The Cultural Paradoxes Of Obama’s Middle East Policy

In the process of globalization, the leadership of America is facing unprecedentedchallenges politically as much as economically and culturally and so on. BarackObama’s coming to power in2008psychologically raised the hopes of not onlyAmericans but also others all over the world that he can give the world peace andprosperity. President Obama surely changed the implementation of President Bush’sunilateralism as soon as he took office, and spared no efforts to promote his “SmartPower” strategy, adopting multilateral talks, in order to invite more countries to dealwith the global affairs, on the premise of not endangering America’s national interests.He attempted to retard the trend of America’s comprehensive national strength torelatively decline, renewing its super power. Obama’s Middle East Policy, as anindispensable part of “Smart Power” strategy, is playing a very important part in globallayout.The “Smart Power” strategy is a new line President Obama’s is adopting indiplomacy and domestic affairs, including the balance of “Soft Power” and “HardPower” in diplomacy and the balance of diplomacy and domestic affairs. What’s more,it is also detailed by Obama’s Middle East Policy. There are “Arab Spring” to promotethe democratic renovation and “Marshall’s Plan” in the Middle East to encourage andfinance Arabian renovation and reconcile the conflicts between Arabians and Israelisand Americans and so on.Many scholars both in China and the United States have done deep research on the“Smart Power” strategy and Obama’s Middle East Policy, mainly from their nature andimpacts on the U.S. foreign policy, as well as predictive analysis of their influences. Butfew people have made an analysis of the formation of Obama’s Middle East Policy fromthe perspectives of the cultural values, and explored its cultural background from theperspective of history. Thus, this thesis tries to analyze Obama’s Middle East Policy,and its main cultural paradoxes President Obama’s Middle Policy is facing from theperspective of cultural values including three aspects: the paradoxes of “the other” and“the same”, religion and secularity, and democracy and hegemony, and then furtherdiscuss their cultural roots------the sense of manifest destiny, acquisitive morality and universalism in cultural values in the United States, and finally draw a conclusion thatthe chaos in the Middle East can not be ascribed to the clash of civilization Huntingtonsaid, because the clash of civilization is just a superficial appearance, and the culturalparadoxes of Obama’s Middle East Policy should root in America’s in-depth culture.