Economic Diplomacy at the Crossroads of Digitalization and Sustainability: A New Era of Policy Diversification

Economic diplomacy is now at the forefront of global policymaking, increasingly shaped by digital transformation and sustainability. In recent years, the United States has experienced significant changes driven by the contrasting approaches of the Trump and Biden administrations. Trump prioritized trade protectionism, deregulation, and technological advancement, while Biden focused on multilateral cooperation, sustainability, and Artificial Intelligence governance. With Trump’s return to office in 2025, economic diplomacy has shifted toward deregulated digital policies and a potential retreat from sustainability commitments. Existing research emphasizes the growing influence of digital platforms on public sentiment, yet many studies have focused on elections, overlooking the impact of key political events. This study addresses that gap by analyzing social media reactions to Trump’s 2025 inauguration, through a comprehensive sentiment analysis, using Machine Learning models. The results showed positive sentiments, surpassing negative and neutral reactions. Compared to election-period sentiment, the inauguration sparked more positive reactions, reflecting both symbolic optimism and expectations for economic and technological growth, while negative sentiments mainly focused on environmental concerns, revealing ongoing debates about the trade-offs between deregulation and sustainability. These findings contribute to the existing studies by demonstrating how political transitions influence public sentiment, with key events temporarily shifting opinions. By combining sentiment analysis with the study of digitalization and sustainability, this research highlights the importance of understanding public perceptions in shaping economic diplomacy.