The 117th Congress, which began with an unprecedented attack on the U.S. Capitol that personalized and deepened party divides, is preparing to head out of town having notched a surprising number of sweeping, often bipartisan, legislative accomplishments.

In the past six weeks alone, Republicans have joined Democrats in passing measures on gun safety, semiconductor manufacturing, helping veterans affected by burn pits, and approving Sweden’s and Finland’s accession to NATO. That’s in addition to last fall’s bipartisan infrastructure bill, which allocated $1.2 trillion to upgrading America’s roads, bridges, and other systems, including mass transit and broadband coverage. 

Now, Democrats appear poised to push through a bill that would fight climate change, reduce prescription drug prices, and make corporations pay more taxes. Democratic Sen. Kyrsten Sinema’s announcement Thursday that she would support the bill with some changes, including revising the corporate minimum tax to avoid hurting manufacturers, removed the largest potential obstacle to passing the bill through reconciliation, a budget procedure that does not require any GOP votes. 

“To do the biggest infrastructure, climate, and gun bills in the last 30 years is a pretty significant accomplishment,” says Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, who spearheaded the gun deal in June – a decade after the Sandy Hook school shooting that killed 26 in his state a month before he took office. “I’d argue that more substantive, bipartisan legislation has been passed in the last few years than at any time since I’ve been in Congress.”

In 2020, Joe Biden had pitched himself as a pragmatic candidate who would restore normalcy to politics and work across the aisle with his Republican friends. Then Democrats won control of the Senate, and suddenly the 36-year Senate veteran was faced with expectations that he could become the next FDR or LBJ. When negotiations over the multi-trillion-dollar “Build Back Better” bill fell apart last fall, the president’s agenda seemed stalled amid Democratic infighting and accusations of overreach. 

Given previous talk of “transformational” change, some analysts say the current slate of achievements seems relatively modest.

“What we’ve got is a few bipartisan deals and a proposal for a very limited climate deal,” says Henry Olsen, a senior fellow at the conservative Ethics and Public Policy Center. Normally, that would be considered quite significant, he adds, “but compared to expectations [it] is woefully underperforming.”

For now, criticism from the left is fairly muted, as Democrats focus on defending their majorities in the fall midterms. Republicans, while supporting some key measures, are raising alarm bells about government spending and rising federal debt – a record-breaking $30 trillion – and the numerous pressing issues, including a surge in violent crime and illegal immigration, that remain unaddressed.

Indiana Sen. Todd Young, the lead Republican on the $280 billion CHIPS bill to boost U.S. production of semiconductors, calls that legislation “incredibly consequential.” He also says there’s “a lot to celebrate” in the infrastructure bill.

But in his view, those bipartisan accomplishments have been offset by other measures, including the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan in 2021, which many Republicans blame for the current inflation situation. “It’s unfortunate that the positive steps have been undermined and outright negated by these unforced errors,” says Senator Young.

J. Scott Applewhite/AP

From left, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., Sen. Todd Young, R-Ind., Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., talk about the bipartisan effort to pass a bill designed to encourage more semiconductor companies to build chip plants in the United States, at the Capitol in Washington, July 27, 2022. The $280 billion measure, which awaits a House vote, includes federal grants and tax breaks for companies that construct their chip facilities in the U.S.

Senate Democrats may try to pass additional legislation after the August recess, including bills to secure abortion access and protections for same-sex marriages, though those efforts are likely to be an uphill climb. A bipartisan group of senators also announced an agreement to reform the Electoral Count Act, the 1887 law that Trump lawyers sought to use to overturn the 2020 election. 

But even if nothing else gets done before the midterms, Democrats now believe they can point to a significant record of achievement – especially given the range of crises Mr. Biden has faced, and his party’s razor-thin margins in Congress. 

“The president has a double imperative to both draw a contrast between his agenda and the GOP agenda ... as well as work with [Republicans],” says Democratic strategist Tracy Sefl. “And that’s an incredibly tall order in any circumstances, much less this crazy – some call it the ‘end times’ – that we’re in.”

The Inflation Reduction Act

The Democrats’ latest initiative, the Inflation Reduction Act, has done little to assuage GOP concerns about spending, despite progressive criticism that it’s insufficient to address the current economic, social, and environmental crises. The $433 billion proposal is a slimmed-down version of Mr. Biden’s Build Back Better plan, which started with a $3.5 trillion price tag but faced resistance from West Virginia’s Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, who cited concerns about inflation.

