For all the public enthusiasm in Europe over Barack Obama’s arrival in the White House, Werner Weidenfeld sees doubts and difficulties persisting on both sides of the Atlantic
Barack Obama’s election win encouraged Europeans to dream of a new era in transatlantic relations and an end to the years of misunderstanding and alienation. Obamania quickly became the symbol of a new messianic movement, even though it was one that carried within it the danger of creating expectations that would be too high. For never before had an American President been confronted with so many complex challenges, and never before had the eyes of the world been focused so intensively on the White House.
Obama is a political pop star, combining political vision with political leadership. And in these times of radical social change and economic gloom, when we are confronted with both a lack of political orientation and an absence of solutions to the dark side of globalisation, many people seem to be in search of the impossible; they long for a return to stability by way of change and renewal. From the early days of his election, Barack Obama knew how to play this card, not only with American voters, but with the European allies too. And so it was that he became a universal saint on whom everybody seemed able to project his or her hopes. Even we Europeans fell in love with almost this version of an American civil religion, with the result that President Obama is unlikely to do other than disappoint.
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| Obama’s election was undoubtedly an historic event. The broad support his campaign gained was clear evidence of the vitality of the American society, and even reflected the general optimism with which Americans see the future despite the greatest economic crisis in decades.
The major problem for Barack Obama as he strikes to implement change is going to be the legacy of the Bush Administration’s eight years in power. Domestic policy issues of course dominated last year’s election campaign, and thus swung voters to him, and Obama will have to focus on economic issues as his first priority. But the big opportunity for Europe is already apparent in the new tone that President Obama has brought to U.S. foreign policy. By refusing to adopt an absolutist approach to negotiations with Hamas or the Islamic regime in Tehran he’s made it very clear he prefers a much more pragmatic line than his predecessor. It’s also a reflection of his legacy of America’s huge current account and trade deficits, the unfinished financial crisis and the deepening recession of U.S. economy. Because it will be difficult to find solutions that satisfy everybody, pragmatism will be Obama’s best choice. For Europe, this means being asked to cooperate in finding solutions to the most urgent international problems facing the United States, notably reviving the Middle East peace process, defusing the nuclear dispute with Iran, addressing weapons proliferation issues and pursuing more proactive development policies in central Africa.
All this is creating the conditions for a vitally important renewal of transatlantic political relations, providing the spirit of change can be grasped by Europe too. Opinion polls suggest that European citizens, too, long for a charismatic politician like Barack Obama because of the political vision he offers. But while Obama has no difficulty in conveying a grand strategic approach to back up his vision, Europe’s leaders still seem bogged down in detailed technocratic aspects of the policy debate. In Prague this spring, Obama drew a picture of the world without nuclear weapons, while the European Union’s focus was still on the future of the Lisbon treaty, even though so many of the EU’s citizens still don’t understand it and therefore remain lukewarm in their support.
Barack Obama’s first 100 days nevertheless showed that the strong symbolism he conveys has not yet led to fundamental change. The idea of a world without nukes "global zero” has in fact been around in Washington DC for quite some time, so that wasn’t really very new. The secret talks with Syria and with the Taliban too in fact began some months before. So although Obama now represents a greater sense of commitment in Afghanistan and is willing to get much tougher with the European allies in NATO about their contribution to the military effort there, the major difference between him and George W. Bush seems to be of style and tone of voice.
The reality is that Obama is not calling for a global peace movement, nor is he willing in any way to act against U.S. interests. But this is something Europe’s citizens have yet to grasp, and seem surprised about. The result is that the first signs of disappointment can now be observed on both sides. Because President Obama can be seen to act primarily in defence of American interests, whatever the nature of the global challenge, there are already signs of European concern. As to the U.S., Obama’s honeymoon period failed to generate the hoped-for levels of European support on the Iran nuclear dispute or an increased presence of European NATO members in the Afghanistan theatre of operations.
American misgivings about the renewal of the transatlantic partnership are being prompted by Europe’s failure to respond to Obama’s aura of change. His team of heavy-hitters has yet to be matched by the emergence of comparable new talent in Europe. Meanwhile, Robert Gates is the first Republican politician since Robert McNamara to serve as Secretary of Defense under a Democrat president, and is flanked by NATO’s former supreme allied commander General Jim Jones as National Security Advisor, with Richard Holbrooke as envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan and Senator George Mitchell as Middle East envoy. This line-up of top talent makes it abundantly clear that key issues for Obama have shifted to central Asia as well as the Middle East, and that U.S. involvement in Afghanistan means that it believes it has no choice but to think strategically.
Obama’s Washington expects its "partners" in Europe to adapt to this strategic way of dealing with "hot button issues", and do likewise. The transatlantic relationship has thus shifted to a global relationship in which the U.S. and the EU still share the same values and the same idea of the global order, but are still less than united in terms of practical politics. A major problem will continue to be EU member states’ lack of coherence when responding to American commitment around the world. That said, European governments know that they have to develop a much stronger pan-European security concept, while the U.S. is well aware that Europe is key to reaching an understanding with Russia. Providing that Russia is willing to engage EU-U.S. relations could develop on the basis of a new deal with Moscow into a much more global strategic partnership. |