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USA/Africa: New Policy Prospects?
AfricaFocus Bulletin
Sep 13, 2008 (080913)
(Reposted from sources cited below)
Editor's Note
"If the United States takes a narrow view of Africa, as a recipient
of charity, a place to pump oil, and an arena for fighting
terrorists, then African hopes being evoked by the Obama candidacy
will almost certainly be disappointed. If, however, the United
States takes a long view, understanding that its security depends
on the human security of Africans, then there are real prospects
for a new era of collaboration and good will." - Merle Bowen and
William Minter, commentary in Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette
The candidacy of Barack Obama has attracted extraordinary worldwide
attention, not least in Africa and particularly in Kenya, where his
father was born. But, as is typical for U.S. presidential
campaigns, neither candidate has paid much attention to the details
of Africa policy. Expectations that exist are based largely on
symbolism, as well as on the stark contrast Senator Obama offers to
the narrow U.S. nationalism and rigidity of the Bush years and the
expected continuity from Senator McCain. Obama's biography, notes
Paul Tiyambe Zeleza in a commentary cited below, quoting Senator
Obama himself, serves "as a blank screen on which people of vastly
different political stripes project their own views."
This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains an opinion piece ("Wanted: A New
U.S. Africa Policy") being published in the Champaign-Urbana NewaGazette
and several other U.S. newspapers, by Merle Bowen and
William Minter. It also contains selections from two recent
compilations of African commentary on the Obama phenomenon, in
Pambazuka News and The Zeleza Post, evaluating the appeal, the
historical significance, and the limitations of the Obama
candidacy. Also included are the brief paragraphs allocated to
Africa in the two party platforms, and links to other sources for
the candidates' stated positions on Africa..
For additional commentaries, see
http://www.pambazuka.org/en/issue/393 (August 14, 2008)
http://www.pambazuka.org/en/issue/355 (March 20 2008)
http://www.zeleza.com/symposium/577
For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on the US and Africa, visit
http://www.africafocus.org/country/usa-africa.php
++++++++++++++++++++++end editor's note+++++++++++++++++++++++
Wanted: A New U. S. Africa Policy
by Merle Bowen and William Minter
[Merle Bowen directs the Center for African Studies at the
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. William Minter, in
Washington, DC, edits the on-line publication AfricaFocus Bulletin.
This opinion piece was written at the request of the University of
Illinois communications department, and was first published in the
Champaign-Urbana News Gazette on September 7, 2008. It is scheduled
to appear in several other Illinois-area and U.S. newspapers.]
Almost 15 years after Nelson Mandela took office in South Africa,
the United States still lacks a coherent Africa policy. There are
pieces of such a policy - support for the war against AIDS is now
a bipartisan consensus, and both presidential candidates have
pledged to focus on Darfur. Neither candidate, however, has laid
out a policy framework that can serve both African and American
interests.
It is instructive that it was only this June that the U. S.
government finally took Mandela and members of his party off the
official list of terrorists, a legacy of past support for the
apartheid regime. Still, the U. S. did aid the transition to
democracy in South Africa in the 1990s. In recent years some other
African issues have attracted attention, and activists have
pressured Washington to act.
On AIDS the results have been significant, even if still
inadequate. President Clinton, whose administration was missing in
action on AIDS in Africa, became an effective campaigner on the
issue after leaving office. President Bush, whose USAID
administrator initially dismissed antiretroviral treatment for
Africans as impractical because "Africans can't tell time," now
finds that the presidential AIDS program is one of the few
accomplishments he can claim for history.
On other issues - conflict, human rights, debt, trade, and
development - the record is less inspiring. The Clinton
administration shared the international failure to act against
genocide in Rwanda. On Darfur, the Bush administration has offered
heady rhetoric but little effective action. More generally, neither
the Clinton nor Bush years provide a good model. Both Bill Clinton
and George W. Bush raised the U.S. profile in Africa, but neither
followed up the hopes they raised with consistent action.
This record looms large today given the absence of new proposals
from the candidates and the projected makeup of their foreign
policy teams. McCain's Africa policy may well resemble the
disastrous Reagan years, noted for U.S. collaboration with the
apartheid South African regime and African dictators. One of
McCain's top strategists, Charles Black, was a lobbyist for
Angola's Jonas Savimbi and other U.S.-backed African warlords.
