| Looking Ahead: The Faculty Muses |
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April 09, 2009
Contact: Bill Giduz
On January 20, America saw its 44th peaceable transfer of presidential power, as President Barack Obama took the oath of office. Wildcats from all walks of life witnessed this historic event, whether huddled around television sets or, for a lucky few, huddled around one another for warmth in the crowded streets of Washington, D.C.“I don’t think I’d ever been anywhere where there were more people,” said President Thomas W. Ross ’72. “I was near the Capitol, and it was an astounding sight to look down the Mall and see the mass of humanity that was there. All those people were there peacefully to watch a transition of power in a way that we don’t often see in the world today.” Ross looked back over his own lifetime and marveled at current possibilities in uncertain times. “Civil rights; assassinations of a president, a Civil Rights leader, a presidential candidate; Watergate, the resignation of one president and impeachment of another…. There’ve been many times in my lifetime that democracy’s been tested, and every time, it’s come through with flying colors,” he said. Associate Professor of Biology Dave Wessner was there with his wife and eight-year-old son, camping on the Capitol Hill-area office floor of an old friend to avoid navigating city traffic. Wessner recalled a prayer delivered at the Lincoln Memorial reminding Obama that a parent has only one chance to raise his children. “As a father, I found that to be a very powerful sentiment.” Shaw Hipsher ’03 marched in the Inaugural Parade as one of 150 AmeriCorps alumni chosen from across the nation. “When our group passed the First Family, CNN was zoomed in on Michelle Obama and she just lit up and started waving at us with both hands,” she said. Christie Mason ’10 is an alumna of the National Youth Leadership Forum and the United States Senate Youth Program. “I was abroad in Morocco last semester. Being at the inauguration… made me really appreciative, and afterward, I was excited to get back to school, to do my part in my classes while Washington gets to work, too.” And back on campus, Davidson was doing what Davidson does best: examining the significance of the inauguration and what happens next as America turns a page of its history. The Davidson Journal asked a sampling of professors for their thoughts on the sea change in Washington.
Team of Expatriates
Chris Alexander
McGee Director of the Dean Rusk International Studies Program It is hard to exaggerate the excitement that Obama’s election generated abroad. A summary of the world’s editorial pages might read something like this: “Whew! They’re back. They’re going to repair Iraq/Afghanistan/Darfur/the climate…. They’re going to listen to us again.”
Listen, yes. The rest? Maybe—but certainly not as quickly as many would like. If “Change We Can Believe In” was Obama’s campaign slogan, “Managing Expectations” is his governing one. This is as true for foreign policy as it is for domestic issues. Everything about Obama’s foreign policy thus far, from his personnel choices to his initial policy statements, suggests prudence, competence and consistency more than radical change. This steadiness reflects three realities. The first is the simple fact that states have interests, and interests change much more slowly than presidents or congressional majorities. The key issues, goals and regions about which the United States must care did not change dramatically on November 4. Nor did the basic options for dealing with them. That’s the second, and sobering, reality. This administration inherited the most difficult and diverse set of foreign policy challenges in history. Many of these challenges lack alternatives that are clearly better than the current course. The third reality is a function of the people who make up the president’s foreign policy-making circle. Newsweek magazine described them recently as a “team of expatriates.” Most of them have lived, studied or worked abroad for extended periods of time. That experience gives them a perspective that is both open and pragmatic. They appreciate complexity and ambiguity. They understand that differences of interest and opinion are natural consequences of historical, cultural, economic and institutional variety. On the one hand, this global perspective makes them skeptical of quick fixes at a time when many around the world hope to see just that. Managing these expectations without deflating confidence in American leadership will be a constant challenge. But the same perspective that makes Obama’s team skeptical of crusades and silver bullets also gives it the tools it will need for the task: the ability to listen and to see the world from multiple perspectives and the confidence and skill to speak its piece in a way that is aware of the needs and values of others. Back to Top
Planting Yesterday’s Tree
Michael P. Branch
