal and quasi-independent nuclear deterrent, our extended strategic posture, and our dependent military systems - not to speak of our liberal moral standpoint on international affairs. Our mercantilist vision of the UK as a “an open, trading nation” - to quote the Prime Minister - is threatened by what Oliver and Williams describe as “the possibility of a global trading system that is fragmenting, closed and delivering stunted if any growth”. It’ll be an interesting chat to say the least.

Read a Chatham House briefing on Donald Trump’s America in the world.

Quick Reads

Take back control. How Parliament handles Brexit is critical to its ongoing constitutional status. Hansard Society

Boxed in. Research from the US suggests that not requiring applicants to declare convictions in the name of equal opportunities can actually prompt racial discrimination. Centre for Justice Innovation

Wrong medicine. Would direct government allow Northern Ireland to face up to “unpopular but necessary” changes that devolved government has ducked? Constitution Unit

A bit technical. An analysis of how climate change is talked about in the House of Commons. Green Alliance

On the money. “We see a number of obstacles” to Theresa May’s plans, but the speech had “exactly the right tone”, was “robust and optimistic” - in sum, “the tone it struck and the overarching aim...is fantastic”. Asset managers respond to Theresa May’s speech. Channel Group

Reports

Ways of working. Employment law hasn’t kept up with a changing workplace. Should we task a Fair Work Authority with protecting our rights? Citizen’s Advice

Two steps forward. Most men in the UK are allies to women’s equality, but a minority - one fifth of men aged 25-34 - don’t want gender equality at all. Fawcett Society

Fewer rabbits. Customs around budgets and tax policy have created “a system with a bias towards constant and time-pressured actions and too little scope for challenge”.  Chartered Institute of Taxation, the Institute for Fiscal Studies and the Institute for Government

Disintegration. Commissioning for outcomes in public services isn’t happening enough. Integration of services remains patchy, and pressure to make savings has stalled decentralisation of services. Reform

See also

Decoding Trump. Some recommendations from experts in democratic theory for making sense of the 45th President of the United States. Democratic Audit

Obama effect. How American public opinion changed - and didn’t - under the 44th President. Fivethiryeight

Numbers game. Trump’s Press Secretary had a weird go at the press for playing down attendance figures at the inauguration. Check for yourself with this one billion pixel photo. CNN

Think Tanks

10 things to know if you want to influence policy with research. Overseas Development Institute.

Public value. Mariana Mazzucato is to head up a new Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose at UCL’s Bartlett Faculty of the Built Environment.

“Bonfire of the promises”. Bronwen Maddox on whether we’re experiencing a uniquely difficult time to run a country, and how governments might respond. Institute for Government

Take part in a survey on racism in the workplace, run by the TUC.