Obama's most prominent advisors, veterans of the Clinton
administration, include Anthony Lake, who presided over the failure
to respond to Rwanda, and Susan Rice, who has proposed direct U.S.
troop intervention in Darfur a step which would almost certainly
escalate the killing.
Neither candidate has criticized the disastrous Bush policy on
Somalia, where it encouraged Ethiopian military intervention and
worsened one of the world's worst humanitarian crises. Both have
endorsed AFRICOM, a new military command that risks reinforcing an
already over-militarized U.S. response to Africa. Opportunistic
support for dictators continues, while crises and conflicts - some,
such as in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, surpassing Darfur
in casualties - are ignored.
With his openness to multilateral cooperation and his personal
connections, Senator Obama has the potential for crafting a
constructive Africa policy. But without an alternative framework,
and active public pressure, the path of least resistance will
likely follow narrow conceptions of U.S. national interests, as in
the Cold War and post-Cold War periods. Anti-terrorism, Africa's
oil, and competition with China are all real concerns. But pursuing
those goals without attending to Africa's own needs would be
self-defeating.
A new policy must encompass the diversity of African countries and
of U.S. interests. There are no magic formulas. Nevertheless, there
are principles that should apply:
- Build on the example of the response to AIDS, both multilateral
and bilateral, to address African needs in health, education, food,
economic infrastructure, and the environment, with all countries
paying their fair share.
- Open a genuine dialogue about trade and development policy,
instead of imposing rigid free-market policies that are
systematically biased in favor of rich countries.
- Minimize bilateral military involvement in Africa, which risks
sucking the U.S. into local conflicts, in favor of multilateral
diplomacy and peacekeeping, including paying U.S. peacekeeping
arrears at the UN.
- Stop aiding repressive regimes, and support democratic African
solutions, as in the aftermath of the election in Kenya. This
crisis, which threatened to turn into a civil war earlier this
year, was peacefully resolved through African mediation led by
former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. The U.S. played a
supportive rather than an ostentatious role.
- Rely on skilled African diplomats, who include many distinguished
former presidents, for dealing with other crises, as was done in
Kenya. Despite the negative example of Thabo Mbeki's ineffective
mediation in Zimbabwe, the fact remains that no initiative is
likely to succeed unless African civil society and political
leaders are in the forefront.
- Support the large community of recent African immigrants to the
U. S., many of whom are engaged in family and community projects to
help their countries.
In short, if the United States takes a narrow view of Africa, as a
recipient of "charity," a place to pump oil, and an arena for
fighting terrorists, then African hopes being evoked by the Obama
candidacy will almost certainly be disappointed. If, however, the
United States takes a long view, understanding that its security
depends on the human security of Africans, then there are real
prospects for a new era of collaboration and good will.
The Meaning and Implications of the Obama Phenomenon
E-Symposium on The Zeleza Post
http://www.zeleza.com/symposium/577
Introduction by Paul Tiyambe Zeleza
The euphoria over Senator Barack Obama's victory in the Democratic
Party primaries in early June as the party's presumptive nominee in
the presidential elections in November is now giving way to serious
reflection on what his nomination and a possible Obama presidency
might mean for the United States, the Pan-African world, and the
world at large. There is little question that Senator Obama's
campaign has been electrifying in its audacity and implications.
The historic appeal of Senator Obama's candidacy can be attributed
to complex social forces in America's contemporary domestic and
international political economies, not least the country's utter
exhaustion following eight years of the Bush Administration,
perhaps the worst in American history. The Bush presidency has
bankrupted the country at home and diminished it abroad, left its
economy in recessionary tatters and its international reputation
terribly battered, thanks to the dangerous marriage between
neo-liberalism and neo-conservatism, the lethal consummation of
capitalist and imperialist hubris.
Driving the Obama phenomenon are other complicated dynamics,
including generational, racial, gender, and class shifts in the
ecology of American society and politics. Some of these forces are
easily discernible, others barely perceptible, representing
long-term and conjunctural trends including the possible collapse
of the Republican coalition and supremacy over political and policy
discourse in America's post-civil rights and post-Cold War
realignments. The Bush presidency has severely devalued Republican
currency as the custodians of national security, moral values, and
economic management. Race is their last card.
