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| Jamal Mecklai: The New American Dream | |
| Obama’s inauguration will be seen symbolically as the birth of the New American Dream | | Jamal Mecklai / New Delhi January 9, 2009, 0:36 IST | |
I believe that Mr Obama’s inauguration as President of the United States will be seen symbolically as the birth of the New American Dream. Not because a black man has become President for the first time in history — to the contrary and gratifyingly, Mr Obama’s blackness is hardly ever mentioned, except, of course, in some cobwebbed corners of the Republican Party.
Again, this is not to suggest that Mr Obama is some kind of messiah. Messianic he may be and smart he definitely is, but, to my mind, his election to the presidency is more the result, rather than the cause, of this New American Dream, which has been in gestation for several years — perhaps, a couple of decades — waiting for the old dream to decay and die out, which, as is all too apparent, it has.
The Old American Dream was the opportunity for every [white, heterosexual] married couple to buy their own home in the suburbs, with a two-car garage, where they would live happily ever after with their mandatory 2.2 children. Today, America is no longer white — Hispanics, blacks and other non-white immigrants make up a significant percentage of the population; gay couples are slowly but surely getting recognized by the face of law; and, of course, more people in America are divorced or single than married. Clearly, the Old American Dream is structurally dead.
Operationally, too, it’s on life support, with home ownership having turned into a nightmare for many Americans, and the American automobile industry more or less gone.
It is, perhaps, unsurprising — the law of unintended consequences — that the very success of the Old American Dream carried within it the seeds of its decline. Since blue collar work — building all those houses and making all those cars — enabled a very comfortable — handsome, compared to most parts of the world — life, people had very little incentive to spend time and money on education. And if the kids simply wanted to play baseball and drink beer and, at graduation (or even before) follow Dad to the plant — well, it wasn’t really a bad life, was it?
Thus, education — which, everywhere else in the world, is recognized as the key to a better life — never had a major place in the American Dream. And as technology and, in particular the Internet — both really products of the American Dream — began to change the world by bringing information and knowledge to the thirsting millions everywhere, the American Dream began to shrivel.
Of course, it is not to say there was no focus on education — to the contrary, America still has the best considered higher education infrastructure. It’s just that Middle America didn’t really believe that a good education was the key to a good life. A direct result is that Americans, certainly till very recently, scored about as poorly on quantitative tests and on history and general knowledge as kids from the poorest countries. And it is also why America has consistently elected not very well-educated — and, in some cases, not very bright — presidents. Indeed, even highly educated ones, like Bill Clinton, pushed the good old boy image at the expense of his educated “elitist” side.
In many ways, this lack of appreciation of the importance of education — and particularly an understanding of history and world culture — has led to the poor image of America in the world, and, worse, the bumbling militarism of American foreign policy over the past 50 years.
The good news — a result of the coming of age of the New American Dream — is that President-elect Obama recognizes this gap. He is reportedly planning to substantially increase funding for the United States Information Service. The USIS, before President Reagan — an American Dreamer, if there ever was one — effectively closed it down in the 1980s, was America’s public relations arm, and, while it did deliver some propaganda, it mostly served to educate Americans and American diplomats about the rest of the world.
Thus, the hallmark of the New American Dream is a dramatic new focus on education. Mr Obama, in his focus on the subject and in his selection of his Education Secretary, has shown a definitive commitment — indeed, it would be great if our Prime Minister could show such focus. And, of course, his own example will certainly inspire the huge underclass of poorly educated Americans — black, white, of all colours and races — to work to improve themselves.
And while all this is excellent news for America, it is equally good news for the world. A more educated and globally tuned America — let’s not forget that Mr Obama’s life experience has been multi-racial and multi-cultural, again symbolizing the New American Dream — will be a huge force for positive change in the world.
And, of course, the timing is perfect. The collapse of the flimflam world of finance has opened the window for young people (and older fellas, like us) to explore new areas of endeavour (as well as neglected old ones), and push our creativity to resolve the large issues of our time — cultural clashes (rest in peace, Mr Huntington), the environment and inequity.
People say that 2009 will be a special year in world history. The birth of the New American Dream will be part of it.
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