Obama snubs Brown? So what?
MORI founder Sir Robert Worcester reports what people feel about the `Special Relationship'
There goes the "Special Relationship"?
Every week it seems that e.g. a160Rachel Sylvester in the Times argues that since fewer than 5% of Americans don't know who Gordon Brown is proves that my two countries have fallen out of love, as does a TV clip of160Obama giving David Miliband a big hello at the same time "snubbing" Brown. Whenever there's something to do with the US in the news, the British media seem to feel the need to report that the "special relationship" is dead. It really doesn't matter if John Doe in America or Joe Bloggs in Britain have heard of Brown or not, the strength of the "special relationship" is not measured by the views of the hard hat from Dayton or a taxi driver in Bradford. The Special Relationship depends on solid bonds in four key areas, diplomatic, defence and intelligence, nuclear and business. These are all in very good shape, no matter these `inside the beltway/chattering class' stories. Former diplomat160Sir Jeremy Greenstock said as much on Newsnight last week. Most current and former British ambassadors, whether they've served in America or not, will tell you the same, and that while recognising that Britain is the junior partner, they'd a lot rather Britain to be in alliance with the USA than not. The new American Ambassador, Louis Susman, proclaimed in his first formal speech earlier this month at a Pilgrims Society dinner160how strong our two nation's ties are, and how he intends to maintain them so. His Bush appointed predecessor, Ambassador Robert Tuttle, in his departing speech to the Pilgrims a few months ago pointed out that every year during his four year term at Winfield House some 12,000-15,000 American senior civil servants, American politicians and members of the American judiciary visited their opposite numbers in Britain. There's no other country that comes close. He too proclaimed the value of British contribution to the close and deep friendship which suits the interests of both countries as does the two countries' business ties. There is no question either that when you speak with one of Britain's top military commanders, Navy, Army, or RAF they all endorse its importance. They all know their opposite numbers, many have served with American forces, and all of them hold the defence special relationship in high regard. This is true not only on this side of the Atlantic; it's also true, in spades, in America. There was no stronger advocate of this than the former Chairman of the American Joint Chiefs of Staff, the late Admiral William Crowe, to be Ambassador to the Court of St James's. Ambassador Crowe was living proof of the high regard with which both the American diplomatic and military at the highest level regard the contribution made by Britain not just to partnering with the United States but also the contribution that Britain makes to the United Nations, its Security Council, the G7/G20 and to the world. Our universities are respected by their educators as are our scientists. We are not as rich, that's for sure, but in the clichйd phrase Britain certainly punches above its weight in education and science and in demonstrating British values are shared with the American establishment. After all, Americans learned them from its British colonists. A week ago I was in Paris to speak at an international meeting of the English-Speaking Union. My brief: "The Image of America: Then and Now". Using a mixture of sources, Ipsos's British data, Ipsos North America's 22 country study, the Pew Foundation's annual 25 country project, the German Marshall Fund/Taylor Nelson Sofres's findings, I contrasted attitudes to America across the world then, a year ago, and now, following the change in the White House from George W Bush to Barak Obama.
Even at its lowest, in Bush's last year in office, 2008, a majority of the British public (53%) had a favourable opinion of the United States; it had dropped 30 points from 2000 before Bush took over from Clinton.
It hasn't totally recovered, but it's up 16 points to 69% now, according to Pew's study. Over the past year France has gone from 42% favourable to 75%, Germany from 31% to 64% and Spain from 33% to 58%; an average increase across these four countries of +73%.
In a smorgasbord of other countries from Korea to Poland, Brazil to Nigeria, India to Argentina Pew found that the average increase in favourability across 13 countries was 10%. In the Middle East and Turkey, Russia and China however the average increase is only up 2%, not a statistically significant difference. When asked last year just 16% of the British public said they had a confidence in President George W Bush to do the right thing regarding world affairs. Six months into the Obama presidency 86% of the people in Britain said they had confidence in US President Barak Obama to do the right thing to do with world affairs, a massive 70 point increase. In 2008, TNS/GMF found that only 38% said it was desirable that the United States exerts strong leadership in world affairs. That figure is now at 58%, up 20 points. Similar figures are found in other Western Europe countries.
Ipsos North America160provided some prescriptive data from an international study conducted just after Obama's election last November. They found when they asked citizens in 22 countries "Thinking about the attributes listed please choose the top two attributes that you think are the most important for a country to have in order to be respected?" the top three scores (out of a dozen) were "respects human rights", "respect the rights of its citizens" and "contributes to international peace and cooperation".
But when they asked over 20,000 people across the world how they rated the USA on these 12 factors, "respect the rights of its citizens" ranked 6th, "respects human rights" 8th, and out of 12 attributes, "contributes to international peace and cooperation" ranked just 11th. One of the other speakers at the Paris meeting was the new Ambassador to France, and another was the Parliamentary majority spokesman on Defence. In closing I put up the British data on "Do you favour or oppose US led efforts in Afghanistan?" and "Should the US and NATO keep troops in Afghanistan or remove them?". The French defence spokesman said "I am sure the figures in France would be much lower". In fact the French were ten points higher than the British on supporting US efforts in Afghanistan and four points higher on believing that the US and NATO should keep troops in Afghanistan.
Sir Robert Worcester is the Founder of MORI
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