By Cameron Scherer

One year after Barack Obama’s historic 2008 election, much of the world is still riding those final waves of euphoria, all too willing to chalk up any shortcomings to beginner’s mistakes or even part of a larger plan. Not the Haverford political science department.

At Wednesday’s second installment of the Borowiak/Mendelsohn Debates in the Center for Peace and Global Citizenship Wednesday, Professors Craig Borowiak, Barak Mendelsohn and Anita Isaacs all painted a rather cynical portrait of the president’s foreign policy in the year following his election (To be fair, Obama still has another two months until his first full year in office is up). 

“Exchange of opinions and mutual respect are the essence of Haverford,” said Academic Director of the CPGC and History Professor Alexander Kitroeff, introducing the panelists to the packed audience. "The History Department is envious of Political Science for the opportunity to launch such debates."

Isaacs, the first speaker to the podium, spoke to Obama’s ability to shape the U.S./Latin American relationship, framing her speech by first asking whether Obama has even made a difference, let alone affected change for the better. The answer, she said, is easy: he has not really made a difference, because there is not much to make a difference about. In this respect, history is against him. The United States has approached Latin America with the same agenda for decades, and it would be difficult for any individual to reverse such a trend. 

Yet for all the optimism he sparked for merely being “not Bush”—a remark that would be echoed verbatim by both Mendelsohn and Borowiak—and for all the “rhetorical flourishes, gestures, and pledges” he has made, little has been accomplished, or even really attempted. Ruled out trade negotiations, limited Cuban reforms, and meekness toward the Honduran coup all suggest to her that “this partnership shows signs of wear.” Obama’s failure to act, she said, is indicative of a deeper issue.

“I thought this all mattered,” she said, explaining that her struggles to say something that had not already been said led her to completely reevaluate her perspective. “Perhaps people like me are marriage counselors for an abusive relationship,”  she added, introducing yet another theme of the evening.

Battered by the U.S.’s abusive behavior, she said Latin America is “already seeking extramarital affairs” in the form of economic relations with China and Iran.

“Maybe it’s time to forget about it," Isaacs said. "Maybe it’s time for Latin America to stand on its feet and get the U.S. to care.”

Mendelsohn followed suit, arguing that the sky-high expectations Obama generated for himself in the Middle East proved to weaken him. Although Obama had the distinct advantage of, again, not being Bush, the very rhetoric of hope and change that should have helped him build bridges has in fact “undermined his ability to succeed.” 

By relying on the same “simple solutions” to which the campaign reduced complex realities, Obama was able to take office “physically unprepared” and without a plan, choosing not to think critically until too late. This flaw is evident in the President’s approach to both the Israeli/Palestinian conflict and Iran.

“Even Bush was able to bring two parties to the table," he said.

Even Obama’s June speech in Cairo regarding Middle-Eastern relations, which by many measures was a success, effectively alienated the Israeli people, a sentiment now reflected in his four percent approval rating among the Israeli public. And by misjudging Ahmadinejad’s interests in Iran and continuing to impose U.S. hegemony—in this respect, he said, Democrats and Republicans hardly differ—Obama may have unknowingly started a new arms race.

“Don’t be surprised if immediately after Iran goes nuclear, Saudi Arabia announces it has weapons from Pakistan," he warned. "This is how the arms race will go.”

While Isaacs and Mendelsohn both spoke of Obama’s actions (or lack thereof) towards their respective regions of expertise, Borowiak instead appealed to the more theoretically minded in the audience. He approached the topic by situating Obama in the context of American nationalism, which, he explained, is “fundamentally bound up in internationalism.” The American identity is rooted in high ideals that allow us to act as both “Superman and the policeman” abroad.

For all his talk of emancipation, Bush “made a mockery of these ideals.” By hollowly appealing to a higher moral ground, he replaced the United States’s ability to provoke change through influence and by example with “cynical brute force.” 

As Obama took office—“and boy did he take office”—he once again restored faith in these universal values by presenting himself as both a nationalist and cosmopolitan. With his cool intellect, he sought to restore the rule of law in places where it has ceased to exist, withdraw troops from Iraq and end the language of the War on Terror. He has reenergized multilateralism and restored confidence in the economy. In this way, Borowiak said, he is a highly discursive president.

The problem, he wondered, is if he is “merely discursive.” In this regard, he said, it is too early to tell.

“Diplomacy is a slow process," Borowiak said.

The problem is that while Obama’s approval ratings are at an astounding 98 percent abroad, less than half of the world’s population feels U.S. power is a good thing. The international community has begun to separate the structure of power from the ruler.

In this way, Obama “embodies this conflict,” he said, for he has yet to reconcile these higher ideals and the coercive power that comes with his job description.

“He tells us we should reject the choice as false between our safety and our ideals, but this is fundamentally misleading because there is a trade-off,” Borowiak said. Obama has what Antonio Gramsci calls the “optimism of will,” but still needs the “pessimism of the intellect” that will allow him to openly make the tough decisions.  

“He is a walking contradiction—he aspires to rise above injustice, but in fact commits acts of injustice, acts that he has whitewashed.” Obama, he fears, will either “mask this coercion or refuse to exercise power of coercion altogether.”

Unless he takes a firm stand and carves out a distinct space for himself in the global arena, Borowiak said Obama runs the risk of being, in the words of George Will, “adored but ignored.”

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