Thomson Professor of Environmental Studies It is a truism among gardeners that “the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago; the next best time is now.” I sometimes find it disheartening that it often takes our culture a generation to act on scientific findings that clearly demonstrate the ways in which our actions are harmful to the environment and thus dangerous to both human and nonhuman life. In listening to President Obama’s inauguration speech with my two young daughters, I was struck by his comments on the urgency of energy-policy reform and his reflections on the broader issues of sustainability and environmental responsibility. Observing that “the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet,” for example, he proposes that we “harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories.” Environmentally concerned citizens have been saying this for a long time, of course, and there is an eerie sense in which these words might have come from President Carter’s inauguration speech rather than President Obama’s. But environmental responsibility is not an automatic response to information, awareness or even concern; it is instead the result of actions. My hope is that President Obama’s environmental leadership will recognize that our children will judge us not by what we knew but rather by what we did. Although the shade provided by the tree we failed to plant a generation ago can offer us no shelter while we work today, the time to begin digging in earnest is now. Back to Top
Rhythms of Change
Suzanne Churchill
Associate Professor of English As a professor of English and teacher of modern poetry, I am delighted to have a president who speaks poetry. Though George W. Bush’s Texas-plain speak may have won over many Americans, his rough riding over English grammar and syntax neither charmed nor amused me. The change inaugurated by Barack Obama is palpable in his speech. When Obama speaks, I, like many others, thrill to listen. Obama is a good writer and an even better public speaker. When in his victory speech he declared, “This victory alone is not the change we seek—it is only the chance for us to make that change,” his words pulsed in our veins not only because of the consonance and parallelism of his prose, but also because of the masterful modulation of his voice. The line is actually buried deep in the middle of the transcript, but it stands out in our collective memory because his delivery was pitch perfect. Obama speaks poetry because he understands that words are not merely marks on paper or abstract shapes in our minds. Words affect us physically through sound, rhythm, volume, pitch and pace. That’s why we call certain speeches “moving.” Obama’s inauguration speech did not move us to the same exhilarating heights as his victory speech. But our 44th president is not merely a master of rhetoric: he is a serious man with a serious job to do. Though he grasps the power of words, he also recognizes their limitations. As he observed in his famous speech on race, “words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part—through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk—to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time.” Unless our words are backed by our gestures and actions, Obama reminds us, they are as thin and brittle as the parchment upon which they are written. His words call us all to action. Back to Top
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
Russell Crandall
Associate Professor of Political Science
Principal Director for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Department of Defense Needless to say, the incoming president faces a tremendous challenge on the foreign policy front. The good news is that Obama currently enjoys tremendous goodwill, both at home and abroad. This should allow him at least a window of opportunity to seek cooperation on a variety of key issues. One potential problem, however, is that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan threaten to overwhelm the policy agenda at a time when the U.S. government needs to be deeply engaged in issues and regions across the world. In my estimation, one of President Obama’s foreign policy strengths is that his instinct is to listen to disparate viewpoints before making a decision. Sometimes it’s important to listen to an argument just to realize why it is such a bad one. And already he’s filled his senior staff with a mix of hawks and doves who will likely disagree with each other. Another challenge for the Obama administration will be to manage the expectation of America’s new foreign policy. Obama’s candidacy resonated so sharply around the world that it’s probably inevitable for people to assume he will act in a way that agrees with their views. So how can Obama still change America’s image in the world without sacrificing his need to promote our country’s national security interests? I think a key part here is credibility. The president must demonstrate that he means what he says, even if it’s an unpopular position. In the end, respect is more critical to foreign policy than popularity. Back to Top
The Crossing
Brenda Flanagan
Edward M. Armfield Sr. Professor of English Dear Barack,
You came, you wowed and wooed.
You conquered.
And now, as that old dark crooner from New Orleans
said, “the easy part’s over, now
the hard part begins.”
Like the Russian army returning home at the end of the war
the trek will be long and arduous,
the winds blowing ‘cross the fields of Karaganda
will not cease
because you are on the road.
They may, in fact, howl louder,
whipping ’cross your back with a vengeance born
of old hates.
At the cross road, your car will be stopped
by those who believe
they are to protect the road from you,
from what lies ahead.
They will insist that you move forward
only with a convoy
which can, and will,
slow your progress.
