Obama’s Multipolar Moment

(c) jurvetson

In the aftermath of the Cold War, America was crowned its ‘Unipolar moment’ and George Bush was to preside over a nation that had unprecedented power and legitimacy in a new world. A decade on and his son was clearly in the same mindset, except by now it became apparent to the rest of the world that this thinking was outdated.

The moment from the outset was greatly exaggerated anyway and is shockingly dismissive of historical and present-day evidence. Throughout history nations have risen and fallen from world dominance, this cyclical action is no coincidence. While everyone strives to progress and develop, they do so at different rates. America’s unipolarity cited its unparalleled strength across the board – militarily, economically and politically – but this relied upon the assumption that progress from its challengers remained constant. Need I say it never does.  Furthermore, in the increasingly globalised society of today with the rapid advancement of communications and technology, this process was only ever going to accelerate and complicate.

Today many will recognise the EU as much more than just an economic trading bloc, even if it is not an autonomous state, its wealth and composition of political heavyweights satisfy the requirements of becoming a major global player. China with its huge population, economy predicted to overtake America’s by 2020 and growing cultural engagement across the globe is another nation hard to refuse global superpower status to. Additionally the other so-called BRICs nations (Brazil, Russia and India) along with Japan are also briskly striding towards the privileged status of global superpower.

Without a doubt the USA are still, and always will be, a major superpower. Its sheer size, population and natural resources means that its ‘natural’ place in the world will still be very significant, it just has to learn to share that top table with a few others. Under the unipolar mentality the US, in Charles Kupchan’s words, ‘compromised perhaps its most precious asset – its international legitimacy’. Nothing shows this up more than Iraq.

In Barack Obama, America has a leader who not only recognises these cold hard facts, but has the commitment and ability to restore America’s international legitimacy through his ‘soft’ policy action. This is not to be confused with the literal sense of the word; it is only in contrast to ‘hard’ policy action of using military and economic resources as an expression of power.

In his election campaign the ‘Obama-Biden Plan’ on foreign policy presented the task of ‘Renewing American Diplomacy’ where they underline that the US ‘cannot make progress unless [they] can draw on strong international support’. He also condemns the ‘saber-rattling’ tactics of the previous administration when dealing with Iran and instead promotes ‘tough, direct presidential diplomacy with Iran without preconditions’.

These good intentions are proving to be more than just electoral soundbites, exemplified in his direct message to the Iranian leaders. It seems that despite all the damage the unipolar era has caused to America’s reputation; under Obama they can finally handle the end of this mindset. The inauguration of Obama from an international relations point of view should be remembered as America’s ‘multipolar moment’.