Imperial Designs: Neoconservatism and the New Pax Americana - Hardcover

Dorrien, Gary

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0415949807 ISBN 13: 9780415949804

Publisher: Routledge, 2004

Synopsis

This work argues that the influence of neoconservatives has been none too small and all too important in the shaping of this monumental doctrine and historic moment in American foreign policy. Through a fascinating account of the central figures in the neoconservative movement and their push for war with Iraq, he reveals the imperial designs that have guided them in their quest for the establishment of a global Pax Americana.

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Review:

"...a prolific author whose writings include two volumes in an acclaimed series on American liberal Christianity and a decade-old book on neoeonservative ideology, thoroughly rehearses the movement of the ideas and people operating the U.S. foreign policy machinery. In an astonishingly comprehensive discussion of the neoconservatives' rise to power, Dorrien identifies the major players who devised the grand strategy of unipolarism, which calls for America to assert itself as the preeminent global power in the post-Cold War world..." - The Christian Century

Synopsis:

In the waning months of the Cold War, shortly before an expiring Soviet Union finally disintegrated, a group of neoconservative policymakers and intellectuals began to argue that the moment had come to create an American-dominated world order. Some of them called it 'the unipolarist imperative'. Instead of reducing military spending, they contended, the United States needed to expand its military reach to every region of the world, using America's tremendous military and economic power to create a new Pax Americana. This book describes how the ideology of American global preminence originated during the presidency of George H. W. Bush, developed in the 1990s, gained power with the election of George W. Bush, and reshaped American foreign policy after September 11, 2001. Structured as a narrative, this account deals with government policymakers and outside advocates. It tells the story of the development of unipolarist ideology and its role in recent American foreign policy. It makes an argument about the nature and problems of this ideology, emphasizing that an unrivaled superpower makes the whole world its geopolitical neighborhood.

It offers a critique of the unilateralist militarism of the second Bush administration and it contends that the problem of imperial expansiveness, though dramatically heightened by the Bush administration, did not begin with it. The problem is inherent in the anxiety of being a global hegemon.

About this edition

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0415949807
• ISBN 13: 9780415949804
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 312