Senators Manchin and Schumer worked behind closed doors to arrive at a compromise, surprising even their own Senate colleagues when they announced a deal last week. The legislation promises to reduce carbon emissions 40% by 2030, invest in domestic energy, reduce prescription drug prices, and require corporations to pay a minimum 15% tax. Supporters say it will cut the deficit by at least $300 billion, in part by beefing up IRS tax enforcement.   

Republicans have panned the bill as irresponsible amid current inflation concerns. It includes $60 billion for environmental justice measures such as funding energy efficiency for low-income households, and reinstates tax credits for wealthy people to buy expensive electric vehicles, while doing nothing, Republicans say, to address other, pressing problems. 

“We’re seeing skyrocketing inflation, gas prices through the roof. We’re seeing rampant crime, murder rates, carjacking rates all out of control; we’re seeing utter chaos at our southern border. And all of that is a direct consequence of out-of-touch, socialist policies that are inflicting enormous pain on Americans,” says GOP Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas.

Democrats, for their part, appear relatively united, despite the scope being much smaller than many on the left had originally sought. 

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, one of Mr. Biden’s most formidable primary opponents in 2020, says the bill would not address the major crises affecting working families, including early childhood education and home health care. As chair of the Senate Budget Committee, Senator Sanders had originally sought $6 trillion in spending – more than 12 times what this bill includes.

“The debate is whether it is better than nothing,” he told the Monitor in a brief hallway interview on Thursday. “And I’m going to be on the phone this afternoon, talking to a whole lot of people to try to come up with an answer. There’s some good things in it.” 

Is gridlock a thing of the past?

Does all this mean that Congress, the institution with single-digit approval ratings that has been increasingly gridlocked in recent years, is suddenly working again?

Yes and no. 

To some extent, the severity and urgency of the current crises may be greasing the wheels, says Ms. Sefl, the Democratic strategist.

But members on both sides of the aisle say Congress still needs to do a better job of working together, and not just across party lines, but also between the House and Senate. The latter has emerged as much more influential under Mr. Biden – to the frustration of many House Democrats, especially progressives. 

Democratic Sen. Ben Ray Luján of New Mexico, who formerly served in the House, says that Congress is no different from any other setting, in that when people stop talking, less gets done. “There’s a lot to learn from folks” you disagree with, says the former public utility commissioner, who cites how his own views on domestic energy production changed after listening to colleagues on the other side. “There’s something important about being humble in a place of this magnitude.”

Republican Sen. Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming, who served 8 years in the House and then took a 4-year hiatus during the Trump years before returning to Washington in 2021, said Congress was “almost unrecognizable” when she came back. The unexpected Democratic wins in Georgia, which gave Mr. Biden’s party control of the Senate, together with Jan. 6 and the heavy security presence for months afterward, set the stage for an acrimonious first year. 

“By the end of last year, I totally regretted running for the Senate,” she says, walking back from a vote. “I just thought that the place had become irredeemably hateful and lost.”

She also is disheartened about how little, in her view, Congress has been able to accomplish for the American people. But she sees glimmers of hope in the bipartisan cooperation that led to the infrastructure bill, and in her own work on nonpartisan issues like cryptocurrency, which she calls a “saving grace.” 

“There are flashes of progress and success along the way that give me hope that next year will be better,” she says.

Michal Dyjuk/AP

U.S. soldiers attach a flag to a military vehicle prior to a press conference of Polish President Andrzej Duda and Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda, near Szypliszki, Poland, July 7, 2022. U.S. President Joe Biden recently announced plans for a U.S. military base in Poland, which will have 600 to 800 troops involved in directing the use of the U.S. military’s resources on the continent.

As part of what’s billed as the biggest overhaul of NATO defenses since the Cold War, the United States is planning a permanent military base in Poland, its first in Eastern Europe.

While the U.S. troops headed to the new base “aren’t massive” in number, their presence “will have a pretty profound impact – an outsized impact – on security in Europe,” says John Deni, research professor at the Strategic Studies Institute, the research arm of the U.S. Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

President Joe Biden told U.S. troops temporarily deployed to Poland earlier this year that they were “in the midst of a fight between democracies and oligarchs.”

The war in Ukraine has prompted the U.S. to reevaluate its military footprint in Eastern Europe despite a 1997 agreement, the NATO-Russia Founding Act, that ostensibly prohibits permanent U.S. bases in the region.

