WASHINGTON–A year ago, during his State of the Union address, U.S. President Barack Obama set a goal for a national high-speed rail (HSR) network: 85 percent of the country’s population would have access to HSR within 25 years. One year later, that goal seems wildly optimistic.

Within a month of Obama’s speech, Florida Governor Rick Scott joined the governors of Ohio and Wisconsin (all Republicans) in rejecting HSR funds that had been targeted for his state. He, like many critics of HSR, argued that the project was too costly during a time of economic crisis and the risks would outweigh the benefits. Then, earlier this month, California’s HSR effort appeared to run out of steam. The California High-Speed Rail Peer Review Group, an independent body created by the California High-Speed Rail Authority to advise on the proposed system, released a report that detailed numerous concerns about the project’s overall funding plan and the lack of a fully vetted business plan. In the end, the report concludes that too many flaws and financial unknowns exist in the plans, representing “an immense financial risk” to the state of California. The report might well kill the prospects for a true HSR project in the United States for the foreseeable future.

So, why did Obama’s signature infrastructure project meet such a quick demise? While each project has its own reasons for failure, the Obama administration also made a critical tactical error in the way it awarded funds. Instead of identifying and investing in one promising project, the administration allocated $10 billion ($8 billion from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and $2 billion from appropriations) to 13 HSR projects in 31 states to foster the development of a national HSR network all at once. Additional federal funds for the network (approximately $43 billion according to Obama’s plan) were to be secured through the annual appropriations processes. The administration’s strategy appears to have been to hope the initial federal investments would spur even more substantial state and local investments in HSR, especially in a number of swing states, leading to the creation of a national network. At current estimates, a national HSR network could cost hundreds of billions of dollars — the California system alone is projected at $98 billion. With dramatic budget cuts looming, a slow economic recovery, and a toxic political environment, this strategy is not viable.

The lack of significant progress on HSR is unfortunate. A well-planned and smartly operated HSR system can be transformational for cities, helping them to maintain or improve quality of life and enhance economic competitiveness in the global economy. At one level, HSR facilitates intercity travel, fosters regionalism, and can enhance regional economic viability. At another level, as populations and densities are projected to rise in America’s large urban regions, new and better mobility alternatives will be imperative to meet a host of associated challenges. When integrated intelligently with other modes of transportation into the urban fabric, HSR can help stimulate the development of economically vibrant corridors and station stops.

A better approach to start up a national HSR network in the United States can be found in Spain. Over the past two decades, Spain has created the longest HSR network in Europe. However, AVE, the Spanish network, began with a single project, the Madrid-Seville line, which proved itself for more than 10 years before significant expansion occurred. The line, averaging 185 mph, cut the 300-mile trip time by more than half between the two cities, significantly decreasing the automobile and air travel between them but increasing the number of individual trips. Equally compelling, existing businesses near AVE stations have reported significant benefits from the investments in infrastructure. None of this is to say that Spanish HSR has been perfect — the Spanish government ultimately may have over-invested. But if the Obama administration chooses to revisit HSR, a more effective strategy would be to start small, be focused, invest smartly, and allow HSR to prove itself, which could put aspirations for a national HSR rail network back on track.

Brent Riddle is a Senior Program Officer in the German Marshall Fund’s Urban and Regional Program.

WASHINGTON—Earlier this week, according to the U.N. Population Fund, the world’s population surpassed 7 billion. With the global economy in recession and the impacts of a warming climate increasingly apparent, this new milestone comes at a time of enormous strain and has significant implications for the world’s natural resources, its economy, and of course, its urban areas. More than half of the world’s population lives in urban areas, and the upward trend is continuing unabated. It has been suggested that by 2050, approximately three-quarters of the world’s population will be urbanized. At this rate, one thing is very clear: cities must be part of the solution to the economic, environmental, and social challenges of our time.

But as asked in the recent U.N. State of the World Population report, “what, exactly, is a ‘city’ in 2011?” Traditional city government structures and boundaries generally do not match the web of economic and social activities among urban residents, businesses, and other institutions. Are cities then the right geography for responding to today’s tough challenges? And if not, at what scale can the pressing economic, environmental, and economic challenges of our times best be addressed?

