Moisés Naím / Foreign Policy

The world wants America back. For the next several years, world politics will be reshaped by a strong yearning for American leadership. This trend will be as unexpected as it is inevitable: unexpected given the powerful anti-American sentiments sweeping the world, and inevitable given the vacuums that only the United States can fill and that others will increasingly demand that it fills.

This renewed international appetite for U.S. leadership will not merely result from the election of a new president in 2008, though having a new occupant in the White House will certainly help. But other, more compelling factors are fueling the world’s hunger for America. Almost a decade of U.S. disengagement and distraction have allowed international and regional problems to swell to the point where a growing number of foreign leaders are feeling that "someone had better do something, fast." And very often, the only nation that has the will and means to "do something" is the United States.

Not that anti-Americanism will suddenly disappear; it never will. Nor will America’s enemies go away. But strong anti-American currents will increasingly coexist with equally strong international demands for the United States to play a larger role in world affairs. This trend, whereby American influence is welcomed and even sought, will become, in a manner not seen since 9/11, one of the defining features of the international political landscape.

Of course, the America that the world wants back is not the one that preemptively invades potential enemies, bullies allies, or disdains international law. The demand is for an America that rallies other nations prone to sitting on the fence while international crises are boiling out of control; for a superpower that comes up with innovative international initiatives to tackle the great global challenges of the day, such as climate change, nuclear proliferation, and violent Islamist fundamentalism. The demand is for an America that enforces the rules that facilitate international commerce and works effectively to stabilize an accident-prone global economy. Naturally, the world also wants a superpower willing to foot the bill with a largesse that no other nation can match.

These are not just naive expectations. Foreign leaders know that, even in the best circumstances, the next U.S. president will not be able to deliver on all these things. They also understand that American leadership always comes at a price. And the price can be hefty. Appearing too closely allied to the United States is a risky political position for elected politicians everywhere. Still, some have shown a surprising readiness to do so. Last March, President George W. Bush traveled to Latin America, a region he has largely ignored. The trip was bound to be inconsequential as the U.S. president had nothing concrete to offer.

Yet, all the Latin American presidents who were asked to host this lame duck, empty-handed, and politically radioactive guest readily agreed to do so; some even lobbied not to be left off his itinerary. What was in it for them? The hope of getting the superpower to do something for them. The leftist Brazilian President Luiz Inácio "Lula" da Silva, who is a personal friend and staunch supporter of Bush’s nemesis Hugo Chávez, wanted help with his country’s ethanol industry. In Turkey, like Brazil, the population is deeply critical of the United States. Yet, like his Brazilian counterpart, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has openly courted the Bush administration. The Turkish president knows that the United States is his country’s best ally in the effort to get Turkey into the European Union.

Lula and Erdogan are not unique. They are just two in a long list of world leaders who understand that, though the United States may sometimes use a heavy hand, the alternatives are much worse. Few want to see the world’s stage led by autocratic regimes like Russia or China. An ineffectual Europe does not offer much in the way of leadership. And, short of these options, there are few possibilities besides living in an anarchic vacuum. Many of these foreign leaders will therefore be willing to pay the price that comes with American leadership. They only ask that it not require subservience to the whims of a giant with more power than brains and whose legitimacy is undermined by regular displays of incompetence, recklessness, and ignorance.

Opinion polls in multiple countries show that the legitimacy and prestige of the United States has deteriorated. Yet, the same populations that say they don’t want the United States to be the world’s leader also say that they don’t want America to withdraw from world affairs. For example, 93 percent in South Korea, 78 percent in France, and 71 percent in Mexico say that the United States should play a role in solving international problems. Moreover, despite the overall negative perceptions of the United States, most people surveyed believe that bilateral relations between the United States and their country are improving. In no country surveyed does the population think that their nation’s relations with the United States are getting worse.

And they are right. Not just because the world wants it to be the case, but because Americans are likewise yearning for the United States to be more respected abroad. Sixty-nine percent of Americans say they believe it is best for the United States to take an active part in world affairs. This popular demand is also shared by part of the policymaking elite. One of its most senior members recently called for a new direction in the way the United States thinks about world affairs. "Success," he said, "will be less a matter of imposing one’s will and more a function of shaping the behavior of friends, adversaries, and, most importantly, the people in between." And later: "[T]here is a need for a dramatic increase in spending on the civilian instruments of national security — diplomacy, strategic communications, foreign assistance, civic action, and economic reconstruction and development." The American making this appeal for a drastic departure from the Bush administration’s overly militarized foreign policy is none other than Robert Gates, the current secretary of defense.

The demand abroad for change in the way America behaves is obvious. The United States is once again ready to supply the leadership.