Political scientist Jackson Janes – cracks in the foundation of the United States

Moderation: Stephan Karkowsky

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“The pandemic, second, the economic disaster, third, the case in Minnesota. These things look like an X-ray of America,” says Jackson Janes. (dpa / TT NEWS AGENCY)

Racism is closely related to economic and social problems in the United States, says political scientist Jackson Janes. He believes that US President Trump can unite the country – and hopes for a change of power.

Stephan Karkowsky: Yesterday, tens of thousands again demonstrated in the United States against racism and police violence. I spoke to political scientist Jackson Janes from Johns Hopkins University in Washington about it and asked him if the curfews in Washington would be met.

Jackson Janes: A few minutes ago there are still hundreds of people gathering in one place where they can see the White House, but not just there. In any case: they don’t stick to it. And that’s the case in New York and elsewhere, across the country.

Karkowsky: Television pictures can be deceptive because they mostly only show the extreme: the fires, the violence, the looting. In your opinion, are these just isolated riots? Or do you notice these riots all over Washington?

Janes: The riots when it comes to people in town making a fuss – that’s already there, usually late at night. But the gatherings are mostly peaceful. And to the extent that they concentrate, by the way also in the corner of the White House – these are more demonstrators who want to make their voices loud. In this respect, I don’t think that’s the problem that something is sometimes widely distributed in the press or on TV. It’s a problem that’s there, but it’s not a huge one.

The cracks have been there for a long time

Karkowsky: It is said to be the biggest protests since the days of Martin Luther King. How do you rate that? Could these protests have the potential to change things for the better in American society?

Janes: Yes, maybe that’s hope. There are three things that come together: first, the pandemic, second, the economic disaster that goes with it, and third, now this case in Minnesota. And all of these things that look like an X-ray of America showing the cracks, and the cracks have been there for a long time.

There was a turning point somewhere or the water boiled and it boiled over. And it’s amazing for me too, because I’m myself a sixty-eight, how similar it seems to me right now, then and now. How this unfolds cannot be said. But it is amazing how far and how quickly it has spread.

Access to the army is restricted

Karkowsky: Do you trust the President to carry out his threat and actually use the army against his own citizens?

Janes: No, I do not think so. I mean, of course, Washington DC is not a state, so it has some access here – which is not strictly allowed in Maryland or Virginia, or in the other states in America, unless the governor gets up from the country and says so : I need help.

So I think it’s a threat. But I don’t see that coming, because most of those who have just commented on it – the governors of the past few days – said: We don’t expect that at the moment. He may have the legal right, but only if it happens with the permission of the governor.

“We all have the same challenge”

Karkowsky: Many in Germany also show solidarity with the protests in the USA, there have been demonstrations, and at least in the part of Berlin where I live you can see graffiti everywhere on the walls called George Floyd, Black Lives Matter, as is often mentioned , also on social media, racism is everywhere. Do you agree, or is American racism a special case?

Janes: No, it is not a special case, it is everywhere in the world. And I think that’s the problem now when you see on the one hand how people gather not only in Berlin, but also in Amsterdam and across Europe, for example: it should be understood that there are problems there too .

And if you show solidarity and you say that America has the problem for very specific historical reasons – we have it too! – but the appearance across the images we see, across the world, are all connected somewhere. In this respect: We all have the same challenge.

“Typical Trump, a lie”

Karkowsky: The US President runs his own news channel on Twitter with millions of followers. You read this morning that the Trump administration has done more for black people in the United States than any president since Abraham Lincoln. Do you believe that too?

Janes: It’s typical Trump, a lie if I can say that. It’s not the case. It has happened a lot in the past three and a half years in the economy for which he wants to put his laurels on, but that is not the case.

The problem we have with racism is related to economic problems, social cracks, cracks in our own foundations. And that’s visible for a long time.

And then he has the tendency to grab everything and say ‘I have now corrected this’ or ‘I have now solved the problem’. That is not true at all. Presidents before him have not solved the problem and he will not solve it either. And I think what we need right now, in my opinion, is a change in November because I honestly mean: this man is unable to provide the unity that we currently need.

Comments from our interlocutors reflect their own opinions. Deutschlandfunk Kultur does not adopt statements made by its interlocutors in interviews and discussions.

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