'Anti-Americanism all over world except India'

Washington, June 25 : With the exception of India, Eastern Europe and Japan, ''anti-Americanism'' is prevalent all over the world and covers a diverse set of attitudes that varies from country to country, a foreign policy expert said in her book.

In a new book, ''Friendly Fire: Losing Friends and Making Enemies in anti-American Century'', Ms Julia E Sweig, a senior fellow at the Council of Foreign Relations (CFR) says, ''Since 2000, polls by over a half dozen organisations -- from Pew to Zogby, German Marshall Fund to the Guardian, Eurobarometer to Latinobarmetro -- have tracked the declining views about America, Americans and U S foreign policy in every region of the world.'' Even a pro-American writer like Mario Vargas Llosa argued in June 2004 that images from Abu Gharib prison and the Gaza Strip ''have done more damage to the United States and Israel than all the bombs and the suicide attacks of the Islamic extremists in the last few months.'' A review today in the Washington Post of her ''well researched and well written new book,'' noted that Ms Sweig acknowledge that though anti-Americanism existed long before the administration of George W Bush or the 2003 invasion of Iraq ''as the big kid on the block, the United States is bound to engender feelings of envy and resentment.'' Moreover, demagogues in failing, corrupt and stagnant societies often use the United States as a scapegoat, blaming us for their own failure to cope with modernisation and globalisation, the book contended.

''Just as the Inuits of Alaska have twenty-three words for ice, a part of nature that surrounds them and indeed defines their worldview,'' so South Koreans have eight separate words to describe their outlook on the ubiquitous United States -- loathe America, worship America, criticise America, resist America and so forth.

In a series of interesting case studies, Ms Sweig traces the historical roots of anti-Americanism in Korea, Turkey, Germany, Britain and Latin America (her academic specialty). In all these instances, the trend is unfavourable for the United States.

However India, Eastern Europe and Japan are exceptions that seem to have bucked this tendency of anti-Americanism. Unfortunately, her book devotes scant attention to them and therein lies an anomaly, says the Post review. Ms Sweig says anti-Americanism is obviously unpleasant and it really hampers American power. She says after favourable attitudes toward the United States dropped from 52 percent in 2000 to 12 percent in 2003, Turkey -- a NATO ally -- refused to let U S troops cross its territory to fight in Iraq.

Similarly, anti-Americanism inhibited pro-American leaders such as Vicente Fox of Mexico and Ricardo Lagos of Chile from supporting US policies on Iraq at the U N Security Council. Moreover foreign perceptions of U S hypocrisy continue to undercut the Bush administration's ''efforts to promote democracy''.

Ms Sweig says being admired makes it easier to be effective.

To some degree, she says these trends can be reversed. ''The structural foundations feeding anti-Americanism will remain deep-rooted,'' Ms Sweig says but worries about what she sees as ''the answer du jour'', the Bush administration's efforts to spend more money on broadcasting and public diplomacy.

But the best advertising in the world cannot sell a poor product.

''How can public diplomacy overcome images of torture? It cannot,'' she says. ''The answer is not to assert the United States is committed to human rights but to implement policies that ban the practice of torture and hold accountable those responsible, especially at the highest levels,'' she added.

UNI