Book

The Obama Moment

European and American Perspectives

Álvaro de Vasconcelos and Marcin Zaborowski
Release Date: July 31, 2010

The election of Barack Obama has raised major expectations in Europe and opened up new opportunities for dealing with global challenges. Authored by leading experts from both sides of the Atlantic, this book provides an authoritative analysis of the most topical issues facing the agendas of the European Union and the United States.

The volume addresses the global questions of multilateralism, the economy, disarmament, and climate change, as well as key regional issues including Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Russia, Africa, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The book concludes that it is imperative that Europeans and Americans seize “the Obama moment” in order to capitalize on the urgency of acting now. They will also need to move to a new paradigm of the EU-U.S. relationship and NATO’s role within it—one that takes account of the fact that the West needs “the Rest” to deal with the most pressing issues of our time.

“An important contribution to the debate on how we can renew our transatlantic partnership for a new age…. This book lays out the challenges and choices we face. It deserves to be widely read.”
—Javier Solana, high representative for the EU Common Foreign and Security Policy

“A timely contribution to the much-needed dialogue regarding transatlantic relations. Both sides need to understand each other better and this volume helps its readers understand the causes of discord and the key issues to be addressed.”
—Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security adviser to President Carter

Contributors include Alexandra Bell (Ploughshares Fund), John Bruton (Ambassador,
EU Commission to the United States 2004-09), Tom Cargill (Chatham House), Joseph
Cirincione (Ploughshares Fund), James F. Dobbins (RAND), Nikolas Foster (SAIS Johns
Hopkins University), Daniel S. Hamilton (Center for Transatlantic Relations), Bruce Jones
(Center on International Cooperation, NYU), Erik Jones (SAIS Bologna Center, Johns
Hopkins University), Ibrahim Kalin (Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian
Understanding), Andrew Kuchins (CSIS), Michael O’Hanlon (Brookings Institution),
Rouzbeh Parsi (European Union Institute for Security Studies), Glen Ranwala (University
of Cambridge), Pawel S´wieboda (demosEUROPA), and Alex Vines (Chatham House).