At the End of the American Century: America's Role in the Post-Cold War World

“It was one thing,” writes editor Robert L. Hutchings in the introduction to the present volume, “to lead an alliance of Western democracies in a grand struggle against Soviet communism; quite another for the accumulated obligations of the forty years of Cold War confrontation to ensnare us in a continued international role against no certain foe toward no certain ends.” In At the End of the American Century, Hutchings brings together a distinguished group of authorities to review essential questions of morality, interest, politics, and economics in U.S. foreign policy after the collapse of the Soviet empire. The contributors—prominent legislators, foreign policy makers, scholars, and business leaders—offer a back-to-back basics inquiry: How much does morality, rather than self-interest, drive our foreign policy? How do we confront an anarchic world when our strategies have been developed for opposing singular, organized forces? What do we really want out of global trade, and do we know who our partners will be?

The contributors are Thomas S. Foley, Jonathan Clarke, H. W. Brands, John Lewis Gaddis, Joseph Duffey, Robert Kaplan, James Rosenau, Bryan Hehir, Bowman Cutter, Michael Oppenheimer, Alfred Eckes, Samuel Berger, Ronald Steel, Milton Morris, Timothy Wirth, and Carol Moseley-Braun.

Robert L. Hutchings was director for European affairs at the National Security Council in 1989–92 and special adviser to the secretary of state in 1992–93. He is now Assistant Dean for Academic Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University. He was awarded the Polish Order of Merit in recognition of his contribution to Poland's freedom and independence.

Foreword: A Second American Century
Thomas S. Foley

Introduction
Robert L. Hutchings

Part I. The American Foreign Policy Tradition
1. Searching for the Soul of American Foreign Policy
Jonathan Clarke
2. Exemplary America versus Interventionist America
H. W. Brands
3. Rethinking Cold War History: A Roundtable Discussion
John Lewis Gaddis
4. The American Century and Its Discontents
Joseph Duffy

Part II. The Changing Shape of International Politics
5. World Politics in the Twenty-first Century
Robert L. Hutchings
6. An Anarchic World
Robert D. Kaplan
7. The United States in a Turbulent World
James N. Rosenau
8. Strategy and Ethics in World Politics
J. Bryan Hehir

Part III. The United States in the Global Economy
9. A New International Economic Order?
W. Bowman Cutter
10. The New Mercantilism: Where Is Business Leading Our Foreign Policy?
Michael F. Oppenheimer
11. A New Protectionism? Tariffs versus Free Trade
Alfred E. Eckes, Jr.

Part IV. American Foreign Policy in the Post–Cold War Era
12. Challenges Approaching the Twenty-first Century
Samuel R. Berger
13. The Internationalism Temptation
Ronald Steel
14. Searching for a New Domestic Consensus
Milton Morris
15. Building Domestic Constituencies for Global Action
Timothy E. Wirth

Afterword: A New Paradigm of Shared Prosperity through Partnership
Carol Moseley-Braun