The Roots Of American Foreign Policy

One of America's most perceptive young historians examines the misunderstood dimensions and implications of a great question confronting the nation -- our foreign policy. Professor Kolko makes it clear that our foreign policy is neither the result of omission or ignorance nor of a "military-industrial complex." Civilian authority and civilian-defined goals, he asserts, are the consistent sources of American foreign policy. From this premise, Kolko undertakes to investigate "the respectables," the self-styled liberal realists and businessman who are the architects of the decades-old premises of American foreign policy. He also outlines the nature of American power and interests in the modern world and provides an assessment of who gains and who loses as a result of the policies Washington pursues."--Jacket.

Originally published in 1991, Explaining the History of American Foreign Relations has become an indispensable volume not only for teachers and students in international history and political science, but also for general readers seeking an introduction to American diplomatic history. This collection of essays highlights a variety of newer, innovative, and stimulating conceptual approaches and analytical methods used to study the history of American foreign relations, including bureaucratic, dependency, and world systems theories, corporatist and national security models, psychology, culture, and ideology. Along with substantially revised essays from the first edition, this volume presents entirely new material on postcolonial theory, borderlands history, modernization theory, gender, race, memory, cultural transfer, and critical theory. The book seeks to define the study of American international history, stimulate research in fresh directions, and encourage cross-disciplinary thinking, especially between diplomatic history and other fields of American history, in an increasingly transnational, globalizing world.

The American Search for Opportunity, 1865-1913 analyzes the period between the American Civil War and World War I (1865-1913) as the formative basis for twentieth-century American world power--"The American Century" as it has become known--and examines the "Imperial Presidency" that these roots produced. The extent of U.S. power was so great that it not only transformed American society, but reshaped other societies around the globe as well, by helping fuel--and in some cases directly causing--the great revolutions of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries in Mexico, Russia, China, Cuba, Hawaii, the Philippines, Panama, and Central America. The book, therefore, not only examines American history, but the history of many other areas that were dramatically affected by U.S. power as they entered the twentieth century.

Exhaustive examination from colonial times to the present, emphasizing conflicting opinions on foreign policy issues.

Paying close attention to its domestic roots, this textbook provides a valuable introduction to the construction and application of US foreign policy in the modern era. Accessibly written and including helpful illustrative material, a glossary and guide to further reading, it is organised around four broad themes: • the ideologies of US foreign policy; • the institutions of US foreign policy making; • the actors who influence and shape the content of US foreign policy; • the policy goals and ideas that motivate US foreign policy. Drawing from analyses of the broader history of US foreign policy throughout the post-Second World War period, the book encourages readers to think about how these ideas, institutions and goals have been at work in the foreign policy of recent presidential administrations, including those of George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump and Joe Biden.

The Routledge History of U.S. Foreign Relations provides a comprehensive view of U.S. diplomacy and foreign affairs from the founding to the present. With contributions from recognized experts from around the world, this volume unveils America’s long and complicated history on the world stage. It presents the United States’ evolution from a weak player, even a European pawn, to a global hegemonic leader over the course of two and a half centuries. The contributors offer an expansive vision of U.S. foreign relations—from U.S.-Native American diplomacy in eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to the post-9/11 war on terror. They shed new light on well-known events and suggest future paths of research, and they capture lesser-known episodes that invite reconsideration of common assumptions about America’s place in the world. Bringing these discussions to a single forum, the book provides a strong reference source for scholars and students who seek to understand the broad themes and changing approaches to the field. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of U.S. history, political science, international relations, conflict resolution, and public policy, amongst other areas.

This important text offers a clear, concise and affordable narrative and analytical history of American foreign policy since the Spanish-American War. The book narrates events and policies but goes further to emphasize the international setting and constraints within which American policy-makers had to operate, the domestic pressures on those policy-makers, and the ideologies, preferences, and personal idiosyncrasies of the leaders themselves.