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Obama: the new authentic American?

By Brendon O'Connor - posted Thursday, 30 April 2009


Obama’s autobiography is a far more reflective, open and indeed melancholy book than many would expect from the pen of a politician and provides hope that Obama is indeed different. However, after what he has been through since its publication 14 years ago, it might also turn out to be the words of another man from another time.

Obama’s second book, The Audacity of Hope, derives its title from the sermon delivered by Reverend Wright at his Trinity church on Obama’s first visit there. The Audacity of Hope, a far more traditional pre-campaign book, combines biography with long sections of political analysis and a few policy proposals.

Obama asserts his difference by presenting the case for a new post-partisan politics that is unashamedly progressive, but he avoids demonising Republicans. Civility, empathy and fairness are his guiding values throughout the book. Like Obama’s speeches, the book reads crisply and he is mighty convincing, but what it all means in practical policy terms is not exactly clear. On one level, Obama seems full of new answers to intractable political stalemates; however, given his gift with words, maybe all he is really offering is platitudes rather than hard choices. Or, as Mendell puts it: “While talking or writing about deeply controversial subjects, he considers all points of view before cautiously giving his often risk-averse assessment, an opinion that often appears so universal that people of various viewpoints would consider it their own.”

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Now that he is president, this tension between the risk-averse and pragmatic side of Obama’s political temperament and his promise of real change will be more starkly on display, with the potential of disappointing many star-struck supporters.

The best biography written to date on Obama is Obama: From Promise to Power (2007), by David Mendell, who has followed Obama for years as a reporter for the Chicago Tribune. The biography provides good coverage of Obama’s early political races and career, highlighting how luck, tenacity and cunning aided his rapid progression through the tricky world of Illinois politics.

Mendell highlights Obama’s supreme confidence, egotism and driving ambition. He largely attributes this confidence (illustrated most graphically in Obama’s speeches) to Obama’s mother and to her constant reinforcement of her son’s self-esteem. Mendell’s behind-the-scenes view - the great promise of any well-researched biography - points to the negative side of this confidence and egotism: “What the public has yet to see clearly is his hidden side: his imperious, mercurial, self-righteous and sometimes prickly nature, each quality exacerbated by the enormous career pressures that he inflicted upon himself.”

Mendell also has much praise for Obama’s intellect and his ability to inspire (particularly women); he also suggests that Obama’s Hawaiian upbringing accounts for his being much more laid-back in appearance and cooler under pressure than most politicians. It seems to me that this grace under pressure, particularly in the debates with John McCain and during the financial crisis at the end of the 2008 campaign, was crucial in reassuring many Americans as they considered voting for a black presidential candidate.

On the question of race, these books provide plenty of evidence to suggest that, in his personal life, Obama has strongly emphasised his black heritage and identity. Although Obama’s father was an almost entirely absent physical presence from his life, his legend (and skin colour) cast a significant hold on Obama’s life. At school and university, Obama identified with African-Americans more so than whites, despite being raised by his white mother and white grandparents. Describing his upbringing, he has said he saw himself as “like an orphan” who was “trying to raise myself to be a black man in America”.

After finishing his studies, when he chose a calling (more than a career) he was drawn towards community organising in the nearly entirely black public housing projects. When he chose a church it was the black congregation of Reverend Wright. When he chose a wife, it was a black woman (race had been an issue in the breakup of at least one relationship with a white girlfriend).

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Obama’s personal life story is one of seeking out an African-American identity. Politically, race plays a more nuanced and subtle role. Obama is clearly proud to be a successful black leader and is mindful of the legacy he has inherited; nonetheless, he emphasises racial inequalities and lingering racism far less than other prominent black leaders like Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton. Obama’s emphasis of his racially mixed background even led to some commentators referring to him as a “post-racial leader”. Looking at the statistics, however, I would claim that those who suggest Obama’s election signifies the end of racism in America are being overly-optimistic. The United States currently only has one elected black governor and no elected black senators. According to exit polls, only ten per cent of the white population of Alabama and eleven per cent in Mississippi voted for Obama.

Obama has certainly humanised American politics with his unusual biography and his engaging personal style. He has inspired a generation of young Americans and African-Americans, and has significantly improved America’s image abroad. Future biographers may well tell us that people saw in him what they wanted to and missed his weaknesses, or that he was simply overwhelmed by the tumult of the times. More remarkably, they may say that he remained an authentic and effective political leader. Only time will tell.

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This is an edited version of an article that appeared in the April edition of the Australian Book Review.



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About the Author

Brendon O'Connor is an Associate Professor in the US Studies Centre at the University of Sydney and is the 2008 Australia Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington DC. He is the editor of seven books on anti-Americanism and has also published articles and books on American welfare policy, presidential politics, US foreign policy, and Australian-American relations.

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Creative Commons LicenseThis work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

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