Why Obama keeps his friends close, his enemies even closer

This, and not a particular ideology, is the sense in which Obama’s inclusive style of leadership represents a radical departure from politics as we’ve known it.

Obama’s integrative approach, listening to conflicting points of view, then synthesising their best elements, could begin to unlock the immense creative potential inherent in conflict.

The 20th century, an age of ideologies, drove us into two worldwide hot wars and a cold one, resulting in the collapse of both Communism in 1989 and cowboy Capitalism in 2008.

The 21st century begins to look like an age of pragmatism, where unquestioning adherence to fixed ideas is replaced, at best, by a firm commitment to general principles and a flexible approach to fulfilling them.

This integrative process is epitomised by the elegantly simple principle that drives the hybrid vehicle engine, where the very braking energy that slows forward movement, rightly utilised, becomes fuel for the next lap of forward movement.

To the extent that we can apply this “mechanical aikido” to the realm of politics, economics and culture, we will tap into an immense force for social progress.

As a transitional leader who embodies the effort to reconcile conflicting races and cultures of many kinds, Obama seeks nothing less than to bend the arc of history. This is surely more responsibility than any individual can bear.

In seeking to bridge the most treacherous cross-currents in domestic and global politics, Obama attempts the same fusion and tempts the same fate as Abraham Lincoln, his professed inspiration.

It is, therefore, incumbent on all of us who believe in a more inclusive politics and culture to move out ahead of him to open up a space into which he and others can safely move.

Franklin D. Roosevelt, another of Obama’s inspirations, once responded to his progressive supporters’ entreaties to accelerate the pace of change by telling them, “You’ve convinced me. Now go out and make me do it.”

Shifting to a politics of both-and rather than either-or is a work not of one man or party but of a diverse range of actors over generations. As Obama himself has often said, “It’s not about me; it’s about us.”

If we want a world that actually addresses its challenges rather than exacerbating them, we’ll need to engage in the hard work of reconciling not only the conflicting constituencies in our politics but the conflicting impulses within ourselves.

Obama presents an admirable example of how to transform a potentially crippling inner conflict into a potentially healing political process.

Now it’s up to the rest of us to enact the change evoked and embodied by his emergence.

Mark Sommer is host and executive producer of the internationally syndicated radio programme, A World of Possibilities