The Obama Effect

“I must admit that even the attitude (of) immigration officers at the airports has changed … not every black person is a desperate coming to the West for greener pastures.”

So says Deo Ladislas Ndakengerwa, the Policy and Campaigns Officer for the Irish Refugee Council, when asked about the effect of having a US President-elect of colour. “He is the most living and REAL inspiration to each of others especially to the next generation.”

This sentiment is being echoed back and forth and around the globe as arguably the most important election since the founding of the United States concludes. But the question has to be asked: Will this have a lasting motivational effect on the involvement of ethnic minorities in public life or is it simply a flash in the pan?

Here in Ireland, we are no strangers to controversial campaigns, having elected the first female president in Europe in 1990 with the inauguration of Mary Robinson and breaking yet more new ground when Mary McAleese was elected as the “first woman president having succeeded another one … in history”.

The effect that having female presidents has had on Mná na hEireann is debatable. When Robinson first came to the Áras, it was during a time of general female emancipation in Ireland and there was a growing trend already for greater political awareness and activity among Irish women. The National Women’s Council of Ireland had been in existence for nearly two decades, the Good Friday Agreement was proving pivotal in cross-border cooperation between women’s groups and there had been a surge in the number of female candidates standing for election to the Dáil from 8.5% of the total of those running in 1982 to 13.9% in 1987. So perhaps the time was ripe for a lady president. Added to this general ground-swell of female activism, ill-timed misogynistic comments by a government T.D. only added fuel to the fire and assured her of a sweeping victory.

During his election, the situation Obama faced States-side was not that dissimilar to Robinson’s election. On the one hand, Obama as a candidate of minority representation generated hot support from the black population. On the other, being put under direct threat by the Klan presented a powerful incentive to the populace to protect and support the (apparent) underdog.

But was the ground-work already laid for a coloured US president just like the path was cleared for a female president here? The growing body of Americans of colour attaining precedence in their fields of endeavour and making their mark on history, from musicians Sammy Davis Junior and Snoop Dogg to sportsmen Jesse Owens and Arthur Ashe, from Bond-girls Rosie Carver and Halle Berry to scientists Benjamin Banneker and Marjory Joyner, might say, yes, the foundations had been dug from aeons past. A coloured president was perhaps not so far out after all. Also, with the rise of Colin Powell and Condoleeza Rice to preeminent positions in the US administration, it is perhaps less and less surprising that a man of colour should be about to sit in the Oval Office. After all, standing on the shoulders of giants is a time-honoured way to reach the top and glass ceilings have been cracking in this manner though the generations.

According to Dr Maryann Valiulis, Director of the Centre for Gender and Women’s Studies in Trinity, when Mary Robinson came to the Áras, she made a point of visiting and encouraging women’s groups and community groups, started up women’s studies courses and was very supportive of women’s issues in general. On one occasion, she invited the entire editorial staff from the Irish Journal of Feminist Studies to the Áras for lunch, which was a move guaranteed to impress watchers both national and international and it was one which gave women’s and community groups in Ireland a legitimacy heretofore largely unknown. However, as Dr Valiulis points out, in practical and real measures the representation of women in public life has remained to a greater or lesser extent static, stagnating in or around 13%. It may therefore be argued that a female presidency did not have a revolutionary effect on the motivation of women to partake in public life and was instead simply a welcome bright spot on a longer journey. But was it a necessary shot-in-the-arm to the women’s movement here in Ireland? Would the drive have faltered without President Robinson’s feminist priorities and does President-elect Obama have the same focus on colour-issues in US?

Unlike Robinson who wore her gender like a badge, stating in her inaugural address “As a woman, I want the women who have felt themselves outside history to be written back into history”, Obama only owned the issue of his colour towards the end of the race, acknowledging it almost grudgingly, almost reneging on his early commitments to not play the race card during the election. While Mary Robinson wanted to be elected as a Woman, Barack Obama did not want to be elected as a Black Man, but simply as an American. While understandable, this may prove crucial to those who wish to use him as a mascot for change.

A number of questions need to be answered. Will Obama’s personal ambition be translatable into a desire and impetus for representation beyond Obama and his immediate supporters? In other words, will his mere existence be powerful enough as a mascot or will he need to be an active and driving force behind the ethnic minorities’ movements to see lasting change in our governments worldwide? And will the euphoria being witnessed by ethnic minorities in general and black communities in particular translate into real changes in public representation? All this remains to be seen.

Perhaps Mr Ndakengerwa sums it up best. “After the election of the most intelligent and smart black living (sic) at the moment, it feels like impossible is nothing. But it also has demonstrated that nothing comes easily- you need to earn it.”


References:
Websites:
http://www.terra.es/personal2/monolith/00women2.htm
http://www.nwci.ie
http://www.cleveland.com/moviebuff/index.ssf/2008/11/female_bonding_from_ursula_and.html
http://blog.spout.com/2008/11/12/5-bond-girls-who-died-after-wearing-a-bikini/
http://afroamhistory.about.com
http://www.infoplease.com/spot/bhmpeople6.html
http://www.cmgww.com/sports/ashe/
http://www.lehigh.edu/~incntr/publications/perspectives/v19/Patterson.PDF
http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/new_hibernia_review/v012/12.3.hardy.html

Email:
From Deo Ladislas Ndakengerwa (Deo@irishrefugeecouncil.ie) to Anne-Marie Curtin (a_m_c_29@hotmail.com) on the 19th November 2008, 16:09:32

Telephone conversation:
With Dr Maryann Valiulis, Director of the Centre for Gender and Women’s Studies in TCD on the 7th November 2008

Books:
Politics in the Republic of Ireland, 4th Ed. p272-302; ed. Coakley, J. & Gallagher, M.; pub. by Routledge in association with PSAI Press 2006

Newspapers:
Obama’s victory speech, transcribed in p4, The Guardian, 6th November, 2008