A Bound Man: Why We Are Excited About Obama and Why He Can't Win [Hardcover]

Shelby Steele (Author)

Book Description

Release date: December 4, 2007

In Shelby Steele's beautifully wrought and thoughtprovoking new book, A Bound Man, the award-winning and bestselling author of The Content of Our Character attests that Senator Barack Obama's groundbreaking quest for the highest office in the land is fast becoming a galvanizing occasion beyond mere presidential politics, one that is forcing a national dialogue on the current state of race relations in America. Says Steele, poverty and inequality usually are the focus of such dialogues, but Obama's bid for so high an office pushes the conversation to a more abstract level where race is a politics of guilt and innocence generated by our painful racial history -- a kind of morality play between (and within) the races in which innocence is power and guilt is impotence.

Steele writes of how Obama is caught between the two classic postures that blacks have always used to make their way in the white American mainstream: bargaining and challenging. Bargainers strike a "bargain" with white America in which they say, I will not rub America's ugly history of racism in your face if you will not hold my race against me. Challengers do the opposite of bargainers. They charge whites with inherent racism and then demand that they prove themselves innocent by supporting black-friendly policies like affirmative action and diversity.

Steele maintains that Senator Obama is too constrained by these elaborate politics to find his own true political voice. Obama has the temperament, intelligence, and background -- an interracial family, a sterling education -- to guide America beyond the exhausted racial politics that now prevail. And yet he is a Promethean figure, a bound man.

Says Steele, Americans are constrained by a racial correctness so totalitarian that we are afraid even to privately ask ourselves what we think about racial matters. Like Obama, most of us find it easier to program ourselves for correctness rather than risk knowing and expressing what we truly feel. Obama emerges as a kind of Everyman in whom we can see our own struggle to accept and honor what we honestly feel about race. In A Bound Man, Steele makes clear the precise constellation of forces that bind Senator Obama, and proposes a way for him to break these bonds and find his own voice.The courage to trust in one's own careful judgment is the new racial progress, the "way out" from the forces that now bind us all.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Why we are excited: Obama is a talented, charismatic politician and living proof that whites have welcomed blacks into the mainstream. Why he can't win: He's still mired in an ideology of racial victimhood and separatism that Steele (White Guilt), a Hoover Institution fellow and, like Obama, the son of a black father and white mother, deplores in this stimulating, conservative critique. Obama's conflict over his mixed parentage and abandonment by his father, the author argues, engenders a need to prove his racial authenticity by accommodating a black identity politics that, while it energizes his African-American base, risks alienating white voters. Worse, as president Obama might reflexively support affirmative action and government initiatives to help African-Americans, instead of emphasizing the self-reliance, individual responsibility and avid assimilation that Steele contends are the only remedies for the black community's problems. The author's tendency to psychologize Obama's policy agenda sometimes overreaches. Still, the book is full of fresh insights into the cultural politics of race; Steele's analysis of Louis Armstrong and Oprah Winfrey as iconic Negroes granting moral absolution to whites, for example, is a tour de force. (Jan. 8)
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Review

“Full of fresh insights into the cultural politics of race” ---Publishers Weekly

--This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 143 pages
• Publisher: Free Press (December 4, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1416559175
• ISBN-13: 978-1416559177
• Product Dimensions: 5.3 x 0.7 x 7.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (61 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #997,456 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

165 of 190 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Speaking from personal experience... December 5, 2007

By Ronald

Format:Hardcover

Shelby Steele has travelled a path similar to that trod by Senator Obama. He, too, was the son of a interracial marraiage. He, too, was loved and well-educated by his parents. He, too, has become a prominent spokesperson on racial matters in the United States. And he is uniquely suited to write this book.

As opposed to an earlier reviewer who described the book as a "hit piece" against Obama's candidacy, the book is much more than that. It is an examination of the state of racial thought in this country and why - sadly - it is still perceived as necessary for both whites and blacks to assume "masks" to shield public perception of their true character. It examines the masquarade that we all attend in daily lives with our costumes and facades because we are too fearful and timid to expose the true nature of our beliefs - right or wrong, PC or not - for fear of repercussions.

