International Attitudes

[Have At You]

In my travels, I of course see many differences between Americans and other people around the world. But one of the most striking differences is the way people think of other countries.

In most countries I've visited (with the notable exception of China), there is a huge preoccupation with the United States and Great Britain. People really seem to care what those countries do -- they may be very angry about it or very excited, but there's always a lot of emotion there.

In the US, however, there is hardly any concern whatsoever about any other countries. Most Americans are vaguely aware that there are other countries out there like Czechoslovakia, Zaire and Burma. But they'd be hard pressed to find them on a map, much less have an opinion one way or the other about them. It's rare enough to have a working knowledge or opinion of the other 50 states, much less some country out there you're probably never going to visit.

In Great Britain, it's only slightly better. The only country they seem to have any strong feeling about is France, which I don't get the sense is reciprocated.

Anyway, this is just an observation, and by no means intended to be judgmental of anyone. But I'm curious what the rest of you think. Is this a fair observation? Do you have any theories that might explain it?

[TrainingDummy]

Of course they're jealous, their countries suck and they all want to move here. GOD BLESS THE USA! THESE COLORS DON'T RUN!

[Zilverzmurfen]

Most Americans are vaguely aware that there are other countries out there like Czechoslovakia... [snip]

Actually, Czechoslovakia was dissolved in 1992. They're now back into their 'old' countries again; Slovakia and Czech Republic. But I guess you knew that, right?

Is this a fair observation? Do you have any theories that might explain it?

I'd rather use the word 'correct', but yes, this is my observation too.

Theories to explain it? Indoctrination and constantly patting each others backs, convincing yourselves you're 'the best' country in the world? Just look at TrainingDummys post:

Of course they're jealous, their countries suck and they all want to move here.

Right... I know you're joking, but I honestly think you'd be surprised how many people that are not the least interested in wanting to come and live in the US, or being stuffed with US politics.

Don't get me wrong, I would love to go to USA some day -- as a tourist. It's a vast country with lots of things to see and do. It's quite different from Europe and it would be very interesting to experience.

I'm sure it's a wonderful country to live in -- especially if you're wealthy and healthy.

[Mr Epee]

Anyway, this is just an observation, and by no means intended to be judgmental of anyone. But I'm curious what the rest of you think. Is this a fair observation? Do you have any theories that might explain it?

I came across a study about 6-7 years ago that compared awareness of other countries with the economic influence of one's own country.

I forget the specifics of the study, but the conclusion was that people tend to be generally more aware of countries with significantly higher economic power, and that people tend to be significantly more aware of countries with slightly higher economic power.

One of the case studies involved people in an African country that had a high awareness of an E European country. Politicians in that country had been using the post-communist E European country's transitional period(s) as a guide for development in their own country... somehow this trickled down.

I don't remember much beyond that, but be comforted by the fact that people are studying this situation, and there are explanations beyond being "dumb Americans". It's just the natural conditions for members of powerful societies.

[PeterGustafsson]

Hi!

Mr Epee: Let´s hope you know more than the average american about Finland, at least.


Hyvvä!

Peter Gustafsson

[pigeonmeister]

In Great Britain, it's only slightly better. The only country they seem to have any strong feeling about is France, which I don't get the sense is reciprocated.

Certain strong feelings are reciprocated! I think your wrong though- The British are very aware of the wider world, and especially Europe. Not always a positive awareness though. For instance Romania and Bulgaria are in the process of joining the EU and certain right wing newspapers are preoccupied with the prospect of more Eastern European migrant workers coming over.

Sport is a good example- Americans get most excited by their Superbowl and whatever the baseball and basketball equivalent is. These are American sports, played largely (but by no means exclusively) by Americans in America. Soccer, Rugby and Cricket are international sports. Pakistan and India have come to England this summer to play cricket to much media attention, the world cup in Germany sent Britain into a rampant fervour and the forthcoming battle for the 'Ashes' in Australia is a massive deal right now. The champions league (Europe's premier soccer competition) is the most respected and watched tournament, football supporters thus get used to following their team around Europe. If your a Chelsea, Man United or Arsenal fan then your team heros, manager and owner (in two cases) are all foreigners.

Our Prime Minister seems to have very strong feelings for Bush's ass, and by association- America. But then again he did just book Clinton as a key speaker and the Labour Party conference last week, so I think he has a general penchant for American presidents.

American culture is far more accessible and far reaching and what America does in the world impacts on us all. America produces cool music and have an enormously influential movie industry. Consequently everyone is obsessed with America, why they still care about us I don't know. In terms of living there, people seem to want the culture of New York or Boston but on a beach in Florida.