Urban experts have long called for a more regional approach that reaches beyond city boundaries to include the residents of entire metropolitan areas. In a recent article for Atlantic Cities, for example, Bruce Katz of the Brookings Institution wrote that “metropolitan communities, here and abroad, represent the true economic geography…they are also the undisputed vehicles for environmental sustainability and social inclusion.”

But another trend is also emerging in the drive toward sustainable urban development: a greater focus on neighborhood efforts to integrate environmental, economic, and social responses to our current crises. Last week, the Portland Sustainability Institute (PoSI) hosted its third annual Ecodistricts Summit, bringing together practitioners around the globe who are pioneering neighborhood-level sustainability projects. Participants highlighted both new development and redevelopment efforts – projects that, in the words of Rob Bennett, PoSI’s Director, are “small enough to go fast and large enough to make a difference.” Among the projects presented were the Seattle 2030 project, which engages downtown property owners and businesses in an effort to minimize the environmental impact of building construction and operation; the Hammarby Sjöstad project in Stockholm, which converted an old industrial area into a modern, mixed-use, low-emissions neighborhood with state-of-the-art environmental infrastructure; and pilot projects spanning the globe from Portland, Oregon, to New Orleans, Louisiana, Sao Paolo, Brazil, and Nagoya, Japan.

So what types of innovation can best be supported at the neighborhood level? Clearly, there are technologies and strategies, such as district energy systems, that are highly relevant and effective at this scale, while other policy interventions, including those related to transportation, are more effectively implemented at a larger scale. Perhaps the strongest argument for working at the district level is that all of us live in, do business in, and identify with neighborhoods. The personal relevance of neighborhood interventions can drive community engagement and help build new coalitions. EcoVillage Cleveland, a project launched in the 1990s, for example, built new partnerships among environmental and community development advocates and the public sector around a plan that combined environmental sustainability and affordability goals, all with the aim of supporting neighborhood revitalization. Among the project’s many achievements are the construction of homes that are both permanently affordable and energy efficient, the creation of community gardens, bike trails, and other recreational spaces, the rehabilitation of the local transit station with passive solar heating and other green elements. Indeed, the district scale may be the ideal geography for effectively integrating the multiple approaches — environmental, social, and economic — that truly make a neighborhood sustainable.

Metropolitan and neighborhood approaches to sustainable urban development are not in conflict. Nor does either approach diminish the role of the city with its formal authority and urban development tools. But as we reflect on the size of our population and the enormity of the challenges we face, it is important to remember that we will only be able to resolve our current economic, social, and environmental challenges if we engage as many of the world’s 7 billion residents as possible in developing new, more sustainable forms of development and growth. This will require focusing not only on regional visions and strategies, but on making these strategies come to life through neighborhood projects and design decisions shaped by the very people who live with them every day.

Tamar Shapiro is the senior director of urban and social policy at The German Marshall Fund of the United States in Washington, DC.

Image by SkyScraperCity.com

WASHINGTON — Civil unrest is breaking out on both sides of the Atlantic. This year, Greek protestors took to the streets in resistance to government austerity measures. Riots broke out in London neighborhoods in response to cutbacks in government services and rising unemployment. Now Americans are camping out in city centers across the country, following the example of disgruntled citizens who decided the best way to be heard was to physically occupy Wall Street. Although some in the media dismiss this movement as simply an assembly of grumpy leftists angry at the inequities of capitalism, the fact that the Occupy Wall Street movement has spread so rapidly to far-flung towns reveals that it has touched a deep nerve in U.S. society.

Recent surveys show that over 70 percent of Americans think the country is headed in the wrong direction. This year, for the first time, a majority of Americans say they believe their kids’ generation will be worse off than they are. Given the United States’ precarious economic situation, the popularity of any movement based on anger over economic weakness comes as no surprise. Perhaps more interesting is that the Occupy Wall Street movement, at just under a month old, seems rooted more in a sense of civil unfairness than simply anger at unemployment. Though they have yet to settle on a single coherent message, the “occupiers” seem to share a common anger at what they see as a deep unfairness in U.S. economics and politics that has its root in the preferential access to political power enjoyed by the wealthiest Americans.

