I will preface this by saying that any and all comments posted in response to this will be deleted. This is intended as observations, not as the start of a political debate.
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Anyone who knows me will be aware of how I feel about the 2016 Presidential Election results but experiencing it from afar - both the process itself and seeing it through the eyes of others - was pretty interesting.
When talking to people from outside the US, it is remarkable how many are knowledgeable about our government, and not only about this election. At a time when, for example, sizable numbers of US citizens know very little about the Supreme Court, it is striking when people know not just who is President but about the congressional structure, the Electoral College, key figures in any given administration, etc. I am confident in saying that they tend to know not only more than we know about their governments, but also more than many of us know about our own. As an example, someone I met in Slovenia (an ordinary citizen, not a politician or diplomat) was asking me specific questions about how the Electoral College operates and comparing it to the British Parliamentary system around the same time that a candidate for the US Presidency was unable to name a single leader of a country outside the US and college students were unable to name the US Vice President. I had similar conversations with people in Malta, Taiwan, England, Holland and Belgium, making it clear to me that this heightened level of knowledge is pretty common.
My observations about this may be partly skewed because I work for an intergovernmental organization, one focus of which is democracy and elections. My co-workers are from many different countries (there are only a few of us from the US) and many had a more-than-usual interest in the election due to the nature of their jobs. Regardless of that, the interest I notice is also from people outside of my organization - people working in academia, advertising, finance, technology and science.
One result of the more international focus I see on the part of Europeans is that the election results were not as shocking for some as they were for many in the US, probably because the current trend has been going on in Europe for a while and has not stopped. Poland's presidential election in 2015 resulted in a candidate with limited experience in public office (four years in Parliament) defeating the incumbent president. His nationalistic, more-conservative party (although he officially resigned from it as he took office) went on to win control of Parliament and has since seen the one-party control as a mandate to carry out changes desired by the party leader. These changes has been very divisive, leading to street protests, heated arguments between friends and family members, and a lot of anguish on the part of people who believe that economic and social progress made since the fall of communism is in jeopardy. Supporters view these changes as necessary to reclaim Poland's pride and independence from what they see as European Union overreach, the threat of immigration and the dilution of Polish culture. Sound familiar? That the now-governing party won the elections in 2015 was a surprise result to many at the time.
Overall, what I see is that many people in Europe feel affected by the US election in a way that is not reciprocal; that is to say, the role that successive US administrations have carved out and maintained over the years has led many to rely on the US for a sense of stability while much of the US population does not pay much attention to the politics of other countries because they believe it really has no impact on their lives.
The act of voting itself was also an education. During my stint in the Peace Corps I got familiar with the absentee voting process and thought I understood it, but things change. I voted without a hitch in the New York State primary - I was registered, I got my ballot by email, I mailed it back as instructed and I was able to confirm over the phone that the ballot had been received. I then waited for my ballot for the general election,,,and waited, and waited. As it was getting close to election day with no ballot, I logged onto the website but was unable to determine what had happened. I called the information line to discover that New York State had recently changed its rules about emailing ballots - only those who indicated that they were permanently away would receive email ballots while others (like myself) who were away only temporarily would have only have paper ballots mailed to them (problematic since I had recently moved and had not updated my mailing address - I know, my own fault). The person I spoke to was not able to explain the rationale for the change but indicated that if I changed my status I could receive the ballot my email. I did so (just in time, it seems) got my ballot, mailed it back via the US Embassy in Warsaw and was able to confirm it was received in time. Good thing I called.
The time difference also prevented me from keeping up with the results, so what I expected when I went to bed was quite different from what I woke up to. By the time the election was called officially, I was on my way to work rather than in the middle of an all-nighter (this works in my favor for seeing the Oscars also, but that is another matter).