Structural forces cannot of course be the sole explanations. There
is also the organizational prowess of the Obama campaign, combining
old-fashioned grassroots community organizing, hardball party
politicking, and digital mobilization into an electoral juggernaut
that vanquished the indomitable Clinton machine. In this equation,
we must add Obama's own complex biography, which taps into four
narratives of historic and contemporary American political
discourses. In other words, Obama's biography, as he himself states
in The Audacity of Hope, serves "as a blank screen on which people
of vastly different political stripes project their own views."
There is the son of a Kenyan father, the Obama of the migrant
narrative, deeply etched in the myth of the American dream for
non-black Americans. There is the self-declared black man married
to a black woman, the Obama of the African American narrative of
longstanding oppression and marginalization. There is the person
born in Hawaii and partly raised in Indonesia with a multicultural
family on several continents, the Obama of the transnational
narrative that America's cosmopolitan classes aspire to for their
despised country. Then there is the son of a white woman, the Obama
of the biracial narrative for those who dream of a postracial
America.
Each Obama appeals to different constituencies at home and abroad:
Africans and African Americans seeking redress, biracials in search
of recognition, whites desperate for redemption, and the rest of
the world looking for respite from America's imperial arrogance and
violence. "As such," Obama writes, "I am bound to disappoint some,
if not all, of them." That has already started to happen as he is
forced to spell out specific positions on the thorny issues facing
America's domestic and foreign policy from the Iraq war to the
price of gas.
The contributors to the eSymposium insightfully address many of
these questions: Obama as the signified and signifier of black
citizenship and globality, the symbolic and substantive
implications of his candidacy, the power of hope and the limits of
structural change his presidency would represent, the
quintessential Americanness of this most gifted of politicians and
the anxious Pan-African expectations pinned on him. While
celebrating the historic achievement and possibilities that Obama's
candidacy imply, all the contributors caution against investing a
possible Obama presidency with the illusions of transformational
power.
Continued on http://www.zeleza.com/symposium/577, with
contributions by multiple authors.
Son of the Soil? Pan-Africanism & Third World Prospects in a
Possible Obama Presidency
Steve Sharra
[Steve Sharra is a visiting assistant professor, Peace and Justice
Studies, Dept. of Philosophy, Michigan State University.
Brief excerpts only. For full article, including links to other
sources, see Sharra's blog at http://mlauzi.blogspot.com or
http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/features/50074
For other articles from the Pambazuka News special edition on
Barack Obama: Prospects for Africa, see
http://www.pambazuka.org/en/issue/393 (August 14, 2008)]
The exclamatory commentary that has accompanied Barack Obama's
ascendancy to the nomination of the Democratic Party's presidential
candidate has excited, beneath it, the question of what the
nomination itself, and a possible Obama presidency, might mean for
the Pan-Africanist world as well as the Third World. While much of
the commentary has been laudatory, there have also been cautionary
tones, not to mention ambivalent ones. Beyond the excitement,
caution and ambivalence of what a possible Obama presidency might
entail for Pan-Africa and the Third World, what Obama himself has
said in his writing, and has not said, might prove to be revelatory
... We take this exploration by examining some of the issues that
have been raised by editorialists and columnists, bloggers and
other commentators in Africa and beyond. We also delve into what
Obama himself has said in his two best-belling books, as we ponder
how the significance of a possible Obama presidency may be realized
more in the symbolic transformation of perceptions of race, racism
and racial identity in the US and in the world, than in what the
office of the US presidency itself is capable or incapable of
achieving.
...
In his autobiography Dreams From My Father, Barack Obama has
demonstrated his awareness of both a Pan-Africanist and Third World
consciousness, but for the nationalist demands of American politics
today, he has not made that awareness a part of his campaign
platform. But those who know Obama's autobiographical instincts in
guiding his best judgments know that his upbringing and struggle to
identify himself are a core part of who he is. And it is his
autobiographical narrative that has appealed to people around the
globe. Thus while heeding the call to be cautious in speculating
what a possible Obama presidency might do for the Pan-African
world, it is worth discussing the extent to which Obama's narrative
in itself has the potential to influence new visions and energies
in the study of the Pan-African world and its future prospects. ...