America is so big you could travel around it for a lifetime and still think you had seen everything the world has to offer. American passport ownership seems to be about 20%, not sure how many of these are naturalised American citizens, for whom getting a US passport is a natural step to ensure less hassle by the INS when travelling. In Britain it is about 55%. So pure geography and the associated factors of cost and ease means that Europeans are more internationaly travelled. American analysts seem to have just two geo-historical references (WW2 and esp Munich 'appeasement') or Vietnam (for the anti-war camp). Europeans are more aware of their colonial experiences (and mistakes) thus our history books are more globaly orientated.

All in all Americans have less opportunity, less need and less inclination to look beyond America. The world looks to America instead.

[Morgant]

America is also primarily a monoglot society, which I'm sure plays a role in it.

[Morion]

In a large part it might be that Americans are geographically isolated from much of the rest of the world. We really only have Canada, Mexico and Russia sharing a border with us and Russia doesn't count because so few people live anywhere close to the Aleutians. If for no better reason than economics many of us never travel. I would love to visit Europe but it would cost a few thousand dollars and I don't have that to spare. Add that consideration to the fact that most Americans do not get as much time off work as Europeans do and it ends up that we do not get out much.

[dcmdale]

In the US, however, there is hardly any concern whatsoever about any other countries. Most Americans are vaguely aware that there are other countries out there like Czechoslovakia, Zaire and Burma. But they'd be hard pressed to find them on a map, much less have an opinion one way or the other about them. It's rare enough to have a working knowledge or opinion of the other 50 states, much less some country out there you're probably never going to visit.

In Great Britain, it's only slightly better. The only country they seem to have any strong feeling about is France, which I don't get the sense is reciprocated.

Anyway, this is just an observation, and by no means intended to be judgmental of anyone. But I'm curious what the rest of you think.

Is this a fair observation? Do you have any theories that might explain it?

I think that this is partially fair...

1. The U.S. is a big country both in geography and population. That allows it to be more inwardly focused. There is a lot less contact with other nationalities than in many other parts of the world. The economic dominance also means that our broadcast media is our media and our entertainment is our entertainment.

2.

In most countries I've visited (with the notable exception of China), there is a huge preoccupation with the United States and Great Britain. People really seem to care what those countries do -- they may be very angry about it or very excited, but there's always a lot of emotion there.

A lot of the preoccupation is less with the United States than with what is happening in Washington, D.C. ("If Bush sneezes, Africa gets a cold.") Americans also focus on Washington for the same reason.

3. For those who do pay a little attention to what is going on outside the U.S., there is no obvious single focus so the attention is more diffuse. My own daily new scanning includes the Iran Daily [http://www.iran-daily.com/], China National News [http://www.chinanationalnews.com/], Times of India [http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/], AsiaPulse [http://sg.biz.yahoo.com/intl/asiapulse.html], Al Jazeera [http://english.aljazeera.net/HomePage], and All-Africa [http://allafrica.com/] as well as various international and regional wire sources (BBC/AP/Reuters). I think that I am probably reasonably well informed for an American, but I know less about any of the countries that I follow than the average guy on the street in Nairobi knows about Bush's comments to Kikwete in September. The "rest of the world" is simply too big to focus on.

[TrainingDummy]

Czechslovakia has been split up, and Burma has been renamed

[I_luv_saber]

Theories to explain it? Indoctrination and constantly patting each others backs, convincing yourselves you're 'the best' country in the world?

I disagree this is the root reason (I do think it is A reason for some but not the major reason). The major reason is quite simple... we chose to do this! Monroe Doctrine. True, it shouldn't still apply (well, IMO, anyways), but for years, we determined to remove ourselves from European political/war affairs (Nor, might I add, did many Europeans want us in their affairs). I can't believe making this move politically would not cause a similair effect on the society. And personally, I think that was a wonderful choice... then... now not so much, IMO. You can't expect to go from years of keeping yourself removed, to immediate integration. In this respect, I think Chinese history is a great example. My point, yes, most Americans are more removed... but I don't think it's because Americans think they are better, this is nothing more than stereotype... it's simply because we've kept ourselves removed for years on purpose, and coming back into it is not a quick process for the society. And geography plays a large part as well, I think...

[Philistine]

Burma has been renamed

So has Zaire....

--Philistine

[TrainingDummy]

Ah, that's right. I was thinking Zimbabwe, which used to be Rhodesia.