NATO officials have said that Moscow nullified the act with its annexation of Crimea in 2014 and its invasion of Ukraine this year. For now, an evolving cooperation within NATO – symbolized by the new base – is central to achieving the alliance’s goal of security, analysts say.  

But U.S. officials have also been careful to point out the to-the-letter ways in which America has not abandoned the agreement, says Gavin Hall, teaching fellow in Political Science and International Security at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland.

It’s an indication, analysts add, that NATO allies haven’t lost hope in a founding act that’s still intact and could prove essential – perhaps when Russian President Vladimir Putin is no longer in power – to one day rebuilding trust and cooperation beyond the alliance, between the two superpowers themselves.

Part of broader U.S. engagement

The permanent U.S. base in Poland was the marquee item in a series of new moves the U.S. will be taking to increase its military presence across Europe.

During a major NATO meeting in Madrid on June 29, President Biden announced that the U.S. will be sending warships to Spain, fighter jet squadrons to Great Britain, troops to Romania and the Baltics, and air defense systems to Germany and Italy.

“In a moment where Putin has shattered peace in Europe and attacked the very, very tenets of the rule-based order, the United States and our allies, we’re stepping up,” Mr. Biden said.

Temporary deployments of thousands of American troops to central and Eastern Europe following the Russian invasion of Ukraine brought the U.S. force levels on the continent to roughly 100,000, up from 80,000 before February. 

This is compared with some 370,000 U.S. forces in Europe in the late 1980s, before the fall of the Berlin Wall.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the moves demonstrated America’s “decisive leadership” in “the midst of the most serious security crisis we have faced since the Second World War.” 

President Biden “is trying to meet the moment by making these announcements and recommitting to Europe,” says Rachel Rizzo, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center. But this comes with a concern, too, that the moves could give some NATO allies “the impression that they can now back off the strides they’ve made over the last few years,” she warns.

These strides include hiking defense spending among NATO allies up to 2% of their gross domestic product, measures called for by the U.S. and designed in part to counter the impression among many that “Europeans don’t view themselves – or each other – as legitimate security actors,” Ms. Rizzo says. “And Putin doesn’t either.”

As a result, there’s a widespread sense that “if Europe is to be defended, it’s the U.S. that has to be present,” she adds.

But while it’s true that the gold standard of deterrence has long been U.S. boots on the ground, Eastern European countries like Poland, in particular, have been bolstering their defense posture in “impressive” ways, says Luke Coffey, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.

In fact, the planned U.S. base accentuates what’s already a source of tension for Russia: the way that Poland, historically cast in the role of a buffer zone between Russia and Germany, has shifted since 1989 from being a Soviet ally to a full-fledged member of NATO, starting in 1999. 

Poland announced plans last month to increase its defense spending to 5% of its GDP. “They take defense seriously. If anything [the permanent U.S. base in Poland] is a reward for good behavior for countries who’ve shown a genuine commitment to the alliance,” Mr. Coffey says.  

Still, history has shown that U.S. troops on the continent lessen the chances of wider war, he argues. 

“Obviously, outside areas of NATO responsibility there’s been fighting. But in areas where the U.S. has a military presence there has been relative peace, security, and stability,” he says. “It’s because of the large U.S. military presence in Europe that most of the continent has experienced relative peace for the past seven-and-a-half decades.”  

Alex Brandon/AP

U.S. Army Lt. Gen. John Kolasheski, the commanding general of V Corps, holds an operational overview as he speaks with reporters, April 24, 2022, in Poland near the Ukraine border. Beyond aid for Ukraine, the Biden administration is bolstering U.S. support for NATO defenses, including a permanent base in Poland for V Corps.

“A big deal” as a precedent

Located at the permanent U.S. base will be the headquarters of the U.S. Army’s V Corps, consisting of some 600 to 800 troops.

These forces will “qualitatively improve” U.S. operations in Europe, the U.S. Army War College’s Dr. Deni says, especially when it comes to so-called command and control capabilities. This includes directing the use of the U.S. military’s resources on the continent, including tanks, cyber teams, logistical operations, and air power.

“U.S. Army headquarters in Europe was frankly really strapped trying to pull off this mission of telling brigades what to do when it came to looking at all the big intelligence picture and signals we get from around the theater,” Dr. Deni says. 

