Table Of ContentMatthias Maass
THE WORLD
VIEWS OF THE
OBAMA ERA
From Hope to
Disillusionment
The World Views of the Obama Era
Matthias Maass
Editor
The World Views of
the Obama Era
From Hope to Disillusionment
Editor
Matthias Maass
Yonsei University
Seoul, Korea (Republic of)
ISBN 978-3-319-61075-7 ISBN 978-3-319-61076-4 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-61076-4
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017951393
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In memoriam
Elspeth Rostow
A
cknowledgments
This book is dedicated to the late Professor Elspeth Rostow who, among
many other things, played a critical role in the establishment, evolution,
and development of the academic discipline of American Studies. This
book is a moderately modern interpretation of American Studies,
“updated” for an ever more global world but mindful of the discipline’s
traditional pillars Rostow taught and emphasized.
In her class, I met Dr. Charles D. Kupfer, now teaching American
Studies and History at Penn(sylvania) State University in Harrisburg. His
friendship is unrivaled, his intellectual support throughout this (and other)
project(s) was/were of critical importance, and his insights into things
American gave me perspective on an “Obama era” and “world views” on
the 44th American president. And I thank him for that.
Projects such as this one depend on modern information technology. I
do not know a particular person to thank, but I need to recognize the
anonymous work of many who are in the business of providing the tools
for instant communication across continents and oceans. In a related fash-
ion, I owe much gratitude to a long list of professionals at Palgrave-
Macmillan who were involved at various stages and in various functions in
a project that was in the works for more than two years.
I also wish to thank student assistants here at Yonsei University in
Seoul, especially Ksenia Andryushchenko who helped much with editing
and evaluating. Thanks are also due to Jordan DeWeger for his profes-
sional editorial and language editing work.
Special thanks to Frank Smith for his editorial work as native English
speaker, his calm handling of difficult tasks on short deadlines, and his
vii
viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
friendship. Similarly, I thank my colleague and friend Hans Schattle for
allowing me to vent from time to time, for allowing me to benefit from his
expertise, and for the professional wisdom he shared.
Despite all these individuals’ best efforts, though, this book project may
have flaws and shortcomings for which, however, only I am responsible.
Seoul, May 2017
c
ontents
1 “The World Views” of Barack Obama 1
Matthias Maass
2 The Barack Obama Presidency: Cuba 17
Michael Eleazar Parmly
3 Nigeria: Views from the Hegemon in West Africa on
the Obama Administration 31
Cassandra Veney
4 Obama Delivers for Kenya: On Business 49
Elijah Nyaga Munyi
5 Egypt and Obama: Turbulent Times, Bouncy Relations 65
Nael Shama
6 A Bilan of Eight Obama Years: Between Bush and Trump 87
Ruchi Anand
ix
x CONTENTS
7 Russia’s View on Obama’s Presidency: From Hope
to Disappointment 113
Ivan Kurilla and Victoria I. Zhuravleva
8 Turkish Perceptions of Turkey–US Relations
During Obama’s Presidency: Dialectics of Expectations/
Partnership and Disappointments/Estrangement 141
Müge Kınacıoğlu and Aylin G. Gürzel Aka
9 Israeli View of the Obama Era: A Relationship
Reexamined 171
Ronnie Olesker
10 Obama’s Legacy: The View from Persia 193
Barbara Ann Rieffer-Flanagan
11 Chinese Views of US Foreign Policy under the Obama
Administration 213
Gaye Christoffersen
12 South Korea’s Perceptions of Obama’s Foreign
Policy Toward Northeast Asia 237
Mason Richey
13 The Obama Era: The View from Indonesia 263
Prashanth Parameswaran
14 Obama and the United States–Pakistan Marriage
of Convenience 283
Christopher Clary and Niloufer Siddiqui
CONTENT S xi
15 India’s Views of the Obama Era: Maturing Defense
Partners but Reluctant Asia-Pacific Friends 309
Shivaji Kumar
16 The Obama Era in the Eyes of the World: From
High Hopes Back to Normalcy 327
Matthias Maass
Index 341