A June 5th editorial in The Daily Nation of Kenya
(http://worldmeets.us/dailynationka000005.shtml(, where Obama's
father, a Harvard Ph.D., hailed from, offered three reasons as to
why Africans were celebrating Obama's victory. The first reason had
to do with Obama being "the first African American ever to win
nomination to vie for the presidency of the world's sole
super-power." Second, Obama was considered "a son of Africa" who
has excelled in the world. And thirdly, Obama was "a son of Kenya,"
since Obama traced "his roots" back to his fatherland, Kenya, in
"the present-day Siaya District." The three reasons culminated into
one huge hope: Africans were hopeful that "with this win, 'their
son' will implement Africa-friendly policies that could uplift the
continent from poverty"
...
By far the most authoritative statement of caution if not negation
came from Dr. Makau Mutua, Dean and University Distinguished
Professor of Law at State University of New York at Buffalo, and
chair of the Kenyan Human Rights Commission. Writing in the>Daily
Nation of June 5th, Dr. Mutua started out by quipping that the
reaction to Obama's clinching of the Democratic nomination was as
if Obama was "poised to become" the president of Kenya, or indeed
Africa. ... Dr. Mutua then set out to demolish the expectations
edifice by pointing out "the nature of the US as a state, and the
character of the American presidency" as the reasons why he was
urging caution to the hype of what Obama would do for the
continent. Dr. Mutua [noted that] "the American presidency is a
highly circumscribed office that is subject to larger national
interests on which there is consensus about the purpose of
government."
What would prevent a President Obama from being helpful to Africa
then were the two core functions of the American presidency: to
"develop and implement a foreign policy to enhance US interests and
pursue a domestic policy that will bring economic prosperity to the
nation." It was in the service of those two functions that
America's role in the world had been historically shaped, and
continued to be, limiting the scope of what an individual president
could do ... "Why am I pessimistic about the prospects of an Obama
presidency for Africa?" asked Dr. Mutua. The answer, he offered,
lay in Africa's "structurally racist and exploitative relationship
with Africa. In slavery - the brutal capture, transportation, sale
and exploitation of Africans to build America - and the support by
the United States of Cold War despots in Africa, lies the
destructive relationship between black people and America."
...
[This points to the] important distinction that has to be made
between the president as an individual and the president as an
institution. As an individual, we only have to hark back to Obama's
autobiography, Dreams From My Father. ... the personal importance
of Africa to Barack Obama is not only evident in the book, it is
profound to Obama's own identity. ... Obama takes 450 pages to
offer an intimate look into his life, from early days in Hawaii,
Indonesia, Los Angeles, New York, and Chicago, to an epochal
homecoming in Kenya. The amount of detail Obama dedicates to his
life in the United States and Indonesia, where he lived all his
life hitherto, contrasts sharply with the one third of the book
that he devotes to Kenya, where he only spent three months. ...
...
However the reasons for caution in imagining what an Obama
presidency may do for Africa and the Third World are equally
sobering. By the time we get to the US senate and to his next book,
The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream
(2006), Africa has pretty much disappeared from Obama's narrative,
replaced by distant references that characterize much of mainstream
Western attitudes about Africa. Missing even from the Index, Africa
is mentioned only perfunctorily, no longer as the place Obama spent
a lifetime yearning for, but rather as the known poster child for
the world's worst maladies and disorder. "There are times when
considering the plight of Africa - the millions racked by AIDS, the
constant droughts and famines, the dictatorships, the pervasive
corruption, the brutality of twelve-year-old guerillas who know
nothing but war wielding machetes or AK-47s -I find myself plunged
into cynicism and despair" (p. 319). But Obama is also aware of the
progress Africa has made, citing Uganda's success with the AIDS
pandemic, and the end of civil war in countries like Mozambique.
,,,
Obama is also able to go beyond the average politician in his
candidness about the ravages brought on Indonesia and other parts
of the world by the ideological juggernaut of US foreign policy.