Establishing a permanent U.S. military base in Poland is also “significant as the first step towards the possibility of other permanent presence across Eastern Europe,” he adds. “This is precedent, and frankly I kind of hope that Moscow perceives it this way – we want them to perceive this as a big deal.” 

At the same time, U.S. officials have also taken care to not abandon the NATO-Russia Founding Act completely. U.S. officials were quick to point out that the V Corps forces are not combat troops, which are prohibited under the parameters of the act. 

Keeping some semblance of the act intact is important for future security in Europe, Dr. Hall says. 

It is part of a strategy outlined in a pivotal 1967 NATO document called the Harmel Report, which emphasizes the necessity of both deterrence and detente. The ideal, it argues, is to maintain military strength and political solidarity to deter aggression, while simultaneously pursuing, as the report puts it, a “search for progress towards a more stable relationship in which the underlying political issues can be solved.”

NATO Secretary-General Stoltenberg “has referred to this repeatedly,” Dr. Hall says. “You present a nice, strong, united front – which arguably this permanent U.S. base is. This enhances NATO’s ability to defend itself. But you also pursue detente to try to influence Russia’s actions.”

Having a founding act “that can at least be reformed and renegotiated with Russia,” he adds, “is signaling some kind of hope that it could be used to rebuild cooperation and trust – someday.”

One evening in mid-July, Nick Skordilis looked out his window and took in the scenery. He’d just polished off a rich chocolate mousse dessert. Down below, he could see the rivers and mountains of Glacier National Park. In the distance, the sunset flared pink and orange, stretching long shadows from the pines.

It was a moment of perfect summer vacation bliss. And it was all the more striking since Mr. Skordilis was lumbering through the park on a train going 40 mph, still 16 hours from his destination. 

Finding joy at your vacation destination should be easy – that’s the whole point – but for most Americans, the actual travel to reach restful getaway spots is more about gritting teeth than finding bliss. That has been particularly true this summer, with airports in meltdown, rental cars scarce, and the classic road trip under siege from gas prices. But there is one bright spot for American travelers this summer: the rails.

Passenger rail is handling the double whammy of a summer vacation surge and end-of-pandemic travel bump well – or at least better than its competitors. Amtrak, which has a monopoly on long-distance rail travel, has hurriedly restored services it mothballed during the worst of COVID-19. Ridership is up, too, reaching 85% of pre-pandemic levels in the Northeast and showing a promising pattern elsewhere. The company is even opening up new lines.

“It’s been a much stronger rebound than even Amtrak had projected in its very optimistic report to Congress earlier this year,” says Sean Jeans-Gail, vice president of policy and government affairs for the Rail Passengers Association, which acts as an advocate for train travelers. 

“Amtrak has been very resilient,” he says.  

Much of the demand has been driven by fresh faces. Amtrak noted that 31% of April passengers were “new riders.” At least some portion of those seem to be turning to the rails to escape the chaos in airports and pain at the gas pump. 

Daniela Casalino, an architectural designer living in Seattle, wanted to take an early June trip to see a friend in San Francisco, just a 2 1/2 hour flight away. But when she saw that flights cost about as much as a train trip, she paused.

A fairly frequent flyer before the pandemic, Ms. Casalino had only flown once since it began. She did not enjoy it. “I just found it really anxiety inducing,” she says. “I was like, I don’t want to do this for a while.”

Driving was also a no-go. “I like driving, but I don’t have a car. And also with fuel prices now, I’m not sure I would’ve driven down there anyway,” Ms. Casalino says. “That also sounds really exhausting.”

Embracing the luxury of time, she opted for the 24-hour train ride. She didn’t regret it.

“It was super fun,” Ms. Casalino says. “I met a lot of really interesting people, and it was super beautiful. This stretch between Seattle and Emeryville – it’s just gorgeous.”

Courtesy of Nick Skordilis

Amtrak’s Empire Builder train casts a shadow as it traverses a bridge in the rolling foothills of the Rockies near Glacier National Park in Montana on July 14, 2022, in this photo by passenger Nick Skordilis. Mr. Skordilis is one of many Americans traveling by train this summer to avoid the frustrations of airport chaos, scarce rental cars, and high gas prices.

Earlier in the summer, Mr. Skordilis, a Chicago native who works in recruiting, made a similar choice after realizing he could ditch a car ride for his visit to his partner’s parents in Michigan. 

