Barack Obama, Europe and the Transatlantic Relationship: From the World’s White Knight to the Spy that Came in from the Cold? – A German Perspective

Abstract

Reading assessments of the relationship omnipresent in the German media in 2014, one could easily assume that the so-called Obamania that had swept over Europe six years ago, has not significantly improved relations since the Bush years. While Barack Obama was celebrated in the German media in 2008 as the presidential candidate with the Messiah-Factor, only six years later he was disparagingly dubbed the Drone Warrior. Examining the German media's evaluation of the relationship, one can observe an almost seamless transition from the celebration of a Obamanite age of multilateralism to the declaration of a new transatlantic Ice Age. Considering this circumstance, the following paper aims at giving this shift in perceptions closer attention. It will be looking at how the perception of relations under Barack Obama has been reflected and interpreted in German media discourse over the course of his presidency and which role President Obama plays as imaginative projection surface in the negotiation of a Eurotopian narrative of self in this context.