Charles A. Kupchan - Isolationism

At a time when many are urging America to retreat internationally, Kupchans illuminating history of US foreign policy reminds us of isolationisms pitfalls as well as its continuing allure. Scholars and policy makers alike will benefit from this books trenchant analysis of Americas past and wise counsel about how to forge a more balanced, realistic, and enduring foreign policy going forward.

Peter Trubowitz, Professor of International Relations, London School of Economics

Charles Kupchan reminds us that a globally assertive foreign policy is more the exception than the norm in American history. Even those who do not fully agree with his arguments will find this book sharply argued, provocative, and engaging.

Hal Brands, Henry A. Kissinger Distinguished Professor of Global Affairs, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS)

Astute political history.

Kirkus

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Charles A. Kupchan 2020

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Kupchan, Charles, author.

Title: Isolationism : a history of Americas efforts to shield itself from the world / Charles A. Kupchan.

Other titles: History of Americas efforts to shield itself from the world

Description: New York, NY : Oxford University Press, [2020] | Includes index. |

Identifiers: LCCN 2020019840 (print) | LCCN 2020019841 (ebook) |

ISBN 9780199393022 (hardback) | ISBN 9780199393251 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: United StatesForeign relationsHistory. | IsolationismUnited StatesHistory.

Classification: LCC E183.7 .K86 2020 (print) | LCC E183.7 (ebook) | DDC 327.73dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020019840

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020019841

To Nicholas S. Fish

The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is an independent, nonpartisan membership organization, think tank, and publisher dedicated to being a resource for its members, government officials, business executives, journalists, educators and students, civic and religious leaders, and other interested citizens in order to help them better understand the world and the foreign policy choices facing the United States and other countries. Founded in 1921, CFR carries out its mission by maintaining a diverse membership, with special programs to promote interest and develop expertise in the next generation of foreign policy leaders; convening meetings at its headquarters in New York and in Washington, DC, and other cities where senior government officials, members of Congress, global leaders, and prominent thinkers come together with CFR members to discuss and debate major international issues; supporting a Studies Program that fosters independent research, enabling CFR scholars to produce articles, reports, and books and hold roundtables that analyze foreign policy issues and make concrete policy recommendations; publishing Foreign Affairs, the preeminent journal on international affairs and U.S. foreign policy; sponsoring Independent Task Forces that produce reports with both findings and policy prescriptions on the most important foreign policy topics; and providing up-to-date information and analysis about world events and American foreign policy on its website, www.cfr.org.

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Part I
The Era of Isolationism, 17891898

Part II
The Defeat of Realist and Idealist Internationalism, 18981941

Part III
The Rise and Fall of Liberal Internationalism, 19412020

The United States is in the midst of a bruising debate about its role in the world. Not since the interwar era have Americans been so divided over the scope and nature of their engagement abroad. President Donald Trumps America First approach to foreign policy certainly amplified the controversy. His isolationist, unilateralist, protectionist, and anti-immigrant proclivities marked a sharp break with the brand of internationalism that the country had embraced since World War II. But Trumps election was a symptom as much as a cause of the nations rethink of its approach to the world. Decades of war in the Middle East with little to show for it, rising inequality and the hollowing out of the nations manufacturing sector, political paralysis over how to fix a dysfunctional immigration policythese and other trends have been causing Americans to ask legitimate questions about whether U.S. grand strategy has been working to their benefit. The COVID-19 pandemic then caused a severe economic downturn the likes of which the nation had not experienced since the 1930sthe last time the United States made the mistake of beating a strategic retreat in the face of mounting trouble abroad. Adding to the urgent and heated nature of this rethink of American foreign policy is Chinas rise and the threat it poses to the liberal international order that took shape during the era of the Wests material and ideological dominance.

Isolationism speaks directly to this unfolding debate over the future of the nations engagement with the world. It does so primarily by looking back, by probing Americas isolationist past. Although most Americans know little about it, the United States in fact has an impressive isolationist pedigree. In his Farewell Address of 1796, President George Washington set the young nation on a clear course: It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world. The isolationist impulse embraced by Washington and the other Founders guided the nation for much of its history prior to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941.

My starting premise is not that the United States should or will return to the grand strategy of nonentanglement urged on the nation by its first president. But Americas isolationist past does have much to teach us about the nations current geopolitical predicament. Many readers may find this assertion puzzling. After all, the United States has spent much of the last eighty years strenuously trying to run the world through a global network of international institutions, alliances, and military bases. Beginning during World War II and continuing well into the twenty-first century, successive administrations have sought to open up and knit together international markets while maintaining strategic commitments in virtually all quarters of the globe.