Since the election, I am bombarded by questions about what it all means and, unfortunately, the answer is "I have no idea." The mixed messages about Russia, the UN, NATO, and pretty much everything else have made it hard to predict what it to be expected from the US. The Polish government is officially happy about the result but there are reservations as I mention above. I note the protests going on in the US, note the ones still ongoing in Poland and notice a sense of unease among many people whose lives now seem a lot less predictable than they did only a short time ago. The recent announcement that the US may cut its funding to the UN and similar organizations makes me wonder about what that means for the OSCE (where the US is the largest contributor, although most people I know have never heard of it). In my office there are numerous programs funded with additional US assistance (such as combating human trafficking, improving electoral systems and combating antisemitism) and the uncertainty extends to the question of future projects.
Because (as I mentioned above) Poland had a divisive election of its own and from my visit to London after the Brexit vote, I have already seen the effect on human interaction that is going on back home. People viewing political differences as a character deficiency, the willingness to believe the worst about other people because of how they voted, personal attacks from strangers to a comment or a shared article on Facebook, happy birthday messages becoming springboards for hurling insults - none of this is limited to the US. Not to mention the real life stories I hear of family members falling out because they do not (or cannot) discuss things civilly. As someone who is frequently in the news is fond of saying: Sad.
So I will continue to support what I support and engage civilly when I think there is a point to it, but mostly I try to just get on with my life. When I was in a bar recently, a Swede who learned I am from the US asked me my opinion about the election. After pausing a moment I said I would rather just drink my beer. In vino civilitas.
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Anyone who knows me will be aware of how I feel about the 2016 Presidential Election results but experiencing it from afar - both the process itself and seeing it through the eyes of others - was pretty interesting.
When talking to people from outside the US, it is remarkable how many are knowledgeable about our government, and not only about this election. At a time when, for example, sizable numbers of US citizens know very little about the Supreme Court, it is striking when people know not just who is President but about the congressional structure, the Electoral College, key figures in any given administration, etc. I am confident in saying that they tend to know not only more than we know about their governments, but also more than many of us know about our own. As an example, someone I met in Slovenia (an ordinary citizen, not a politician or diplomat) was asking me specific questions about how the Electoral College operates and comparing it to the British Parliamentary system around the same time that a candidate for the US Presidency was unable to name a single leader of a country outside the US and college students were unable to name the US Vice President. I had similar conversations with people in Malta, Taiwan, England, Holland and Belgium, making it clear to me that this heightened level of knowledge is pretty common.
My observations about this may be partly skewed because I work for an intergovernmental organization, one focus of which is democracy and elections. My co-workers are from many different countries (there are only a few of us from the US) and many had a more-than-usual interest in the election due to the nature of their jobs. Regardless of that, the interest I notice is also from people outside of my organization - people working in academia, advertising, finance, technology and science.
One result of the more international focus I see on the part of Europeans is that the election results were not as shocking for some as they were for many in the US, probably because the current trend has been going on in Europe for a while and has not stopped. Poland's presidential election in 2015 resulted in a candidate with limited experience in public office (four years in Parliament) defeating the incumbent president. His nationalistic, more-conservative party (although he officially resigned from it as he took office) went on to win control of Parliament and has since seen the one-party control as a mandate to carry out changes desired by the party leader. These changes has been very divisive, leading to street protests, heated arguments between friends and family members, and a lot of anguish on the part of people who believe that economic and social progress made since the fall of communism is in jeopardy. Supporters view these changes as necessary to reclaim Poland's pride and independence from what they see as European Union overreach, the threat of immigration and the dilution of Polish culture. Sound familiar? That the now-governing party won the elections in 2015 was a surprise result to many at the time.
The Brexit vote was another indicator. When I was on vacation last spring I had a conversation with a British man about the upcoming vote and he explained to me why he was voting to leave the European Union - he saw it as a question of safety, whereby allowing anyone from the other EU countries free access to Britain was a danger. When I asked him about the economic impact (that the cost of anything imported from outside the UK was likely to increase), his ability to travel easily and other aspects of EU membership he mentioned that he hadn't considered that but that he was sure all would be taken care of. The final result of the Brexit vote caught many by surprise, including people who voted for it. According to a news report: "After the result was announced, the top question on the EU that was asked on Google in the U.K. was 'What does it mean to leave the EU?' the company said on Twitter. The second top question: 'What is the EU?'"
