A Black Man in the White House

After eight years of George W. Bush, a man of intelligence and goodwill has been elected to the presidency of the United States. Well, the Americans owed us that much. But they’ve also given us the bonus gift of a black man – or perhaps, to put it better, a mixed-race man – designated for the highest office. In symbolic terms, it’s the most important event in the history of inter-ethnic relations since the election in 1861 of the anti-slavery candidate Abraham Lincoln to the White House. On Tuesday many people around the world lost the moral high ground in relation to America. Just try to imagine the election of a black or Asian person as prime minister in France, or of a Tibetan in China, a Catholic in the UK, an Arab in Israel, a Jew in Libya, or a Christian in Saudi Arabia. Suddenly the Americans have resumed their place at the head of the civilized world. That’s the main thing to come out of this election.

Of course, from January onwards, Obama will inevitably start to disappoint us. The hopes raised by his election are so extravagant, so many and so contradictory that he cannot satisfy them all. The fact of the matter is that the whole world – not just the United States – is expecting him to deliver peace, harmony and prosperity, no less. If I wanted to be a killjoy I could, with some confidence, write outlines for the despondent articles which are going to start appearing more or less everywhere after the universal jubilation has died down during the course of next year. It’s precisely because I hope with all my heart that Obama will succeed that I am advising calm and level-headedness. If we moderate our expectations, we may find ourselves pleasantly surprised instead of hopelessly disappointed.

On the international level, the main contradiction Obama will face is the following. His fellow Americans are hoping that he will re-establish American hegemony, as Franklin D. Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy and Reagan all did in their day, while the rest of the world is hoping that he will share that hegemony. The new president is going to have to explain to the Americans that they are no longer the rulers of the world, even if they are still its most powerful nation. The years of George W. Bush have destroyed the work of George Bush Snr., who had set out to re-establish order in Kuwait and Iraq with the support of the international community. Obama is going to have to pick up the thread of international problems where Bush Snr., and then Bill Clinton, had left off. In other words, to stop trying to be the world’s police, which has become impossible on a day-to-day level, and instead to offer the kind of leadership that the world needs now. Everyone knows that the face-off between the U.S. and China is going to dominate the next few decades. It is likely that the current diplomatic deadlock will be replaced with a more constructive approach.

In that context, Europe could play an essential role, as both arbiter and intermediary – if, that is, Europe still exists by then, which is far from certain. As we pass through the current crisis, the firmness of the euro, the wisdom of Jean-Claude Trichet, president of the European Central Bank, and the boldness of Nicolas Sarkozy have enabled us to escape the worst. But the Eurosceptics are keeping a watchful eye on the situation, and are ready to pounce at the first sign of failure.

We cannot look to Obama to lift the burden of Europe’s problems from our shoulders. Quite the reverse, in fact. Presidents on the left, believers in strong American leadership like Roosevelt and Kennedy, have never been easy partners for Europeans, and especially not for the French. Between the economic crisis and the turn of events in the U.S., a new era is dawning. We can no longer be satisfied with a half-baked Europe waging half-baked politics with half-baked institutions. The election of Barack Obama has left us facing a stark choice: to take up our proper role, or leave the stage of History.