Watching Obama

“A black president of the US will mean that there will be more American tolerance for people around the world who are different,” said Sunila Patel, 62, a woman in New Delhi.

The primary elections generated unprecedented interest around the world, as people in distant parliament buildings and thatched-roof huts followed the political ups and downs as if they were watching a Hollywood thriller.

Much of the interest reflects hunger for change from President Bush, who is unpopular in much of the world. At the same time, many people abroad seemed impressed—sometimes even shocked—by the wide-open nature of US democracy and the history-making race between a woman and a black man.

While Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton has admirers around the world, especially from her days as first lady, interviews on four continents suggested that Obama’s candidacy has captured the world’s imagination.

The Republican nominee, Senator John McCain, who has extensive overseas experience, is known and respected in much of the world. In interviews, McCain seemed more popular than Obama in countries such as Israel, where he is particularly admired for his hard line against Iran. In China, leaders have enjoyed comfortable relations with Bush and are widely believed to be wary of a Democratic administration.

But elsewhere, people were praising Obama, 46, whose heavy emphasis on the Internet helped make him better known in more nations than perhaps any US primary candidate in history. In Kenya, Obama’s victory was greeted with unvarnished glee. In Kisumu, close to the home of Obama’s late father, hundreds crowded around televisions to watch Obama’s victory speech Wednesday morning, chanting “Obama tosha!” which translates as, “Obama is enough!”

Obama has strong support in Europe, the heartland of anti-Bush sentiment. “Germany is Obama country,” said Karsten Voight, the German government’s coordinator for German-North American cooperation. “He seems to strike a chord with average Germans,” who see him as a transformational figure such as John F. Kennedy or Martin Luther King Jr.

For many, Obama’s skin colour is deeply symbolic. As the son of an African and a white woman from Kansas, Obama has the brownish “everyman” skin colour shared by hundreds of millions of people. “He looks like Egyptians. You can walk in the streets and find people who look like him,” said Manar el-Shorbagi, a specialist in US political affairs at the American University in Cairo.

In terms of foreign policy, Obama’s willingness to meet and talk with leaders of Iran, Syria and other nations shunned by the Bush administration has been both praised and criticised overseas.

In Israel, Gilboa said Obama’s openness to negotiating with Iran and Syria has contributed to the sense that his Middle East policies are too soft. When a leader of Hamas expressed a preference for Obama earlier this year, that turned off many Israelis even more. Many in Israel said they would have preferred Clinton, who is well regarded because of her support for the Jewish state in the Senate. Obama’s candidacy has generated suspicion among Palestinians as well. Ali Jarbawi, a political scientist at the West Bank’s Birzeit University, said that even if Obama appears to be even-handed in his approach to the Middle East, he would never take on the pro-Israel lobby in Washington. “The minute Obama takes office, all his aides in the White House will start working on his re-election,” Jarbawi said. “Do you think Obama would risk his re-election because of us?”

In Iran, government officials have taken no official position on the US race, but several people interviewed said the government and average Iranians would welcome Obama and direct talks between Tehran and Washington. “The majority of Iranians feel that the Democrats support what they want: a drastic change in relations with the US. So for them, the coming of Obama would be a good omen,” said Hermidas Bavand, professor of US-Iranian relations at the Allameh Tabatabai University.

In Latin America, Obama’s recent declaration that he would meet Presidents Hugo Chavez of Venezuela and Raul Castro of Cuba has been widely welcomed as a break from Bush policy, though, he has declared that he is not an admirer of Chavez.

Obama is popular in Colombia largely because of deep resentments toward the Bush administration’s policies, including the Iraq war.

Still, not everyone has been riveted by the US election. Russians have proven supremely indifferent to the U.S. primaries; one poll earlier this year found that only 5 per cent of Russians said they were closely watching the race.