Occupiers call themselves the 99 percent, and focus on the divide between the United States’ wealthiest 1 percent and the rest of society. The message resonates with working class Americans because so many share the view that, since the economy crashed, most Americans are suffering while the wealthiest are protected with bailouts and preferential tax treatment. The Wall Street symbolism works because the big bankers got saved while everyone else feels the pain. It is this deep sense of unfairness that attracts large numbers of new occupiers and gives the movement potential to become a serious political force. The dynamics feeding this populism will only strengthen as Congress struggles to tackle the mounting government debt. Middle class Americans feel detached from that debate, despite the fact that its outcome will affect their job prospects and the education of their children. They fear any debt resolution will only benefit powerful interest groups.

Many are asking if the Occupy Wall Street movement is the left’s equivalent of the Tea Party. Despite the quirky libertarian and anarchist views of some protesters, there is real commonality between the factors that led to the rise of the Tea Party as a national movement and “Occupy” activists. Both were built on a deep sense of unfairness resulting from the bank bailouts initiated in 2008. Both have attracted extreme partisan elements but also appeal to a broad group of politically independent Americans seeking an outlet for frustration over continued high joblessness. The difference is that while the Tea Party focuses on reducing the size of government, the “Occupy” movement is focused on a perception that the pain of recession is not evenly spread due to unequal access to government.

Whether the Occupy Wall Street movement will have an impact on the presidential and Congressional 2012 elections similar to the strong impact the Tea Party had on Congressional elections in 2010 depends on whether one political party can align its core message with the basic sentiments of the occupiers. The Democrats are moving quickly in that direction, asking party members to sign petitions declaring their solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street movement. President Obama’s theme of asking the richest Americans to “pay their fair share” to fund his jobs bill overlaps with the occupiers chief concern. On the other side of the political spectrum, Republican presidential candidates Mitt Romney and Herman Cain were quick to denounce the movement as “dangerous” and “anti-capitalist,” respectively. Romney’s subsequent shift to more sympathetic rhetoric indicates his realization of the movement’s potential to be either a very powerful ally or a problem for a presidential contender. Indeed, the best approach for Republicans will be to attempt to direct the occupiers’ anger about all things economic at the current President, in the hopes of solidifying blame against Obama, building momentum to ouster him.

Though the Occupy Wall Street movement has the potential to be a political force shaping the 2012 presidential election, it does not promise to move the United States closer to resolving its core challenges, either economic or political. The movement has tapped into a very deep and real sense of unfairness in U.S. society, but proposes no solution. If the Democratic Party can channel that sense of inequity into momentum for their candidates in 2012, it could have an electoral impact. But without a central political priority, like investment in preparing America’s kids for success in the new economy or promoting infrastructure development, the occupiers’ energetic involvement in the political process will not produce a mandate for how to deal with the United States’ economic weakness and debt. That spells more polarization and less compromise. That also seems to be the trap both Americans and Europeans find themselves in — popular anger over what’s wrong but no consensus on how to solve it.

Glenn Nye is a Senior Transatlantic Fellow at the German Marshall Fund.

Image by Jens Schott Knudsen

By Tamar Shapiro and Thomas Legge

WASHINGTON — On May 15, Richard M. Daley stepped down as mayor of Chicago. With his retirement, his city lost its chief executive of 22 years, but America also lost one of its most environment-friendly local leaders.  With the failure of the U.S. Congress to pass comprehensive climate and energy legislation, it is local and state governments in the United States, such as Daley’s city hall, that can play a pivotal role in fighting global warming. Europeans need to look to such local officials if transatlantic cooperation on climate change is to make progress in the years ahead.

Daley transformed Chicago from its industrial roots to a green city with more than 7 million square feet of rooftop gardens and green roofs, more than 1300 new acres of open space, more than half a million new trees planted since 1998, and 88 buildings that are LEED certified as meeting high standards for energy savings, water efficiency, and CO₂ emissions reduction. In recognition of these achievements, Daley was awarded the 2010 Climate Protection Award from the U.S. Conference of Mayors.

