DATE=April 15, 2002

TYPE=Dateline

NUMBER=7-36175

TITLE=AMERICA'S IMAGE ABROAD

BYLINE=Ania Zalewski

TELEPHONE=202/ 619-1287

DATELINE=Washington

EDITOR=Neal Lavon

CONTENT=

DISK: DATELINE THEME [PLAYED IN STUDIO, FADED UNDER DATELINE HOST VOICE OR PROGRAMMING MATERIAL]

HOST: Cowboys, rock and roll, and affluence. That's what many people associate with America and Americans. But they also think of poverty, crime, and a swagger born of affluence. America's economic, political and military strength demands the world's attention. A recent conference in Washington provided details on how that attention is focused and received. Here's Neal Lavon and this edition of Dateline.

TAPE: CUT 1, KAPLAN,:08

"It never ceased to amaze me how much the world is centered on the United States. I don't think most Americans are aware of that."

NL: David Kaplan, Senior Editor of U.S. News & World Report, was among many participants of the 2002 Fulbright Scholars Conference held recently in Washington. The Fulbright program, named for the former chairman of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the late J. William Fulbright, sends American scholars abroad and brings foreign academics here. This conference brought together foreign policy makers, academics and scholars from all around the world. Nationally-known polling director Andrew Kohut told the group about his sampling of international opinion about the United States.

TAPE: CUT 2, KOHUT, :19

"I think the United States has been a reluctant superpower, and I think its position as the sole superpower gives it a responsibility, but also prevents it from being seen in a positive light when it does something positive."

NL: Andrew Kohut is Director of the Pew Research Center, and he based his findings on 275 interviews in 40 countries with opinion leaders in politics, media, business, the arts and government. The research was originally devoted to globalization. But after the events of September 11th, the survey refocused on one topic: "How the World Sees the U.S. and How Americans View the World". He specifically asked international elites about America's war on terrorism and, except for people in Western Europe, attitudes were surprisingly negative.

TAPE: CUT 3, KOHUT, :42

"Three quarters, in fact, of Mexicans and Argentines disapproved of American actions in Afghanistan. In most Eastern European countries, except Kosovo, opponents outnumbered proponents of U.S. led war. Even in Russia - the public of our new ally - we found of 39 to 50% margin opposed to U.S. war in Afghanistan. There was mixed reaction in Asia; support of the war in India, obviously, but more than eighty percent in Pakistan and Malaysia opposed, mixed reaction even in Japan and South Korea. Gallup only found a broad support in Western Europe."

NL: Asked for their views on American conduct of the war, most world opinion leaders said they thought the U.S. had failed to take into account the interests of its allies and friends. A strong majority of American elites said if proof existed that other nations promoted terrorism, or protected terrorists, then the United States would be justified to take military action against them. But a poll from the U.S.-based Gallup organization showed how perceptions vary on opposite sides of the ocean. Andrew Kohut.

TAPE: CUT 4, KOHUT, :19

"Only a third of Americans, according to Gallup, worried that extending the war might lead to a clash of civilizations between Islam and the West, but more than fifty percent in Western Europe had this worry and more than two-thirds in most of the other parts of the world had that concern."

NL: Some of the Fulbright scholars expressed similar concerns, accusing the United States of trying to force American values on other cultures. One such scholar was Ahmad Al-Oumar [AGH-mad AHL-oh-MAR] from Syria.

TAPE: CUT 5, AL-OUMAR, :14

"Throughout this campaign, it's noticed there is a strong tendency from (the side of) America to impose its values on other cultures despite the fact that cultures, people are different, and values are different."

NL: But even knowing its faults, Thomas Gorguissian, Washington Bureau Chief of Egypt's Al-Wafd, says the outside worldespecially the Middle Eastremains infatuated with the image of America created by Hollywood. The problem is it doesn't like the idea of America which is being generated from Washington.

TAPE: CUT 6, GORGUISSIAN, :27

"Most of you I think will agree with me that the rest of the world are like the Egyptians, the Egyptians in general have the love-hate relationship with America. That feeling is shaped mainly by Hollywood and Washington. You know what is lov(ed) and what is hate(d). And usually by films and foreign policy. Even the adjective, americany, refers to use of the flash of the camera without taking real pictures, just to make people pose, smile and feel great for a while."