But eventually, the howls will cease,
lights will appear,
and you will arrive, not necessarily home free,
but having braved a crossing that
gripped other men at the ankles. Back to Top
An Historical Isomorphism
Vikram Kumar
Professor of Economics It has been axiomatic in the American ethos that if compensation for individual performance and creativity is determined by dispassionate, amorphous and competitive markets, then rewards are consistent with individual contributions to the productive endeavor. This rule of the game has found broad acceptance because compensation is not manipulated by a cabal, coterie or an uber-empowered group. Little sense of exploitation exists in this state of affairs. It is perceived by many that against increasing income inequalities the rule of the game has now broken down, resulting in a financial crisis that has put in jeopardy the personal wealth of all Americans. The grievance of workers stems partly from perverse incentives under which the managers of large corporations have reaped astonishing personal gains in the face of wholesale corporate failures. They have rewarded themselves handsomely, even as shareholders have borne the bulk of the risk, and workers the pain of unemployment. To repair a troubling breach between labor and capital, the Obama administration and Congress have both moved swiftly to place severe restrictions on the compensation of management of firms in receipt of governmental aid. More such reforms are sure to follow. In 1848 two major works were published amidst similar, though more intense, social unease. Karl Marx published The Communist Manifesto, couched in the language of conflict and revolution and giving a radical voice to the despair of many. Simultaneously, in his Principles of PoliticalEconomy, John Stuart Mill provided a solid defense of competitive markets. But he also advocated profit-sharing for workers, then a heretical notion, to make them direct stakeholders in the capitalist system. I note a striking isomorphism—an equivalence of shape or effect—between those historical attempts and our contemporary efforts to remedy stresses in the social order: the former expanded the scope of worker remuneration, the latter curtails the scope of management compensation. Back to Top
Looking Back to Look Ahead
Sally G. McMillen
Mary Reynolds Babcock Professor and Chair of History As a historian pondering the future, I feel a profound sense of confidence in President Obama’s leadership. Not only does our new president “look ahead,” he also looks to the past. He is an avid reader and a gifted writer with a deep understanding of American history and of himself. Obama’s knowledge of American history resonated in his campaign and inaugural speeches. He admires Abraham Lincoln, a man of uncommon gifts who led our nation through its bloodiest war. Obama alluded to pivotal moments in American history, citing Franklin Roosevelt, Martin Luther King, Jr. and George Washington, among others. By acknowledging and understanding our past, Obama recognizes the sacrifices Americans have made and the obstacles they have overcome. He sees both the honorable and the shameful in our history, events which taught our forefathers and mothers valuable lessons and sometimes united them to pursue a larger national purpose. He now asks us to reaffirm that “enduring spirit” and “choose our better history” as we face a very troubling future. Obama knows of what he speaks because this is a president who has personally experienced our country’s “patchwork heritage.” His memoir, Dreams from My Father, addresses his complicated childhood, his adventuresome mother, myths surrounding his absent father and the racism he faced growing up. His memoir examines those struggles, revealing a man of uncommon perception and sensitivity. As we embark upon a “new age” with our new president, Obama asks us to look to our past and to ourselves for strength and inspiration. Back to Top
The Obama Administration and Africa
Ken Menkhaus
Professor of Political Science For Africa, the election of Barack Obama has enormous significance. Africans accustomed to divisive ethnic politics in their own countries were genuinely impressed that the American people elected a member of a minority group. They were equally impressed at John McCain’s gracious concession speech, a reflection of the democratic rules of the game that are often absent in Africa’s fragile new democracies. But the most powerful aspect of the Obama presidency is the way that it transformed Africans’ image of the United States overnight. Obama represents everything that Africans love about the U.S., the land of opportunity, a place where anyone—even the son of an African immigrant, raised by a single mother—can become president. Obama is, in Africans’ eyes, the embodiment of the American dream. This perception creates an enormous opportunity to improve U.S. relations in Africa, especially in Muslim regions of the continent where U.S. counter-terrorism policies have produced sharp levels of anti-Americanism and have arguably made our security worse rather than better. The Obama administration has a unique chance to reach out to Muslim Africans and establish dialogue and improved relations. The new administration also has the opportunity to take Obama’s inaugural promise—“as for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals”—and put it into practice in Africa by ending certain counter-terrorism policies that have eroded our commitment to democracy and human rights in Africa. Back to Top
Mutually Assured Deterrence
Lou Ortmayer