Similar results were seen in Austria, where a far-right candidate came the closest to winning the presidency in 2016 than has happened since World War II. Gains by nationalist parties have also been seen in France, the Netherlands, Denmark, Hungary and Switzerland.
So, as one colleague kept reminding me a the election drew close "the Populists keep winning" yet people here seemed to think the US might be different. This may be due to wishful thinking about what people have gotten used to with respect to US foreign policy. This is particularly noticeable when the topic of Russia comes up when speaking to Polish people, as the view of their neighbor can be politely termed as "suspicious". Those suspicions are understandable when you consider:
- Poland was officially partitioned three times among the Prussian, Austrian and Russian empires (the third one wiping Poland off the map until the end of World War I).
- Poland was again occupied following the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, and ultimately a lot of the territory occupied by the Soviets never made its way back into Polish territory. This rawness of this was recently renewed when the Russian ambassador to Poland kinda blamed Poland for the start of World War II.
- The Soviet Army "rescued" Poland from Nazi Germany, but waited to do so until after the Nazis stamped out the Warsaw Uprising and burned down most of what remained of the city.
- The governing party in Poland alleges that Russia assassinated its former president (who, by the way, was the identical twin brother of the leader of the governing party).
The act of voting itself was also an education. During my stint in the Peace Corps I got familiar with the absentee voting process and thought I understood it, but things change. I voted without a hitch in the New York State primary - I was registered, I got my ballot by email, I mailed it back as instructed and I was able to confirm over the phone that the ballot had been received. I then waited for my ballot for the general election,,,and waited, and waited. As it was getting close to election day with no ballot, I logged onto the website but was unable to determine what had happened. I called the information line to discover that New York State had recently changed its rules about emailing ballots - only those who indicated that they were permanently away would receive email ballots while others (like myself) who were away only temporarily would have only have paper ballots mailed to them (problematic since I had recently moved and had not updated my mailing address - I know, my own fault). The person I spoke to was not able to explain the rationale for the change but indicated that if I changed my status I could receive the ballot my email. I did so (just in time, it seems) got my ballot, mailed it back via the US Embassy in Warsaw and was able to confirm it was received in time. Good thing I called.
The time difference also prevented me from keeping up with the results, so what I expected when I went to bed was quite different from what I woke up to. By the time the election was called officially, I was on my way to work rather than in the middle of an all-nighter (this works in my favor for seeing the Oscars also, but that is another matter).
Since the election, I am bombarded by questions about what it all means and, unfortunately, the answer is "I have no idea." The mixed messages about Russia, the UN, NATO, and pretty much everything else have made it hard to predict what it to be expected from the US. The Polish government is officially happy about the result but there are reservations as I mention above. I note the protests going on in the US, note the ones still ongoing in Poland and notice a sense of unease among many people whose lives now seem a lot less predictable than they did only a short time ago. The recent announcement that the US may cut its funding to the UN and similar organizations makes me wonder about what that means for the OSCE (where the US is the largest contributor, although most people I know have never heard of it). In my office there are numerous programs funded with additional US assistance (such as combating human trafficking, improving electoral systems and combating antisemitism) and the uncertainty extends to the question of future projects.
Because (as I mentioned above) Poland had a divisive election of its own and from my visit to London after the Brexit vote, I have already seen the effect on human interaction that is going on back home. People viewing political differences as a character deficiency, the willingness to believe the worst about other people because of how they voted, personal attacks from strangers to a comment or a shared article on Facebook, happy birthday messages becoming springboards for hurling insults - none of this is limited to the US. Not to mention the real life stories I hear of family members falling out because they do not (or cannot) discuss things civilly. As someone who is frequently in the news is fond of saying: Sad.
So I will continue to support what I support and engage civilly when I think there is a point to it, but mostly I try to just get on with my life. When I was in a bar recently, a Swede who learned I am from the US asked me my opinion about the election. After pausing a moment I said I would rather just drink my beer. In vino civilitas.
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