NL: The fear that American culture will overwhelm the world and a worry about how the United States flexes its military might, is already fueling a global identity of the United States that is causing concern in Washington. Andrew Kohut says his research shows there are additional reasons why America has an image problem.

TAPE: CUT 6, KOHUT, :26

"Resentment of U.S. power and the perception that U.S. policies contributes to the growing gap between rich and poor nations was far and away the most cited concern by the international opinion leaders about why America is not liked. They far exceeded more specific U.S. policies such as support for authoritarian governments, the growing power of multinational (corporations) and even our policies towards Israel, except in the Muslim countries."

NL: American democratic ideals also are thought to be appealing in most parts of the world. Some Muslim scholars point to this as a principal reason for their approval of America. Iman Nuwayhid (ee-MAN noo-AH-heed] is from Lebanon.

TAPE: CUT 7, NUWAYHID, :28

"People from around the world actually dream about coming to America and enjoying the land of opportunity and I think a lot of us also appreciate the opportunity of freedom of speech and freedom of expression. I think it's really puzzling in my mind why didn't the American government (…) work better on exporting the strengths of the civic society and democratic values."

NL: Andrew Kohut's polls and many of the Fulbright scholars say that America does not "export" what it does best. What they point out is that American opinion shapers underestimate the importance of the nation's role as a technological and scientific leader. This, they add, could bolster America's image overseas. Lara Maria Pia, a scholar from Mexico, pointed out another phenomenon. While many people outside the United States are critical of America and its policies, they often look to the U.S. as a moral compass.

TAPE: CUT 8, PIA, :29

"I think that we tend to forget what the Taliban people were doing to women for example. An interesting thing that happened in the last 50 years is that the United States is alone in a sense of being not only the most powerful country in the world but also maybe the only country that's really capable of assuming the role of being a moral and a political guide."

NL: So much for international opinion of the U.S. We'll take a look at what America thinks about the outside world in a moment.,

You're listening to the new Dateline heard 44 minutes past most odd U-T-C hours on VOA News Now. I'm Neal Lavon.

The polling data collected by Andrew Kohut, demonstrated that the outside world is, to a large extent, critical of America. But what does America think about the outside world? David Kaplan, Senior Editor of the weekly newsmagazine, U.S. News and World Report, summed it up bluntly.

TAPE: CUT 9, KAPLAN,:47

"We don't care about you. And I think this is reflected in the poll data. Perhaps this is a symbol of what's like to have an empire in an early twenty-first century. There was the January 2000 Gallop poll in which the Americans ranked the importance of issues in the presidential campaign - world affairs was twentieth. Now I'm sure things are different since 9-11, but let me continue, because survey after survey has found that the amounts of foreign news in the American news media has plummeted. One report has found that between 1989 and 2000, the use of our TV networks' overseas bureaus dropped by sixty-five percent."

NL: Why don't Americans care about the outside world? The reasons, say David Kaplan, may be traceable to the end of the Cold War, and the very culture that so alarms America's critics.

TAPE: CUT 10, KAPLAN, :33

"Perhaps there is a complacency that has sat in since the end of the Cold War, a feeling that the world doesn't matter. Some have pointed to an anti-intellectual current in popular American culture. Certainly if you look at our television you can see that readily apparent. Perhaps the one good result of the 9/11 disaster that it's shaken Americans out of their complacency - the world does matter and I think we're starting to understand that again ."

NL: America, for better or worse, is like the elephant in the international living room. It's hard to ignore, it's everywhere at once, and its presence dominates the available space. Whether everyone else decides to kick the elephant out, or accept it as a unique part of life, will be determined by millions of individual perceptions made both in the United States and around the world.

This edition of Dateline was written by Ania Zalewski. I'm Neal Lavon in Washington.

MUSIC: THE INTERNATIONAL RAG BY IRVING BERLIN, PERFORMED BY THE NEW LEVIATHAN ORIENTAL FOX TROT ORCEHSETRA TO TIME.