Much of the local climate agenda in the United States has been driven by committed state or city leaders, such as Daley, who have made fighting global warming a goal for their administrations. Many of these local leaders have taken steps to strengthen and leverage their own efforts through bilateral and multilateral partnerships. Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York chairs C40, a group of 18 large cities working together to combat climate change. Former Mayor Greg Nickels of Seattle was instrumental in launching the Climate Protection Agreement, pursuant to which more than 1000 mayors have pledged to meet the standards of the Kyoto Protocol despite lack of action at the federal level. In large part due to the personal engagement of then-Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, California has led state-level action with its 2006 Global Warming Solutions Act, which commits the state to return its greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 and to reduce them to 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050, Currently, more than half of the U.S. states have adopted climate action plans, although none with California’s level of ambition so far, and they are joined by a large number of local governments.

Europe’s climate champions are also to be found at the local level. Mayors like Mayor Bertrand Delanoë of Paris and former Mayor Ken Livingstone of London made green urban development a main plank of their political platforms. Some smaller cities have gone further, adopting targets that far exceed national ambition. Växjö, Sweden, decided in 1996 to become free of fossil fuels and is on track to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 55 percent below 1993 levels by 2015.

Even though such efforts depend on political entrepreneurs, they are supported and sustained by a national or EU-wide infrastructure. The EU has legally binding targets for greenhouse gas emissions, renewable energy, and energy efficiency by 2020, which often translate into legislative action at the city level. The EU has also set up a highly successful “Covenant of Mayors,” under which 1,900 local authorities have committed to exceed the EU-wide target of reducing CO₂ emissions by more than 20 percent by 2020. The Covenant provides targets, baselines, methodologies, and a structure of peer support to drive implementation. Campaigns like the annual European Green Capital award (won by Hamburg in 2011 for its energy savings and smart development of its industrial docklands) can build public awareness and a race to the top among municipalities.

Many European policymakers are encouraging equivalent actions at the city and state levels in the United States in lieu of federal action. Unfortunately, city and state leaders move on eventually, and even the best climate action plan and the most well-intentioned pledge, if not implemented by investment or regulation, can easily be ignored after a political transition. In the absence of a federal framework that drives local investments and regulatory changes, the U.S. climate strategy will inevitably consist of a patchwork of state and local actions — all important, but some with a longer-lasting impact than others. Large-scale investments in transit or in open space and greening — as were made by Daley’s administration — will have an impact that long outlasts the leader who championed them. Similarly, regulatory changes that promote more compact and energy-efficient development, while not irrevocable, are more difficult to undo than a plan.

With the U.S. federal government’s current retreat from the climate policy arena, European policymakers are facing a new challenge: working with many eager but diverse partners instead of one recalcitrant one. European policymakers, especially at the local level, can exchange best practices with their American counterparts. While the United States will still be left with a patchwork of climate change actions for the foreseeable future, such cooperation can help to overcome the unpredictability of political change by encouraging the implementation of measures whose success has been proven elsewhere and which will outlast their champions.

Tamar Shapiro is director of the Urban & Regional Policy Program at the German Marshall Fund in Washington. Thomas Legge is a program officer in the Climate & Energy Program at the German Marshall Fund in Washington

WASHINGTON — News from U.S. state capitols does not often make it across the Atlantic, but over the past month the actions of several U.S. governors have been featured in the European press, from last month’s coverage of the decision of three governors to reject federal high-speed rail funding to last week’s coverage of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s now successful effort to strip his state’s unions of their collective bargaining rights.  This recent interest is a welcome development, but even more attention is merited at a time when a new political culture among governors is shaking up Washington.

Perhaps the inner workings of U.S. statehouses have not been matters of great interest in Europe because there is no real parallel in European governance structures.  Even in Germany, the country whose federal structure is most similar to the United States, the minister-presidents of the Länder are by necessity deeply involved in federal politics due to their dual position as members of the Bundesrat, Germany’s second federal chamber.  U.S. governors, on the other hand, have an unusual degree of autonomy within the American federal system and have often used this independence to stand apart from Washington’s political battles.  But recent events suggest that this may be changing.

Governors are, in the words of Bruce Katz of the Brookings Institution, “leaders grounded in place rather than rooted in ideology.”  As such, they have often been perceived as a moderating influence in our political system — often steering clear of the more bitter federal political battles and, at times, reaching across party lines as potential allies for presidents. For example, in 1989, under the first President George Bush, a bipartisan group of governors reached an accord with him on education reform goals to the dismay of some in Congress who felt they had been bypassed in the process.  Even at a time of great political polarization during President Barack Obama’s first term, four Republican governors publicly and strongly supported the stimulus bill against the views of their Congressional party allies.  Among these governors was then-Governor Charlie Crist of Florida, who explained his position by saying: “It really is a matter of perspective… As a governor, the pragmatism that you have to exercise because of the constitutional obligation to balance your budget is a very compelling pull.”