Driving would’ve taken about as long, Mr. Skordilis says, “and instead of having to look at where to turn and going to the hassle of renting a car, I could sit and open a book and read the whole way there.”

A few weeks later he found himself on that much longer, more sublime trip, gliding through Glacier National Park on his way to see a friend in Seattle.

Ms. Casalino and Mr. Skordilis are the kind of new travelers that rail travel advocates like Mr. Jeans-Gail hope Amtrak can impress. “You can either gain a lifelong customer or lose a lifelong customer based on that first impression,” he says.

But, he cautions, there are real negatives this summer too. Staffing issues are hurting service quality and sometimes causing delays. “Amtrak management cut to the bone when the pandemic hit,” Mr. Jeans-Gail says, and the company is still trying to get staffing levels up.

The freight rail industry’s labor problems are much worse, and are causing indirect effects for Amtrak passengers. Since, in most of the United States, Amtrak shares tracks with freight companies, their traffic jams can freeze passengers in place for hours. 

And, despite a very strong safety record, rail travel is not without risks. An Amtrak train had a fatal derailment in June, killing four people and injuring more than 100 others near Mendon, Missouri.

“I knew [about delays] going into it,” says Dione Wigginton-Duppstadt, who took her family, including four young boys, on a trip from Texas to the Midwest, the Redwoods, and Disneyland.

“There was a lot of worry: Am I going to make my next train?” But, she said, it went smoothly in the end – and her sons proved to be good passengers.

“The kids did great. The kids loved it.”

Courtesy of James Landrum

James Landrum poses with his wife, Pam Landrum, and sons Andrew (left) and Alex (center) on board Amtrak’s California Zephyr bound for Salt Lake City on July 12, 2022. Mr. Landrum and his family rode the rails to Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons this summer, but his children said their favorite part of the trip was the train itself.

James Landrum, who shepherded his family from Indiana to national parks out West by rail, says his children felt the same way. 

“They loved Yellowstone, they loved the Tetons, they loved being there, they loved hiking it. But when anybody ever asked them what was their favorite part of the trip, they said, ‘the train.’”

Amtrak is proving such a solid alternative right now that, for the remainder of the season, trains are full and prices are unusually high. If a rail trip is penciled into your calendar for what’s left of this summer, Mr. Jeans-Gail says, “I hope you booked your ticket already.”

Beyoncé’s latest project, “Renaissance,” is a dance party made for our post-everything world.

With her seventh solo album, the singing supernova provides an antidote to the ills of the day, offering only brief glances at politics and protest. Instead, she carves out space for joy, self-love, and blazing confidence. But critics wonder if this escapism is enough to feed hungry fans what they need for today’s societal battles, or if this dance party will be the soundtrack to forgetting to resist in favor of pop fun.

Beyoncé is great at mirroring the mood and energy of her massive following. She may not meet the often-unattainable expectations of megastars to move the needle on systemic social change, but she is there to reflect back the wants and needs of the Black women and LGBTQ community members who love her.  

She provided a voice to their frustrations on her previous studio album “Lemonade,” and here on “Renaissance,” she makes room for listeners to be fierce and beautiful. (She even agreed to remove a slang word from the song “Heated” after an outcry from disability advocates, and is reportedly also removing a song she sampled with the owner’s but not the artist’s knowledge.) The album speaks, sometimes using explicit language, to the exhaustion and frustration expressed by many Black women who need a break, need some Black joy – to be happy and free and to recharge in order to face the continued challenges of racism. 

These days, joy often seems beyond reach, or perhaps even inappropriate when so many are hurt or suffering. Happiness and contentment are hard to cultivate when the raw materials are so scarce. But joy comes from somewhere beyond the pleasures of the day. Joy, like hope, is not a result of circumstances but a choice one makes in spite of them. 

Generations of Black people have made that choice. Decade by decade, Black people have spun joy from suffering: Through wild creativity in art, food, and fashion, they have wrested beauty and dignity out of trials. And of course, Black people have always created music, an expression of our right to choose life and love.

Blues and rock, hip-hop, and the many genres of dance music featured on “Renaissance” are the sounds of Black resistance. The album plumbs a history of Black dance music from Donna Summer disco to ballroom-ready, bass-heavy beats. While this genre-bending dance-off seems less overt in channeling Black culture than the subdued and deeply personal “Lemonade,” this is no less an album reflecting the feelings of many Black people at this moment. 

