Change in America

By Andrew Fan and Catrina Doxsee

We’re looking back over all of the interviews we recorded in D.C.  The most striking part is the incredible variety of people on the Mall. A group of young environmental activists, a retired teacher, and parents and their children all were among the roughly one million people that watched the inauguration from the Mall. Some jumped at the chance to speak in front of a camera, while others were more reluctant, talking in voices barely audible over the boom of the loudspeakers.

We asked all these people what they thought President Obama’s priorities should be.  Not surprisingly, the economy was, in the words of one person, “the answer almost everyone is going to give.”  Opinions on possible resolutions to the economic crisis ranged from job creation to increased support of the auto industry, but the general consensus was that Obama should take action to avert further disruption.

Just as interesting were those who didn’t mention the economy.  A number of people, including some advertising a student-run environmentalist rally in D.C., named the environment as their central concern, seeing it as an issue that needed to be addressed before any other action could be seriously considered.  The other topic that elicited a similar reaction was education, with several naming it as the most important.

The final hope that emerged during the trip was the desire for Obama to alter the fundamental attitudes of American politics.  Some regarded his biggest task as “fixing the way we do business in Washington D.C.,” and even many of those who saw the environment or the economy as more important still mentioned national unity and less partisan bickering.

In regard to international relations, the general consensus was that America’s reputation abroad has suffered under the Bush administration, but that Obama will be able to improve it.  Two of the people we interviewed had recently been abroad: one to South Africa, and the other to Europe. Both spoke of the hostility arising from America’s foreign policy over the last eight years and the dramatic changes they anticipated under Obama.  To capitalize on this fresh start, many urged Obama to be more willing to deal with other countries and groups, and to fulfill one of his campaign promises by talking with American foes in Cuba and Iran.

Both the variety of different answers and the common threads between them reveal the immense challenges facing Obama.  Nearly every person we talked to was worried by the economic crisis, and ensuring that it does not continue to worsen will be an immediate issue for his administration.  Likewise, the smaller but fervent group that cited the environment as a significant problem mirrors the vocal environmentalist organizations and the growing concern over energy sustainability and global warming.  Finally, the broad awareness of the United States’ poor reputation abroad reflects the unprecedented level of anti-Americanism internationally – somewhat the fault of George W. Bush – that Obama will have to face over the course of his presidency.

In addition to the major themes and looming national issues that colored the interviews, many of the concerns voiced were of a more personal nature.  A Philadelphia native talked extensively about urban policy and helping to improve the nation’s cities, while one woman talked solely about education, citing teacher pay, school supplies, and textbook price gouging as key concerns.  These individual anxieties were a reminder of the sheer number of problems that exist, and the different fronts that Obama will have to consider in the next four years.

During the campaign, Obama was sometimes seen as the candidate for specific groups, especially young people, African-Americans, and liberals.  The people on the Mall did not solely fit these views.  Blacks and whites, liberals there to cheer their candidate, and conservatives there to wish the new president luck all gathered on the mall.  The engaged young activists often seemed outnumbered by older Americans, many of whom remembered a time when the event they were witnessing would have been inconceivable.  The concerns they voiced illustrated the challenges that our new president will face from the start, but on the whole, the crowd was not pessimistic.  They came to the Mall to celebrate the new president and what they hoped would be a new dawn for America.