To be sure, even among governors, crossing party lines has been the exception, not the rule.  While four Republican governors openly supported the stimulus act, 25 states with Republican governors joined lawsuits against Obama’s health care bill.  But the willingness of a small but prominent group of governors to cross party lines nevertheless bolstered the image of governors as moderates willing to get things done on-the-ground without relying on ideology.

But this long-held view of governors is now being challenged.  The new class of governors can hardly be viewed as a moderating force.  Quite on the contrary, they are taking controversial stands that have a direct impact on federal funding and policy, such as New Jersey Governor Chris Christie’s decision to cancel one of the State’s most significant infrastructure projects despite strong federal support, the decisions of the governors of Florida, Ohio, and Wisconsin to reject federal funding for high-speed rail that had already been awarded to their states under their predecessors, and Alaska Governor Sean Parnell’s announcement (now recanted) that he would not implement the federal health care law.  And while Wisconsin Governor Walker’s battle with the unions might not have a direct impact on federal policy, it could have a strong impact on federal politics due to the position of unions among the Democrats’ base.

Are these governors just exhibiting a new pragmatism, driven by unprecedented financial strain, or are they exercising their ideological muscles, buoyed by the Tea Party populism that brought many of them into office? The answers will vary from case to case, of course.  And what is considered pragmatic is undoubtedly colored by ideology, particularly in hard economic times requiring tough budget decisions.  But the fact is that we are witnessing a new willingness for governors to jump into the federal political fray, not as promoters of compromise but as political standard bearers.  As Ronald Brownstein wrote recently in the National Journal, “American politics increasingly resembles a kind of total war in which each party mobilizes every conceivable asset at its disposal against the other. Most governors were once conscientious objectors in that struggle. No more.”

If there was ever a time for proactive problem-solving rather than politics, this would seem to be it.  With all levels of government struggling with ballooning deficits, both the states and the federal government would benefit from an active, pragmatic partnership and an openness to compromise.   Perhaps such a partnership can be encouraged by placing the onus for providing answers back on governors — as appears to be the goal of a recent proposal allowing early opt-out from the health care law for states that pass their own legislation.  Isn’t this what Justice Louis Brandeis was talking about when he famously stated “that a single courageous state may, if its citizen choose, serve as a laboratory and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country”? (New State Ice Company vs. Liebmann, 1932) Let’s hope our new governors begin using the autonomy they have in our federal system not simply to reject funding and oppose legislation, but to propose solutions.  After all, this has long been considered their strength.

Tamar Shapiro is the Director of the Urban & Regional Policy Program at the German Marshall Fund in Washington.

 In my last blog post about the effects of High Speed Rail (HSR) stations on cities in Europe, I discussed the architecture of several notable HSR station buildings that have attracted a great deal of attention in and of themselves.  However, a memorable building alone isn’t sufficient to generate the so-called HSR Effect, which can attract economic growth, tourism, and investment in complimentary local transportation infrastructure such as light rail to cities.

For instance, the HSR station at the airport in Lyons, France, designed by Santiago Calatrava, is a beautiful building, with an innovative curved black ‘wing’ rising from the terminal. However, the station has not yet resulted in much development in the area.

European cities certainly aren’t relying on “star-chitecture” alone to generate urban development around HSR stations.  Soon after the gorgeous HSR station opened in Liège, Belgium in 2009, the city also completed the nearby Mediacite commercial center.  What had been a decrepit industrial area is now a 160,000 square meter business and leisure center, complete with retail outlets, restaurants, office space, and a host of other luxury amenities. These two projects have transformed the Longdoz district of Liège, which is now expected to draw up to 7 million customers and visitors a year.

New HSR stations have also been instrumental in the selection of sites for other important new cultural attractions, such as museums. These cases may reveal a new dynamic for urban transformation, as the HSR Effect becomes intertwined with the Guggenheim Effect to attract tourism and prestige to formerly run-down industrial cities.

