Barack Obama's Post-American Foreign Policy The Limits of Engagement

Barack Obama's election was widely perceived as a turning point in American foreign policy after the controversial and often divisive period under George W. Bush. The great expectations for change in style and substance were significantly, possibly permanently, tempered according to Robert Singh's analysis at the midway point of Obama's first term.The distance between the "change euphoria" of November 2008 and the reality of today is the result of two key factors. First, the international problems confronting Obama appear intractable, especially with the United States stretched thin, both economically and militarily. Equally important, the partial delivery of Obama's "change agenda" has been criticized by conservatives as advancing America's decline and by liberals as showing continuity with the policies of his Republican predecessor.Singh argues that Obama's international approach of "strategic engagement" and his search for the pragmatic ideological middle have cost him political support at home and abroad and have failed to make decisive gains. As such, while assessing his foreign policies to the emergence of what is becoming a "post-American" world, the president has yet to craft or preside over a long-awaited renaissance in American global leadership.

Robert Singh is Professor of Politics at Birkbeck College, University of London, UK. His publications include American Government and Politics (2003), Contemporary American Politics: Issues and Controversies (2003), (as co-editor) The Bush Doctrine and the War on Terrorism (2006) and (as co-author) After Bush: The Case For Continuity in American Foreign Policy (2008).