The American University in Cairo’s Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Bin Abdulaziz Alsaud Centre for American Studies hosted a lecture on Wednesday, 9 May, by John Zogby, author, Forbes columnist and founder of the prominent Zogby Poll.

The lecture was entitled “The 2012 US Elections: Impact in the Middle East," but Zogby’s main focus was the US election and the role of young people and other groups in that election.

Demographics plays a huge role in the development of history, Zogby said: movements of peoples, their growth, the exchanges between them. An early pioneer of now popular online polls, Zogby's opening remarks concerned the Arab uprisings, comparing the demographics of Arabs now to that of the "baby boomers" in Europe and America, saying that Arabs are leaving their mark much like the baby boomers did when they protested against the Vietnam War.

The current boom is worldwide, Zogby believes. The young will inevitably make their presence felt around the globe.

Differences between citizens have narrowed in this generation as planetary sensibility exists today, Zogby said, which poses the question “Why are we going to war against people who look just like us?” Zogby says. The bonding of people in Tahrir Square emanates from this sensibility.

Zogby then spoke about demographics in the current contest between US President Barack Obama and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney. He broke down the main groups into Hispanic voters, African American voters, the youth and professionals. Giving examples from the past election and current polling data, Zogby tried to show what he believes to be the large impact of the size and orientation of the different groups on the electoral outcome.

According to Zogby, Obama is currently well positioned vis-à-vis voters, except for with the youth, where his current standing shows he lost 10 per cent of the youth vote compared to his final gains in 2008. Zogby believes this may be due to present economic difficulties that particularly hit this age group more than others.

“At this point in time we have an election that’s a tie, and we have an election that’s a tie because of demographics,” Zogby said.

Zogby suggests that each of the contenders has a problem. Obama is too dependent on the economy and world events. Romney faces a split in the Republican party between ultra-conservative voters who don’t want to compromise, and moderate opponents of Obama who don’t trust him.

Regarding the election and the Middle East, again Zogby believes it comes down to demographics. Pro-Obama voters see America as the leader among regional powers but understand the limits of foreign intervention. The Republican side, explains Zogby, is different and views the US as a sole superpower and has the capacity to intervene when it wants or when its interests are threatened. “Both are pro-Israel,” he added.