This year, the Pompidou Center Art Museum opened a new museum in the town of Metz in eastern France. Accessible by an 80-minute TGV ride to central Paris, the Metz Pompidou, designed by architects Shigeru Ban, Jean de Gastines and Philip Gumuchdjian, has generated a big buzz in the architecture world, largely because of its complex, freeform, tent-like roof.  Ban has said that they designed the building to be inviting and open to the outside world, and conceived of the vast entryway to be “like a train station.” 

Similarly, The Louvre will open a new satellite museum in 2012 in the town of Lens, France, which also has a HSR station connecting visitors to Paris in just over an hour.

A GMF blog post by Ben Adler in September 2009 discussed the economic potential of high-speed rail, citing governmental and business leaders in Strasbourg, France, who agreed that their area had benefitted from the “High-Speed Rail Effect,” a host of civic advantages that can result from, or arrive alongside, new High-Speed Rail (HSR) service. These effects include attraction of new businesses, increases in tourism, and investment in local transportation infrastructure such as light rail or metro that serves the train station.

I am currently in Europe completing a German Marshall Fund Comparative Domestic Policy Fellowship, where I’ve been investigating examples of the HSR Effect. After nearly 30 years of HSR in France, and its rapid expansion over the past decade in Spain, Italy, and other areas, there are many examples of the ability of HSR station projects to stimulate urban renovation and economic growth. The HSR Effect has been generated most successfully when urban planners and politicians use policy tools and design principles to coordinate economic development, local transportation investment, and housing and commercial development.

In some cities, new train stations with high-speed service are being built as iconic architectural attractions. In much the same way the so-called ‘Guggenheim effect’ is credited with transforming Spain’s Bilbao through the iconic Frank Gehry-designed Guggenheim Museum, a few HSR stations have been designed by some of the world’s most famous architects. These stations strive to create a new identity for a revitalized neighborhood, or even the city as a whole.

Renowned Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava designed the new train station in Liège, Belgium, which opened to worldwide acclaim in 2009.

http://www.inhabitat.com/2009/09/28/calatravas-high-speed-rail-station-opens-in-liege/calatrava-tgv-station-1/

Calatrava also designed the beautiful Oriente Station in Lisbon, the Stadelhofen in Zurich, and the HSR station at the airport in Lyons, France. Of his newest station, Calatrava said, “It was my goal to create a 21st century transportation facility that would not only unite Liège with the rest of Europe, but would also serve as a symbol of the city’s renewal. The project, as a whole, creates a new gateway into Liège and re-establishes a relationship with the city.”

While great architecture alone is not sufficient to generate the HSR Effect and transform areas around rail stations, at its best it can improve the experience of large numbers of travelers and change the reputation of cities.

WASHINGTON — President Obama scored an historic victory by making health care accessible to almost all Americans. Of course, this victory came at a price. The president was not able to win over a single Republican. Nobody who has witnessed the fierce debate in Congress, the comparisons with Hitler and Stalin, and the tumultuous protests of tea party militants, could deny that America is a deeply divided country. Obama’s bipartisan approach has failed. But now his tireless efforts to keep his most important campaign pledge might have beneficial effects even for his foreign policy. With winning the health care battle as his top priority, the President even cancelled his trip to the EU-U.S. Summit as well as a trip to Asia (including Indonesia, his childhood home). He has risked almost everything — and won a lot. He may still disappoint the expectations of many, but those who doubted that Obama couldn’t pick a fight were proven wrong. It now remains to be seen whether he is capable of doing the same for his foreign policy agenda.

After Obama was sworn in as president, he initiated a full-scale revision of American foreign policy. He committed himself to an Israeli-Palestinian settlement, spoke to the Iranian people at Newroz, addressed the Arab world at his historic Cairo speech, and completely overhauled U.S. policy on Afghanistan and Pakistan — all in less than one year. But, so far, the results have been underwhelming. While it is true that his policies did a great deal for America’s reputation and legitimacy in eyes of the world, he fell short on achieving concrete results. The Iranians rejected his outstretched hand, and despite Obama’s two-day trip to Moscow, U.S.-Russian relations remain tense. During her visit to Russia, Hillary Clinton was caught unawares by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s announcement that a Russian-built nuclear plant in Iran will be up and running soon. Putin’s statement came while the U.S. is pressing for UN sanctions against Tehran and during negotiations about a strategic arms reduction treaty that were repeatedly delayed by Moscow’s insistence on linking START and missile defense.