He is correct in categorizing Oprah Winfrey (and Michael Jordan and, to some degree, Tiger Woods) as "bargainers" just as he is correct in calling Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton and Spike Lee as "challengers." It is clear to anyone who takes the time to examine the behaviors and the successes involved. The tragedy is not that Steele categorizes people of color with these artificial terms; the tragedy is that one behaves in these ways in order to achieve recognition and success. The abandonment of self and one's ideals is an immense price to pay for the chance at success.

The author turns a beautiful phrase when he writes:

"[Obama's candidacy]...asks the American democracy to complete itself, to achieve that almost perfect transparency in which color is, indeed, no veil over character - where a black, like a white, can put himself forward as the individual he truly is...."

When we can reach this cultural chimera, we will be truly a nation of one people. Read more ›

55 of 68 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars A Distorted Picture April 12, 2008

By Greg Cleary

Format:Hardcover

I admit that when I first saw this book at a bookstore, I was hooked by the title. Being an Obama supporter, I was curious to know why the author thought Obama "can't win" the presidency. I didn't buy the book, but I found it at a library and checked it out. It is interesting, well-written, and only takes a few hours to read. But I'm glad I didn't buy it.

The problem with this book is that the author never judges Obama on any grounds other than how he plays the racial game--unless you count a few offhand references to Obama being intelligent, talented, etc. So ironically, the "bound man" of the title turns out to be--as one reviewer here has already asserted--the author himself.

Steele does make a strong case for why Obama is walking such a fine line politically, as a black man who is trying to win over both blacks and whites in large enough numbers to win the presidency. He also provides some insight into why Obama chose Reverend Wright as his pastor, which is impressive considering that this book was written months before Reverend Wright was front page news. Steele's categorization of prominent black Americans as either "bargainers" or "challengers" also makes sense, and he is credible in spelling out the advantages and potential pitfalls of each of these approaches.

But unfortunately, the book is so limited in scope that it distorts Obama as well as those who support him. Has Steele even considered that some people may support Obama because he appears to be the most intelligent and the most level-headed of all the candidates?... Some may even support him because his political views most closely match their own, which should not be so hard to believe considering that in the past few years the general public has turned against the Iraq War and has generally moved to the left. Like so many of Obama's detractors, Steele simultaneously accuses Obama of having a harmful political agenda and having no political agenda at all. These people would be more credible if they at least picked one or the other and stuck with it.

Meanwhile, Obama marches on, which makes me wonder if maybe he has figured something out that people like Steele have not. Or maybe Obama just happens to be a good enough candidate to win the election and to be an effective leader, regardless of the color of his skin. What a concept! Read more ›

34 of 42 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Thought provoking book January 15, 2008

By Patricia T. Wood

Format:Hardcover

Shelby Steele's book The Bound Man does a convincing job of detailing the bind that Barack Obama finds himself in as he runs for president. Steele views Obama as the most promising black candidate to ever run for president in U.S. history, certainly someone with more winning potential than prior black candidates such as Jessie Jackson in 1984 and Al Sharpton in 2004. Indeed, Steele argues Obama is distinguished from other black candidates because he chooses not to capitalize on race but instead he runs as an everyman who represents the fervent hope of the greater American public that blacks and whites can finally come together.

Obama's biracial heritage also brands him as unique compared to prior black candidates running for president. His mother who raised him is a white woman from Kansas so Obama is intimately familiar and comfortable in the world of whites. Raised by his Midwestern mother, grandmother and grandfather - all white - he was essentially raised exclusively in a white family first in Hawaii and later in Indonesia. On the other hand, his black Kenyan father who separated from his mother when Obama was two (they later divorced) left Barack Obama with a feeling of disconnection that has motivated a life-long quest to come to terms with his black roots. Steele insists that Obama's choice to work in community agencies in East St. Louis out of college as well as his decision to do civil rights law on the south side of Chicago after graduating from Harvard Law School are both examples of his efforts to come to terms with his black past and black identity.