“Break My Soul,” the first single released from the album, is the track that speaks most directly to a world on fire. The song is an “I quit” email set to a driving rhythm, the chorus a cathartic soul shout: “You won’t break my soul / I’m telling everybody.” Big Freedia, a prominent artist in a New Orleans-born style of hip-hop called bounce, offers an incantation for freeing ourselves from workplace pressure: “release your trade / release the stress / release the love / forget the rest.” 

Matt Sayles/Invision/AP/File

Beyoncé performs at the MTV Video Music Awards at The Forum on Aug. 24, 2014, in Inglewood, California.

Those who call the album escapism worry that Beyoncé is not focusing her voice on a full-throated fight against injustice. Certainly, her stardom can bring massive attention to any issue, but her primary focus is not on the powers that be, but on her fans who are in the fight. Right now many of her fans are hungry for the revolutionary act of choosing joy. 

Part of fighting oppression is protecting those oppressed. So it is today: In the years since the murder of George Floyd, Black communities have focused mightily on healing and self-care. There is no Black resistance movement without a healthy Black community. Black people have dived into finding ways to deepen connection, to address the incredible trauma of racism in America, and to heal so that our lives can matter now, not just in a future where we are liberated. That healing encompasses many avenues, including a focus on joy. Dance and movement are a way to live free in our bodies that are so often under threat.  

Who is to say that the soundtrack to the revolution must always be dour and angry. The daily news cycle delivers enough bad news to tighten our shoulders and bow our backs. This album helps us remember the feeling of joy – and dance it into our bodies. What could be more liberating than that?

Susan X Jane works to create more equitable environments as the principal of Navigators Consulting.

REUTERS

A member of Colombia's military prepares for a parade before the Aug. 7 inauguration of leftist President-elect Gustavo Petro, in Bogota, Colombia.

Societies torn by conflict sometimes wait generations for a path to peace. In Colombia, which has long been beset with drug and political violence, many hope that moment has come. On Sunday, leftist economist Gustavo Petro will be sworn in as president with a promise to restore trust between the people and security forces, restart talks with rebel groups, and address inflation, hunger, and inequality.

Mr. Petro’s rise to power reflects a yearning among Colombians for an end to violence and corruption. His term starts just weeks after Colombia’s truth commission began releasing reports on a half-century of civil war that left more than 450,000 people dead. That commission grew out of a 2016 peace accord with a large Marxist rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (known by its Spanish acronym FARC).

“Colombians are teaching reconciliation in the midst of the most brutal pain,” said Francisco de Roux, a Jesuit priest and director of the truth commission. The long pursuit of peace, he said, has taught people that “we need to leave fear aside.”

Mr. Petro brings an unusual perspective to the presidency. As a member of an erstwhile guerrilla movement in the 1980s, he breaks an uninterrupted line of centrist or conservative leaders. He was imprisoned and, he claims, tortured. He eventually turned to politics, first as the mayor of Bogotá, the capital, and later was elected to the Senate, where he exposed corruption in the military and ties between the armed forces, politicians, and rebel factions.

He inherits a society riddled with overlapping conflicts involving drug cartels, urban gangs, and various paramilitary movements. He has promised to boost spending to address the social and economic reasons that drive many former soldiers to join with guerrilla forces. He has also proposed separating the police from the military and putting it under a new agency focused on reconciliation.

The reforms, Mr. Petro argues, are meant to break a culture within the security forces that regards almost any citizen with left-leaning political views as “the internal enemy.” That change, he argues, requires building a foundation for the rule of law based on a mutual respect for the rights and economic development of both soldiers and civilians. “Human security cannot be built if the soldier and policeman cannot be looked at humanely” and without suspicion, he wrote in a newspaper opinion piece.

His chosen defense minister, Iván Velásquez, has long experience in investigating military abuses of civilians. To lessen a fear within the military that the government will seek revenge and retribution in probes of wrongdoing, he tweeted a message last month: “A government for peace cannot generate revenge or promote hatred, but neither can it protect impunity. You can’t persecute, but you can’t cover up either. So should be the magnanimity of the ruler.”

The new president is also up against widespread concerns among Colombians about violence, the economy, and corruption. Yet Mr. Petro walks into the presidential palace bearing cautious hopes of Colombians that cycles of violence can be broken. That means reforms must win over revenge.