America and the World
America and the World
America has long been much more inclined than other Western democracies to defy norms of diplomacy, international law, and human rights deemed against its interests, although these stances have at times profoundly divided the U.S. public. Americans were bitterly divided over the Bush administration’s use of torture, its aim to detain alleged terrorists forever without trial at Guantanamo, and its catastrophic invasion of Iraq on grounds later revealed to be false. The Obama administration’s rather different approach to foreign policy proved divisive too. The chapter explores why Americans are far more polarized than Europeans over fundamental issues like war, diplomacy, the United Nations, and human rights. From the ideal of Manifest Destiny to America’s relative geographic isolation, superpower status, and the idea that God chose it to lead the world, Mugambi Jouet’s original analysis explains the interrelationship between the different aspects of American exceptionalism shaping U.S. foreign policy.
Keywords: U.S. Foreign Policy, War on Terror, Militarism, Imperialism, International Law, Torture, Guantanamo, Patriotism, Chauvinism, Insularity
California Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs, and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us.