Even with President Barack Obama fresh off a trip to Africa and headed in late summer for a trip to Russia, people outside the United States take a less favorable view of America than they did right after he became president.

Surveys from different parts of the world show the initial goodwill toward the U.S. from the international community after Obama assumed office has waned and recent headlines point to some reasons why -- Revelations of U.S. international surveillance, the manhunt of information leaker Edward Snowden, drone strikes in foreign countries and the continued unrest in Syria have exposed the traditional fault lines of international relations.

The ebbing of world regard for the United States since 2009 was predicable given the extravagant expectations that people in some countries had of Obama when he was first elected.

Right after Obama won in 2008, South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a winner of the 1984 Nobel Peace Prize for his role in working to end apartheid, gushed, “It can't be true that Barack Obama, the son of a Kenyan, is the next president of the United States. But it is true, exhilaratingly true. An unbelievable turnaround.”

He added, “The Bush administration has riled people everywhere. Its bully-boy attitude has sadly polarized our world. Against all this, the election of Barack Obama has turned America's image on its head.”

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