So will the president’s health care victory put foreign policy on the Obama Administration’s front burner? Certainly not. The economic crisis, immigration reform, and (hopefully) climate change will leave little space for foreign affairs on the president’s agenda. And even if a deal on arms reduction with the Russians could (finally) be cut, the ratification process will be time-consuming because of resistance in the Senate.

Nonetheless, one great question remains: what happens when Obama’s outstretched hand is rejected on foreign policy issues? Was his policy of outreach a symptom of weakness (as many critics charge), or was he just badly misread by Vladimir Putin — in the same way that Republican House minority leader John Boehner misread Obama on health care.

Certainly, it was not just Americans who saw their president in a new light this week, and a new style of leadership. There’s no reason to worry: it seems likely that consensus will remain the preferred mode of operation for this U.S. president and his administration. But the message from this week’s health care drama is one that should be clearly understood abroad: If negotiations fail, a decision will be made. Another lesson after almost a year of intense struggle: don’t underestimate the strategic patience of this president.

A few days before the vote, Republican minority whip Eric Cantor added to the Famous Last Words file by declaring that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would not have the necessary votes for the health care bill. Remember the picture of President Harry Truman after his surprise electoral victory in 1948, holding a copy of the Chicago Tribune with the front headline blaring “Dewey defeats Truman!”? On Sunday, Obama followed in Truman’s footsteps both as a social reformer and as a surprise winner of a fight even his friends had not dared to hope he’d win.

Niels Annen is a Senior Transatlantic Fellow with the German Marshall Fund in Washington.

Editor’s note: Corrected to reflect date of Truman’s victory.

WASHINGTON — In the early 2000s, the issue of Muslim schoolgirls, teachers, and civil servants wearing headscarves in public institutions and schools was a heated national debate in France and a source of discussion and controversy around the world. In 2009, President Nicholas Sarkozy rekindled the flames of that debate with statements condemning the burqa in France, calling it a form of enslavement that was unwelcome in the country. Following his lead, on January 26, a French parliamentary panel recommended outlawing the use of face-covering veils in any public building or service institution, including public transportation. Though it is not an outright ban and not yet law, it is a large step toward the further restriction of female Muslim dress in France.

In the United States, where in late October a woman might easily pair a traditional hijab with a Halloween costume without issue, the French headscarf and burqa debates are hard to fathom; seen through American eyes, the bans limit the freedoms of speech and religion that the government of a liberal, democratic society should guarantee. Though it is easy to think of the controversy in this way, it is first important to understand the French government’s reasoning behind the measures it has taken.

Historically, secularism has been intensely important to the French Republic. The ideals of the French state seek to protect religious diversity by eliminating any mention or promotion of religion in official discourse or policy. For instance, you will never hear President Sarkozy request blessings for France the way that American politicians are obliged to end speeches with “God bless America,” and the Catholic crucifixes that are still commonplace in Italian classrooms are absent from French public schools. In this vein, the move to ban headscarves in 2004 was not designed to limit the liberties of Muslim girls and women. Rather, it was enacted to protect those who chose not to wear the veil from peer pressure and intimidation in their community. In this line of thinking, students would thus remain free from religiously based demands in their officially secular public school.

Though the 2004 headscarf law was grounded on the principle of state secularism, the potential burqa ban stands on much thinner ice. It would certainly impede the estimated 1,400 to 2,000   burqa-wearing French women from many aspects of daily life, including riding the Metro, visiting a relative in a public hospital, or entering their children’s school. Again, however, the official justification for the ban revolves around undue religious peer pressure. Proponents of the ban argue that most French women who have taken to the burqa have family origins in North Africa and the Maghreb, regions where the burqa is not a traditional form of dress as it is in parts of the Middle East and Central Asia. Thus, many interpret the French burqa to be a symbol of religious radicalization and increasing efforts to subjugate women in some Muslim communities. However true or not this interpretation may be, the move to outlaw the burqa looks much less like state protection and much more like state-imposed religious limitations.

