Former Secretary of State for the United States, Madeleine Albright, speaks of the necessity to bridge, or close, the dangerous transatlantic divide in a Svenska Dagbladet Brännpunkt article (In Swedish, I could not find any on-line publication of the article in English).

She paints an historical context and describes the current divided situation as a problem both within and between the United States and Europe. Being a former Secretary of State under a democratic president, she is of course critical of the US policies under Bush, but her analysis of Europe’s problems is no less clear.

There are some interesting turns in the article; She acknowledges that Condoleezza Rice seems to want to move towards more cooperation with Europe. Furthermore she states that Europe must acknowledge its role in achieving an acceptable result in Iraq.

Albright’s focus is of course on transatlantic cooperation, but stressing the need to get out of old ways of thinking in Europe and inciting hatred for everything American (she mentions Harold Pinter’s Nobel lecture as an example), she has a good point. Here is my re-translation of that part in her article:

The Europeans on their side should do more to combat the demonization of America, not only among radical Islamists, but also among the likes of the author Harold Pinter, whose recent attack in his Nobel lecture about America’s “systematic, constant, evil, unscrupulous” criminality reflect an all too trendy attitude among intellectuals which should not be allowed to stand uncontradicted.

Two recent articles, one by a Swede living in the US, and one by an American living in Sweden, speaks of the fanaticism and outrageous ignorance shown in Sweden for anything American. (Both articles in Swedish only, Kristianstadbladet and Neo respectively.)

Roland Martinsson (of the blog RolandPM) speaks of the anti-american bias in the Swedish mainstream media, but also of the xenophobia-like agression that met his family in Sweden and made them move back to the US.

Michael Moynihan (of the blog Stockholm Spectator Stambord) describes similar experiences of being met with agressions and bizarre statements about the USA and about Americans.

It seems that Madeleine Albright’s call to combat the demonization of America in Europe is justified. She speaks of ‘trendy attitudes among intellectuals’, but the attitudes seem to have spread wider than that, to the point of affecting the everyday life of any person with a connection to the USA, judging from the above articles.

Unfortunately, some Americans may - maybe unwittingly - encourage this attidude themselves. Travelling last year in South America, another foreigner staying in the same hotel as I in Santiago started our conversation by excusing himself for being American!

There has always been some condescending contempt for the US and Americans in Sweden, and in the rest of Europe. Now it is rampant!