Kori N. Schake - Managing American Hegemony: Essays on Power in a Time of Dominance

The Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, founded at Stanford University in 1919 by Herbert Hoover, who went on to become the thirty-first president of the United States, is an interdisciplinary research center for advanced study on domestic and international affairs. The views expressed in its publications are entirely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the staff, officers, or Board of Overseers of the Hoover Institution.

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Hoover Institution Press Publication No. 563

Hoover Institution at Leland Stanford Junior University,
Stanford, California, 94305-6010

Copyright 2009 by the Board of Trustees of the
Leland Stanford Junior University
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First printing 2009
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Schake, Kori N.
Managing American hegemony : essays on power in a time of dominance /
Kori N. Schake.
p. cm. (Hoover Institution Press publication series ; 563)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8179-4901-3 (hardback : alk. paper)
ISBN 978-0-8179-4902-0 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. United StatesForeign relations2001 . 2. HegemonyUnited States. I. Title.
JZ1480.s33 2009
327.73 dc22 2008007267

ISBN 978-0-8179-4903-7 (electronic)

The Hoover Institution exists, in the words of Herbert Hoover, to point the road to PEACE, to PERSONAL FREEDOM, and to the SAFEGUARDS OF THE AMERICAN SYSTEM. This mission is advanced through the dissemination of ideas that encourage positive policy formation using reasoned arguments and intellectual rigor, converting conceptual insights into practical initiatives judged to be beneficial to society.

Managing American Hegemony, by Hoover research fellow Kori Schake, is just such an undertaking. In it she articulates the elements of power, broadly defined, that form the safeguards of the American way of life.

The success of the United States in the international order cannot be taken for granted. Indeed, the freedom and prosperity our generation enjoys is not guaranteed for our children and grandchildren. Only by understanding the forces that have resulted in American power can we hope to preserve the moral, military, and financial strength that ensures our liberty.

Schake's precise contribution identifies the convergence of elementseconomic, military, diplomatic, linguistic, and culturalthat reinforce American hegemony. The roots of our success stem from a dynamic political culture, where change is championed, individuals are rewarded for risk, and the structures of society adapt and grow with the nation. Schake offers an insightful look at the current state of U.S. power and how we can address fiscal, political, and organizational threats to our continued prosperity.

It is fitting that such a book would be written by Kori. Her experience as a scholar, teacher, and principal within various government agencies, makes her uniquely qualified for the task. She served as a senior policy advisor to the presidential campaign of John McCain; prior to that she was Principal Deputy Director in the Secretary of State's Office of Policy Planningboth roles demonstrate the broad knowledge and wide-ranging thinking necessary to undertake such a book.

A review of her experience includes the Bradley Professor of International Security Studies at the United States Military Academy at West Point and director for Defense Strategy and Requirements on the National Security Council during President George W. Bush's first term. Her political, military, and security research has been recognized and supported by a MacArthur Foundation Research and Writing Award and numerous academic fellowships.

We want to thank Barbara and Tom Stephenson for their significant ongoing support of the Hoover Institution and the work of Kori Schake. Tom, currently serving as U.S. Ambassador to Portugal, is that rare individual who contributes both intellectually and financially to the Hoover Institution.

There can be no more critical field of public policy than the study of economic, political, and societal relationships that shape the international order and profoundly impact foreign policy, security, and trade. With Managing American Hegemony, Kori Schake grounds our understanding of the world in the reality of U.S. predominance. In doing so, she helps shed light on the reality of order, stability, and peace that America's presence brings. Her words are valued now more than ever in an age of American skepticism.

JOHN RAISIAN
Tad and Diane Taube Director
Hoover Institution
Stanford University

This is not a book of scholarship: too much is asserted rather than proven, data provided is illustrative but frequently not systematic. It is, however, a book of ideas, intended to inform public policy debates about our country and the changing international order. It was written in the interlude between my work on the National Security Council and joining the State Department's Policy Planning Staff, to address questions my work there had raised and that I believed were in many cases not explained accessibly enough in the existing literature about how globalization is changing the international order and what it means for the United States. While the arguments advanced would certainly be strengthened by additional research, broader peer review, and revisions, I hope the ideas will nonetheless be of interest to scholars, national security practitioners, and people like my wonderful Mother, who does not work in this field but reads widely and cares about these issues.

I am profoundly grateful to the Hoover Institution for supporting this work. John Raisian's commitment to engaging academics in the country's crucial public policy debates has been a constant source of inspiration. Tod Lindberg, the cheerful and serious-minded Vicar of Hoover's Washington office, nourished this effort and me in innumerable ways. Peter Berkowitz gave me the opportunity to present some of this work to several informed and critical audiences (including his sharp self). Under the terrific stewardship of Colonel Mike Meese, the Department of Social Sciences at the U.S. Military Academy let me use my post as Distinguished Chair in International Security Studies to test-drive these ideas on some of the country's sparkliest and most committed young people. More than anyone else, Major Jon Byrom, my Executive Officer in the Department of Social Sciences at West Point, helped me think these issues through as we taught together. He under-took the research presented in the table, challenged my ideas where they didn't accord with his research or experienceeven bet me money on the proof of several questions we were thinking our way through. My thanks to them all.

This is a book about American power: why it's so predominant in the international order, whether it's likely to remain so, and how current practices can be revised to reduce the cost to the United States of managing the system. Despite clarion calls about the end of the unipolar moment and the demise of American moral and military and financial power, the United States remains the defining state in the international system and is likely to be so for at least several more decades. If there were a market for state power, now would be a great time to buy futures in American power. The commodity is substantially undervalued, and the market does not yet seem to have noticed.