... Obama's candor continues throughout the chapter, noting that
"our record is mixed - not just in Indonesia but across the world"
(p. 280). He calls American foreign policy "a jumble of warring
impulses," at times farsighted and serving the mutual interests of
both the United States and other nations, and at other times making
"for a more dangerous world" ...
In the final analysis, the significance of an Obama presidency for
Pan-Africa and the Third World will lie less in what Barack Obama
may or may not be able to do for people of African descent than in
the symbolic message that his ascendancy to the most powerful
office in the world will do in changing black people's perceptions
of who they are in the world, and how others view them. That has
been the underlying, implicit cause of the renewed hope in what has
been said by the Kenyans, the Malawians, the South Africans, the
Nigerians, Caribbean commentators, and in fact every one else
around the world who has joined in the celebration. ....
Party Platforms
Both party platforms speak briefly and in general terms about
Africa.
Republican Party Platform
Advancing Hope and Prosperity in Africa
The great promise of Africa has been dimmed by disease, hunger, and
violence. Republicans have faced up to each of those challenges
because, in addition to humanitarian concerns, the U.S. has
important security interests in the stability and progress of
African nations. The devastating toll of HIV/AIDS threatens to
destabilize entire societies through large numbers of orphaned
youths. In response, the U.S. has become the unrivaled leader in
fighting the diseases that are the scourge of much of the
continent. Republican-sponsored legislation has brought jobs and
investment to sub-Saharan Africa. To continue that progress, we
advocate continued expansion of trade with African nations.
Genocide must end. The horrendous suffering of the people in the
Darfur region of Sudan, as well as less publicized human tragedies
elsewhere, calls for a far more energetic and determined response
from Africa's elected leaders. The United States stands ready to
assist them with materiel, transportation, and humanitarian
supplies. We will continue America's diplomatic efforts to secure
a comprehensive and humane settlement for the people of the
southern and western Sudan.
The promise of democracy and freedom in Africa is diminished by the
government of Zimbabwe, which has seized lands without
compensation, debased the currency, murdered and tortured its
people, and so intimidated voters that free and fair elections are
impossible. We support sanctions against this government, free
elections, and the restoration of civil government in Zimbabwe.
See http://www.gop.com/2008Platform/NationalSecurity.htm for these
paragraphs in context.
Democratic Party Platform
Support Africa's Democratic Development
U.S. engagement with Africa should reflect its vital significance
to the U.S. as well as its emerging role in the global economy. We
recognize Africa's promise as a trade and investment partner and
the importance of policies that can contribute to sustainable
economic growth, job creation, and poverty alleviation. We are
committed to bringing the full weight of American leadership to
bear in unlocking the spirit of entrepreneurship and economic
independence that is sweeping across markets of Africa.
We believe that sustainable economic growth and development will
mitigate and even help to reverse such chronic and debilitating
challenges as poverty, hunger, conflict, and HIV/AIDS. We are
committed to bringing the full weight of American leadership to
bear to work in partnership with Africa to confront these crises.
We will work with the United Nations and Africa's regional
organizations to prevent and resolve conflict and to build the
capacity of Africa's weak and failing states. We must respond
effectively when there is a humanitarian crisis particularly at
this moment in Sudan where genocide persists in Darfur and the
Comprehensive Peace Agreement is threatened.
Many African countries have embraced democratization and economic
liberalization. We will help strengthen Africa's democratic
development and respect for human rights, while encouraging
political and economic reforms that result in improved transparency
and accountability. We will defend democracy and stand up for rule
of law when it is under assault, such as in Zimbabwe.
For this statement in context see
http://www.democrats.org/a/party/platform.html
Additional Sources on Candidates' Positions on Africa
Council on Foreign Relations
The Candidates on U.S. Policy toward Africa
August 24, 2008
http://www.cfr.org/publication/14749/#2
Democratic Candidates Responses to Questionnaire on Africa
Sullivan Foundation Town Hall Meeting
October 2007
http://tinyurl.com/4d5txe
AfricaFocus Bulletin is an independent electronic publication
providing reposted commentary and analysis on African issues, with
a particular focus on U.S. and international policies. AfricaFocus
Bulletin is edited by William Minter.
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