Fear of change: Two Americas led by Clinton and Trump inhabit separate political galaxies

Fear of change: Two Americas led by Clinton and Trump inhabit separate political galaxies:

Washington: A spectre hovers over America, the spirit of change. For many, it’s a blithe spirit heralding optimism about today and tomorrow, even as change drives life at a relentless speed. For others, it’s a haunting spectre, recklessly disrupting tradition, mores and social order.

The two worlds inhabit separate political galaxies, with very little travel in between. As the current election campaign enters its final laps, political polarisation in the US is as good as frozen. Donald Trump leads a part of the population which sees, with mounting fear, an America changing for the worse; Hillary Clinton leads the other part that sees the country as doing quite well amidst change and promises bright days ahead. The twain can no longer hope to meet.

Fear of change, of course, hangs over much of the world. It began to intensify in the 1990s with the advent of a new phase of globalisation in various forms: technological, economic, cultural, social, psychological. It swept across the globe at high speed, simultaneously generating anxiety and heady optimism. The storm rages on, disrupting the status quo everywhere.

In the US, however, fear of change may have deepened because of two factors apart from the economic, social and workplace disruptions caused by trade and technology. One is race; the other is gender. Both seem to have played significant roles in solidifying political polarisation.

The election in 2008 of Barack Obama as the country’s first African-American president was a cathartic event. Minorities, liberals and moderates celebrated; the hard right and its supporters played on persisting race anxieties to create a political movement to resist the demographic and cultural changes that Obama’s election signified. Trump in fact became a notable player in US politics by stoking precisely those anxieties. He led a drive demanding the president’s birth records to find out whether he had been born in Kenya, as some alleged, or in Hawaii.

Eight years of Obama’s presidency seem to have hardened attitudes on both sides of the political divide. And now comes the possibility of a woman occupying the highest office in the land. The very idea of a woman poised to succeed a black president appears to have sent many cultural conservatives scurrying to Trump in the hope that he will turn back the wave of change.

To clarify, Trump’s followers are by no means all race-biased or sexist. But many are, as opinion polls have shown during his campaign. His campaign staff includes a few near-extremists.

America has been an outlier among democracies when it comes to having a female head of state. India, Britain, Israel, Germany, Brazil and several other democratic nations have boasted female top leaders. Not the US. Why this is so is difficult to answer precisely. But one reason could be that cultural conservatives here have long had an influential presence in politics.

Hillary is the first ever woman to be a presidential candidate of either major party. As she campaigns, criticism of her appearance and looks and expression follows her. Now, many commentators argue legitimately about other shortcomings she may have as a presidential aspirant, but far too often the criticism strays, openly or implicitly, into gender characteristics.

Even her impressive debate performance last Monday had its share of male critics of her smile, demeanour and movements on stage. She is criticised, not least by her opponent, for not looking “presidential” or lacking “stamina” or raising her voice or not smiling as well as smiling too much!

Anna Waters, a debate coach and a junior year college student, wrote a fine essay in the Washington Post last Sunday listing some of the negativity that dogs women debaters, or any female in a male-dominated environ like US politics or business, from as early as high school.

She quotes another young woman on the matter of looking presidential: “To look presidential, includes a lot of things a woman can master and that any good debater should master, but ‘presidential’ as a concept has only ever come to us in the form of a man.”

Indeed. Again, how do you compare that other concept, ‘charisma’, in a woman leader when political charisma is largely defined by masculine models? Maybe women impress followers differently. Ask the seemingly uncharismatic Angela Merkel. One helluva tough leader, isn’t she?