Dueck: Reluctant Crusaders Colin Dueck: Reluctant Crusaders - Power, Culture, and Change in American Grand Strategy

Hardcover: 224 pages
Publisher: Princeton University Press 2006
ISBN: 0-691-12463-9

"To pursue a global grand strategy without providing the means - military, political, and economic - for it is to invite not only humiliation, but disaster. The United States, together with allies, can either take up the burden of truly acting on its own internationalist rhetoric, or it can keep the costs and risks of foreign policy to a minimum. It cannot do both. That is the U.S. strategic dilemma." 171

Dueck analyses 3 periods of strategic adjustment in American grand strategy: 1) 1918-1921 with Wilson and the League of Nations initiative, 2) 1945-1951 with the birth of containment and 3) 1992-2000 the post-Cold War American hegemony.

His findings: crusading spirit to advance liberal world order + limited liability consitute the cultural elements of American grand strategy.

"Americans have often been 'crusaders' - crusaders in the promotion of a more liberal international order. But Americans have also frequently been 'reluctant' to admit the full costs of promoting this liberal international vision. In this sense, the history of American grand strategy is a history of 'reluctant crusaders'." 2

Buzzword: Neoclassical realism
Balance of power: US the hegemon

Neoclassical realism -theory combines systemic pressures (power) and specific strategic cultures to analyze chosen policies. It is a combination of realism and social contructivism. The picture is realist in the understanding of the international anarchy and competition but more analytical in understanding that material reality of power is translated through decisionmakers' perceptions into political estimates and then constructed into policy through their actions.

Second Opinion: Jack Snyder / Foreign Affairs

  ¶ 10/25/2006 12:05:00 ap.