Between Virtue and Power : The Persistent Moral Dilemma of U.S. Foreign Policy

by John Kane

• ISBN13: 9780300137125
• ISBN10: 0300137125
• Format: Trade Book
• Copyright: 2008-10-21
• Publisher: Yale University Press

Summary

In this survey of U.S. history, John Kane looks at the tensions between American virtue and power and how those tensions have influenced foreign policy. Americans have long been suspicious of power as a threat to individual liberty, Kane argues, and yet the growth of national power has been perceived as a natural byproduct of American virtue. This contradiction has posed a persistent crisis that has influenced the trajectory of American diplomacy and foreign relations for more than two hundred years. Kane examines the various challenges, including emerging Nationalism, isolationism, and burgeoning American power, which have at times challenged not only foreign policy but American national identity. The events of September 11, 2001, rekindled Americans' sense of righteousness, the author observes, but the subsequent use of power in Iraq has raised questions about the nation's virtue and, as in earlier days, cast a deep shadow over its purpose and direction.

Author Biography

John Kane is professor, Department of Politics and Public Policy, Griffith University, Brisbane, and author of The Politics of Moral Capital. He lives in Queensland, Australia.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. ix
Introduction	p. 1
Origins and Significance of the American Mythology	p. 18
Founding a Virtuous Republic	p. 32
Problems of Virtue and Power	p. 50
Nonentanglement: The Economic Dimension	p. 66
Nonentanglement: The Political Dimension	p. 81
Innocent Virtue and the Conquest of a Continent	p. 98
From Imperialism to World Peace	p. 123
Woodrow Wilson and the Reign of Virtue	p. 144
Disillusionment and Hope	p. 165
American Isolation	p. 181
American Virtue and the Soviet Challenge	p. 200
Anticommunism and American Virtue	p. 222
Cold War Ironies	p. 238
Vietnam: Virtue Stained, Power Humbled	p. 261
Putting Humpty Together Again	p. 278
Offended Innocence, Righteous Wrath	p. 303
Epilogue	p. 330
Notes	p. 337
Index	p. 393
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