[scrapinpeg]

So has Zaire....

--Philistine

Given that all three countries mentioned no longer exist by those names, I'm guessing it was meant to be a joke.

As for me, I consider myself very interested in international doings. But some honest reflection shows that my areas of interest are very narrow. I read the BBC news online, French news from various sources, the Arab News website, and that's about it for international sources. Domestically, I'm pretty much a CNN/NY Times/Washington Post person. I haven't a clue what's going on in the entire continent of Africa right now, couldn't even place Darfur on a map if you paid me. And I think of myself as fairly well-informed!

[scrapinpeg]

... it's simply because we've kept ourselves removed for years on purpose, and coming back into it is not a quick process for the society. And geography plays a large part as well, I think...

And (rightly or wrongly) there's a strongly-felt perception that every time we DO get involved internationally, it's to clean up messes other countries made. Who then are neither grateful nor gracious about it, but instead gripe and moan about us.

[Fencergrl]

American culture is far more accessible and far reaching and what America does in the world impacts on us all. America produces cool music and have an enormously influential movie industry. Consequently everyone is obsessed with America, why they still care about us I don't know.

I think this is a huge factor. However... those of us living outside of the US get a different perspective on the world. Americans mainly get what the American media offers them... other perspectives are available, but you have to hunt for them yourself.

America is so big you could travel around it for a lifetime and still think you had seen everything the world has to offer. American passport ownership seems to be about 20%, not sure how many of

So is Canada (actually Canada is larger than the US).

In Canada, we learn in school about other countries. Americans learn more about their own country. This is both good and bad. Canadians are more knowledgable than Americans about the rest of the world, but more ignorant than Americans about their own history. Most of the Canadian history I have learned has been on my own as an adult, through reading and traveling.

[jeff]

Our Prime Minister seems to have very strong feelings for Bush's ass

It's that dispassionate, unbiased, carefully reasoned analytical content that always makes pigeonmeister's posts so, er, interesting.

I think there's broad concensus that the large geographical expanse of the US, and the geographic isolation between it and Asia on the one side, and Europe on the other, and the (compared to Europe in particular) strong monoculture the US has makes us more inwardly focused. As I_luv_sabre points out, we also had a historical position from the outset of avoiding foreign entanglements, and its really the events of the last 60 years that dragged us out of being an isolationist agrarian state.

[daeceg]

You all think you have it tough?

I TEACH geography, or try to.... Our education system is set up to indoctrinate students into the belief of American exceptionalism. We don't need to learn about the rest of the world-the rest of the world has to learn about us. While I believe that education does need to instill good citizenship, I'd rather my students learn to be good global citizens. However, in Texas, learning about World Geography, we spend about 1/6 of the year on the United States, 1/6 on Canada and Central America, and 2/3 of the year on the rest of the world. Only one year of world geography is required to graduate from high school.

Now, in college, I minored in Geography and Economics, with a major in political science, so I'm a bit more up to date than the average bird. There's a great book out I'm reading called "Why Geography Matters" which I'm incorporating to make the subject more relevant to my students.

[Have At You]

Nearly every history professor I had in college said "History is Geography" at one point or another.

My favorite philosophy professor also said that the history of philosophy is hugely explained by geography as well. And he was right.

(And yes, that bit about knowing what Czechoslovakia et al. are was supposed to be a dig at the huge lack of geographical knowledge of the american populace.)

[I_luv_saber]

Our education system is set up to indoctrinate students into the belief of American exceptionalism.

I have a bit of a hard time buying that. The education system is screwed up to begin with in many other ways, I don't think it has a thing to do with "indoctrination" (well, it could be in small part, I suppose)... I think more likely it's simple incompetence of the system.

And here's another point of view:
America and all of Europe can be compared roughly in size. So, travelling state to state is very nearly, geographically speaking, the same as travelling from country to country. America simply isn't that close to other countries in the same way Europe is, hence, importance is not placed as much on learning the history of countries nowhere near us. Add that to the fact that, as I said, we purposefully removed ourselves from European affairs, and no wonder it isn't important to your average American! Even if, today, the American government made world history a priority... it would still be decades before society caught up, IMO. It has very little to do with "Hoo-hah! God Bless America! Screw everyone else!"... and frankly, I find it *mildly* insulting to be tossed in that stereotype. You ask most Americans, I bet anything they simply say they don't care. That leads me to believe it is due to our history of isolation, geographically and politically. Not America is better than you are! If we speak of that, I can bring up other countries besides America.