‘Seismic shift’, ‘tidal wave’, ‘sea of change’ – just a few of the expressions echoing in the media, when journalists the world over were trying to capture the moment Barack Obama was declared president-elect of the USA. And indeed, it is hard to imagine that anyone would forget anytime soon the achievement of America’s first ‘black’ president-to-be.
But how much credit should we give to the issue of ‘race’? Obama himself consciously played down the colour of his skin, partly in order not to isolate voters of any demographic group and to keep heated debates at bay. So it seems a little ironic that after the declaration of his victory, the matter of race is seemingly the talking point of the moment. There is no denying the historic nature of Obama’s victory, a moment even more precious to the generation that witnessed and participated in the civil rights struggles of the 1960s and 1970s. But to reduce the achievement to the simplicity of ‘race’ both in terms of his candidacy and electoral support is the equivalent of saying that George W. Bush won because he was a Texan (although some may indeed struggle to find finer qualities to his character).
It makes me wonder whether the academic community too has such a ‘straight-forward’ view on politics and race. I conduct a search on ‘elections’, ‘African-Americans’ and ‘U.S.A.’, which brings back a neat 46 records. Kenny J. Whitby comes to the conclusion in his article ‘The effect of black descriptive representation on black electoral turnout in the 2004 elections’ (Social Science Quarterly, 88:4, 2007) that the ‘presence of African-American officeholders positively affects the politicization of the black electorate’, much in the same way as Priscilla L. Southwell and Kevin D. Pirch argue in ‘Political cynicism and the mobilization of black voters’ (Social Science Quarterly, 84:4, 2003). Although research in electoral demography can bring up some interesting results, it seems to me that scientists are dividing the electorate into easily digestible chunks and are in danger of creating an over-simplistic causality as a way of interpreting the electoral process.
Although ‘race’ may offer an angle for explaining political behaviour that many people find persuasive, it is interesting to see that a simple search combining ‘voting behaviour’, ‘presidential elections’ and ‘U.S.A.’ results in a plethora of complementary and competing explanations (a grand total of 435 results). Thad Williamson has taken a less explored path in his article ‘Sprawl, spatial location, and politics: how ideological identification tracks the built environment’ (American politics research, 36:6, 2008) in investigating how neighbourhood characteristics can help predict voting patterns. In ‘Moral conviction and political engagement’ (Political psychology, 29:1, 2008) Linda J. Skitka looks into the effect of moral values on motivating people to vote. Other topics touched upon include family structure, weather, campaigning and religion, all in the first twenty results.
For these same reasons, and taking into account the huge personal achievement of Mr. Obama, I would wish to see a more nuanced and pluralistic image of him. One that is not merely based on the all-too-familiar ‘black&white’ dichotomy of American politics but an assessment based on intellectual ability, leadership skills and the content of his policies, in short, all the headings that a ‘white’ president would be scrutinized under in good times and bad. Despite the euphoria of an unarguably historic moment in recent political history, I hope that we can see the wood for the trees and appreciate Barack Obama for the great qualities he brings to the Oval Office – can’t we?
Blog feed