Charles A. Dana Professor of Political Science While the Obama administration will likely focus foreign policy attention on Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and elsewhere in the Middle East, for obvious reasons, another security relationship that is more significant for the U.S. government and the American people will strain for attention—that between the U.S. and Russia. As Barack Obama assumes the manifold burdens of the presidency, he will acquire direct responsibility for the fact that the nuclear deterrent operated by Russia represents the greatest physical threat to the U.S. and the only one that might plausibly put the viability of American society into immediate question. The growing tensions in the U.S.-Russian equation brought on by recent clashes over the war in Georgia, Kosovo independence, the controversy over the missile defense system underway in Poland and the CzechRepublic and the conflict over gas pipeline deliveries to Ukraine and on to Europe have together created a security relationship with Russia in need of emergency repair. Foremost among the challenges is the fact that the measures of reassurance necessary to manage the inherent danger in the nuclear relationship between the two powers, set in motion after the breakup of the Soviet Union, have languished, indeed weakened by the Bush administration’s denigration of bilateral diplomacy and disregard for treaties. A key treaty—START—expires in December, and renewal given the conflicts mentioned is not assured. That treaty provides the legal basis whereby Russia and the U.S. inform each other about the disposition of their respective nuclear forces. Confidence, mutual assurance and adequate intelligence are at the heart of deterrence, not new weapons or bluster. Back to Top
Domestic Policy and the Obama Administration
Susan L. Roberts
Associate Professor of Political Science The single most serious domestic problem facing President Barack Obama is as obvious as it is elusive. No, it’s not the economic recession. Our most critical problem is the lack of bipartisanship in attacking the economic recession. We associate of the idea of bipartisanship with a relatively quaint and quixotic way to understand failed or seriously flawed policy packages. We create study groups such as the 9/11 Commission and the Iraq Study Group. We showcase a couple of retired and respected legislators to sift through previous strategies in hopes of finding recommendations for future policymakers. Without question, the American public wants a much more bipartisan line of attack in both foreign and domestic policymaking. Polls taken both before and after the election echo the same refrain. Granted, calls for bipartisanship are as frequent as calls for “transparency.” We may not know what these mantra-like calls mean, but who can doubt the principle? As we approach the end of the first month of the Obama administration, the best-case scenario seems little more than cherry-picking a few votes here and there to pass the economic stimulus package du jour. This cherry picking seems to have trumped any hope of cooperation, civility, comity, compromise or consensus. True bipartisanship calls for involvement in the design of policy and not the necessary votes for passage. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has called himself a “post-partisan” politician and has urged others to consider the same. Quoting the Mamas and the Papas, that looks to be “California Dreaming.” Back to Top
A Three-Legged Stool
Mary Thornberry
Professor and Chair of Political Science Health Care Reform involves three issues: coverage, cost and quality. Pick any two…. There are indeed hard choices ahead. Americans must face the fact that good health care will cost money. We cannot provide everything everyone wants. While savings may come from digital record keeping or from negotiations over prescription drugs, the cost of good medical care will remain substantial. Coverage involves both who and what is covered. Although we can get almost all citizens in some program, providing the same level of service that Congress enjoys would be prohibitive—especially in this economy. Moreover, we must include some measure of personal responsibility yet provide support for good health habits. Smoking, drug abuse and lack of exercise are three examples where personal choices have great consequences for health. How do we factor such matters into any system? What role will government play? How much flexibility in providers will we have? Can there be a role for the current insurance industry? Do for-profit hospitals make sense? At what age might it make sense to restrict certain medical procedures? Should we insist that everyone have an end-of-life plan in place, complete with supporting documents? How do we make sure that appropriate end-of-life care is given without either raising false hopes or abandoning patients? What burdens should family members be expected to bear? These are just a sample of the challenges ahead, assuming that lobbyists can be muted. All of us have a stake here—in coverage, cost and quantity. Back to Top
The Importance of Science
David Wessner
Associate Professor of Biology Despite extraordinary progress in our ability to diagnose, treat and prevent infectious diseases, these diseases remain a major source of morbidity and mortality. Worldwide, approximately five million people per year die from HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. Another 2.2 million children per year die from diarrheal diseases. In the U.S., deaths due to infectious diseases have increased dramatically. In many cases, these diseases are preventable or treatable. To tackle this problem, the Obama administration needs to re-emphasize the importance of science, as the new president so clearly stated in his inaugural speech. First, we need to increase government funding of basic science research. Today’s basic research will yield tomorrow’s medical advances. Second, we need to increase the emphasis on science, technology and mathematics education in our schools. Citizens of today and tomorrow need to be scientifically literate. Advances in science research and education alone, though, will not solve our current problems in global health. In many communities, women bear an increased HIV/AIDS burden because of sexual violence and their economic dependence on men. People displaced by war are at greater risk for numerous infectious diseases because of substandard living conditions. Uninsured or underinsured people in the U.S. show higher rates of preventable diseases because they lack access to basic health care. The problem of infectious diseases, then, is a problem of human rights. It is my hope that the United States shows a renewed emphasis on science research and education. We also must recognize that all people deserve access to adequate prevention and treatment options. It is an issue of social justice. Back to Top
Posted By: Bill Giduz
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