Steele also makes the point that Obama is not someone who has gotten where he is through Affirmative Action and other entitlement programs.... From early on when living in Indonesia where he spent his adolescence, his mother would get him up at 4:30 to go over lesson plans so he had the best education possible. At Harvard Law School, Obama also headed up the Harvard Law Review which is considered the pinnacle of success at that school and this was achieved solely through his own efforts and ability. So Obama represents a biracial black man who has become eminently successful through his hard work, intelligence and obvious charisma.

The bind that Steele believes Obama finds himself in is twofold. As an individual he struggles with a biracial identity which makes it difficult for him to feel fully at home in the world of whites or in the world of blacks. He is always the consummate outsider - a role that Steele identifies with as he is also a man who also grew up with a white mother and black father and has been a senior researcher at the very conservative, largely white think tank, the Hoover Institute at Stanford University since 1994.

But this individual bind pales in comparison to the larger societal bind Obama finds himself in. Steele argues convincingly that all blacks who achieve visibility in our culture do so by wearing certain masks. Since the post sixties, many black leaders, particularly in the political realm have worn the challenger mask. Challengers forever keep reminders of the history of white racism alive in an effort to promote and maintain the policies and consciousness of the ideals of the civil rights movement. By raising the specter of white racism in the white public and capitalizing on white guilt and white fears of being racist, challengers hope that whites will continue to promote and support affirmative action and other entitlement programs that seek to level the playing field left by the long history of white supremacy in this country. Common examples of challengers are many national leaders such as Al Sharpton and Jessie Jackson and rappers such as Kanye West. In Steele's mind challengers never let whites off the hook for their guilt and generally take the stance that whites are guilty of racism until they prove themselves otherwise. For this reason, challengers tend to make whites somewhat nervous and while these challengers are generally respected, they are not always popular with the greater public. Today many blacks wear the challenger's mask and expect blacks in leadership positions to do the same. Yet for Obama to wear the challenger mask he risks losing the votes of whites and if he fails to wear it, he risks losing the votes of many blacks.

On the other hand, other successful blacks like Oprah Winfrey choose not to highlight race but instead wear the mask of the bargainer. Bargainers are blacks, according to Steele, who make a bargain with whites. By not highlighting race, they let whites off the hook for their guilt. As Steele describes this bargain it goes as follows: "I will not use America's horrible history of white racism against you if you will promise not to use my race against me." Other bargainers that Steele cites include Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, and Sidney Poitier - these are bargainers who the white public loves but Steele argues, they are loved because these men choose not to raise the issue of race in mixed company. Steele views Obama as the consummate bargainer but again, the bind Obama finds himself in is that he must be a bargainer to gain wide white support and yet he must appear to be a challenger in order to fully gain the trust of most blacks and win their votes.

In watching Obama in different contexts he addresses his audiences accordingly. When speaking to a group on the anniversary of the march on Selma, Obama dons the challenger's mask: "My very existence might not have been possible had it not been for some of the people here today. So don't tell me I don't have a claim on Selma Alabama. Don't tell me I'm not coming home to Selma, Alabama." On the other hand, addressing white audiences he dons the bargainer's mask as he talks generically of "change is coming" and of being the great "unifier." The tragedy, according to Steele, is that Obama is in an impossible bind which makes it difficult for him to authentically stand for anything. While all politicians are strategic, Steele argues that more than other candidates, Obama can never let you know who he really is and this could ultimately cost him the election. Other candidates may assume postures with certain audiences, but they can still reveal more of their inner beliefs and values. The difficulty for Obama is that he can never let his guard down.

Steele ends his book by summing up Barack Obama's predicament: "Obama's supporters do not look to him to DO something; they look to him primarily to BE something, to represent something. He is a bound man because he cannot BE two opposing worldviews at the same time - he cannot grant whites their racial innocence and simultaneously withhold it from them." In this dilemma, Obama has a Herculean task ahead of him and one that makes him far more vulnerable than a Hillary Clinton, a John Edwards, a John McCain or a Huckabee. For unlike his competitors, Obama has to carry the specter of race that whether he speaks of it or not, is with him every step of the way. Read more ›