Obama's risky strategy

In accepting his Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo last Thursday, US President Barack Obama talked about the quiet dignity of human rights reformers such as Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi, the bravery of Zimbabwean voters who "cast their ballots in the face of beatings" and the need to bear witness to "the hundreds of thousands who have marched silently through the streets of Iran."

Earlier in the week, thousands of Iranians did just that, gathering at university campuses in the most substantial demonstrations in the country since summer, when hundreds of thousands protested Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's disputed presidential election.

But back in June, even as much of the world cheered the Iranian protesters, Obama seemed reluctant to weigh in. The White House may have feared that public support from Obama would allow the regime to paint the demonstrators as American stooges or might undermine US efforts on Tehran's nuclear programme. Such fears seemed to paralyse the administration.

The irony of Obama's Nobel Prize is not that he accepted it while waging two wars. The stranger thing is that, from China to Sudan, from Myanmar to Iran, a president lauded for his commitment to peace has dialled down a US commitment to human rights, one that persisted through both Republican and Democratic administrations dating back at least to Jimmy Carter. And so far, he has little to show for it.

For one thing, Obama clearly wants to distinguish himself from George W. Bush, who badly tainted the human rights agenda by linking it to the war in Iraq and by adopting an overly moralistic, evangelical tone about democracy. According to administration officials, this desire may have led Obama, early on, to be reticent about forcefully advocating democracy abroad, even as he boosted funding for democracy-promotion programmes. But they believe the administration has reversed course and the President is now talking more aggressively about democracy and human rights.

Some officials believe negotiating about human rights behind the scenes works better than bullying in public, since it permits nasty regimes to save face while, at least theoretically, allowing them to quietly make concessions. And some of the administration's top human rights advocates came into office focused, not unnecessarily, on cleaning up America's own abuses, from Guantanamo Bay to its own rendition programme.

In other cases, Obama seems to have decided that winning support on challenges such as nuclear proliferation and climate change means treading quietly around human rights. With China, Obama may also be hesitant to risk alienating the US's $800 billion (Dh2.94 trillion) banker.

Yet, there is little evidence that his strategy will succeed. Obama may have toned down US rhetoric, but who's to say whether this will propel Iran and North Korea to halt their nuclear programmes, or whether China will prove to be an effective partner on climate change?

The extent of the administration's shift is also visible on the ground — even if the payoffs aren't. In Egypt, the US has cut funding to independent civil society groups that promote democracy and is instead working more closely with government-linked nonprofits, according to several human rights activists who closely follow Egypt.

In Sudan, a country whose leader is under indictment by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity, US policy now involves closer dealings than in recent years and the administration's special envoy to the region has de-emphasised human rights abuses there.

Obama's speech in Oslo reminded us why the Nobel committee decided to honour him with the Peace Prize: This was Obama at the height of his oratorical powers, speaking of war and peace and, yes, human rights, and calling upon mankind to "reach for the world that ought to be." But the Nobel committee didn't set out to merely applaud Obama's great rhetoric; it bestowed this honour on him as an aspirational prize, one that would inspire him to even greater actions.

— Los Angeles Times-Washington Post News Service

Joshua Kurlantzick is a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.