Change, Yes We Can?

Among all the candidates for 2008’s presidential elections, Barrak Obama was the only one bright enough to generate a new surge, eruption of hope, hope of change. His enthusiasm and his firm belief in change communicated with the American people and were materialized by the fame slogan: Change, Yes, We Can.

This latter created a fresh dynamism in American presidential elections history. This dynamism was neither a political mobilization, as all other candidates were looking for, nor just an overwhelming communication’s effect. This dynamism was genuinely social. Millions of people, from diverse social and ethnical horizons mobilized to bring a change about. They believed that a change was truly necessary and furthermore possible.

And they succeeded. They made elect the most iconoclast candidate of all both the Democrat and Republican pretenders of the White House.

Now, that dream became reality, Obama is in the Oval Office with all powers granted by the American Constitutions for a president.

These powers are, compared to the other countries’, immense and important. Nevertheless, they are in fact limited by a political system that got used to serve more the particular interests than the public interests. It is true that the current President is not someone of long-run conventional defender of only the special interests; although, the holders of these special interests will, as usual,  be looking for any opportunity to sustain and enlarge their beneficiary’s situation.

The decision of Obama in the first day of its presidency to restrict influence, role and intervention of the lobbies in the White House is a first positive step in the sense of democracy, relevancy and fairness.

But it is not enough. A more serious drift is needed so that the political power, as the Constitution requests so, remains actually in the people’s hands: presence of an active civil society.

The true challenge for Obama and his administration will be how they would establish an equitable and regular balance between particular and public interests. The more Obama goes in the direction of special settlements of big corporations or financial compounds to the detriment of the people’s welfare, the less will be the chance of a true change and its afterwards will come up ;  the more they will side with the public claims, the more change can effectively come about.

It is sure that the current recession and the disastrous financial deficiency require sacrifices, but the question is who should accomplish these sacrifices? Only the people, doing with less and less, or also big boss, with less earnings?

I think if the American civil society leaves alone Obama and his team to handle these issues, they can be sure that the new President and his colleagues would, soon or later, be inclined toward special interests, given that this attitude had been embodied in the DNA of the power’s structure in the United States. And also, because the big corporations have at their disposition the means of political, financial and media’s influence. Then, the main street would be defeated by Wall Street, one more time; whereas, an active, steady and strong presence of civil society will certainly modify this unfortunate equation. All American can and should attend to the change process Obama has pledged and that single-handedly he can not accomplish. Citizens should be conscious, informed, and interested in; intervening directly and energetically in all the issues that touch their existing or futures life’s conditions. This social dynamism, that showed its force a few days ago in the massive number of the people attending to the inaugural ceremony of the 44th President of the United States, should be meticulously preserved. Intellectuals, community organizers, teachers and professors, social workers, political activists, journalists and students can play a crucial role in preserving and enhancing this dynamism. Collective and organized forms of popular participation in decision making process and managerial procedures are necessary in this approach.  

Thanks to this societal liveliness and this popular force any change becomes possible in America, a country whose ongoing existence affects the future of the World.

Obama should not forget that unaided he can never succeed, he knows so and incessantly repeated it during his presidential campaign as well as in his inaugural speech. However, once he will be taken in the politician machine of Washington, he could little by little disregard this necessary grass-rooted support he needs to make the USA exit from this perilous economic and political situation.

Subsequently, we say: change, yes we can, but only if this change is for and by nation. With society and its wellbeing as the keystone of any decision, the change will turn into something feasible. This could not be done if society becomes passive and bystander. People should leave this terrible habit to take part only in the elections and then to let politics doing all the left over. If we want change, this habit also should change. #