WASHINGTON — Having worked in France for what we call a “metropolitan community of cities” in Nantes and for a regional council in Brittany, one of my objectives for my Comparative Domestic Policy fellowship at GMF was to have a close look on how metropolitan and regional organizations in the United States address energy and climate issues.

That is where I met a hurdle: to do so, who was I supposed to talk to? Institutionally speaking, metropoles and regions in the United States are sketchy concepts indeed. Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs), Councils of Governments, Regional Councils, Mayors Caucuses, etc., are a diversity of appellations for organizations whose authority and effective action varies dramatically among regions, especially when it comes to climate protection.

After meeting with people at the Denver Region Council of Governments (DRCOG), the Puget Sound Regional Council, and the National Association of Regional Councils as part of my fellowship, I have compiled some thoughts on the effectiveness of MPOs in combating climate change. These thoughts are also based on my experience over a couple of months spent working at the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (MWCOG) before starting my fellowship at GMF.

The level of interest and involvement in climate protection varies among metropolitan organizations the United States. A few of them are leading the way, such as MWCOG in DC region, the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission in Pennsylvania, the San Diego Region Association of Governments (SANDAG), the San Francisco Bay Area, or the Puget Sound Regional Council in Seattle. They address the question of climate protection through different approaches.

Some of them use a regulatory approach, similar to what they have been doing for years under federal mandate on air quality conformity assessment of transportation plans. In that case, the focus is mainly to determine the impact of transportation policies on greenhouse gas emissions. Some others adopt a “visioning” approach in which energy and climate are considered within a comprehensive strategy for regional growth management, which includes land use, housing, transportation, and other sectors. Under that category you will find MWCOG’s Greater Washington 2050, DRCOG’s Metro Vision 2035, and Puget Sound 2040 vision. Lastly, a few COGs and MPOs have a “policy and program” approach. MWCOG, for instance, provides support to its members on a wide range of issues that pertain to energy and climate, such as green building policies, green fleets, energy-efficient street lighting, energy retrofit financing, and outreach. The objective here is to foster consistency on climate action between all members, and to have more leverage on emissions through regionally adopted policies.

In that context, what are the perspectives for metropolitan organizations on energy and climate?

Because of their proximity to the community, cities and counties will very likely remain the leading organizations dealing with operational projects and policies, community engagement, and outreach. COGs and MPOs are more “2nd level” or back-office organizations, but I have the feeling they will play a growing role in the coming years for a number of reasons.

Firstly, the city level doesn’t match the scale needed to address climate issues, especially on transportation. Since geenhouse gas emissions are for a large part the result of our everyday activities, it makes sense to work on climate protection at the same geographical scale. And today, as people live in one place and work in another, the metropolitan area is definitely more accurate than the city scale.

Climate protection is a subtle mix between operational action and long-term strategy design. For the latter, metropolitan organization are well-positioned to take action. They have experience of cross-jurisdictional consensus-building and visioning processes at the regional level on other issues. They also have already-developed modeling tools well-adapted for long-term climate strategy design. Some of them — like PSRC in Seattle —   have developed impressive evaluation capacities integrating transportation, land use, and greenhouse gas emissions. Of course, these expert capacities and tools don’t replace political will. But they are instrumental in supporting and facilitating policymaking. They make it possible to “visualize” the climate impacts of different policy options.

Lastly, the Obama administration seems to have metropolitan issues on its agenda. The recent “Sustainable Communities” initiative, launched by HUD and DOT in June, and recently joined by EPA, aims at decompartmentalizing federal housing, transportation, and environmental policies, thus making it possible for a metropolitan vision of sustainability to grow. More specifically on climate, aligning transportation, land use, and housing plans with GHG reduction goals at the metropolitan level is expected to be required under the Federal Energy and Climate bill.

In France, metropolitan collaboration really took off about one decade ago when these organizations were given legal existence and authorities, as well as fiscal resources. Now we   are talking about giving them a citizen-elected board, which demonstrates the role they have come to play in local democracy and action.

I don’t know if it is a path the United States is willing to take in the long run. But it would certainly help it seize strategic opportunities for metropolitan cooperation, such as energy, climate, and sustainable development.

Anne Mariani, a fellow with GMF’s Comparative Domestic Policy Program, is on leave from her post as Program Manager for Climate and Energy Policy at the Regional Council of Brittany, France.