On Understanding American Foreign Policy
| DOI | 10.1177/002070205501000203 |
| Author | G. M. Craig |
| Date | 01 June 1955 |
| Published date | 01 June 1955 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
ON
UNDERSTANDING
AMERICAN
FOREIGN
POLICY
G.
M.
Craig*
RITICISM
of
American
foreign
policy
has
become
a
favour-
ite
parlor
game
in
Canada,
the
United
States
and
most
parts
of
the
world.
With
the fate
of millions
hanging
on
the
course
of
this
policy,
it
is
entirely
legitimate
for
people
outside
as
well
as
within
the
republic
to
engage
in
the
"Great
Debate"
and
make
their
views
known.
At
the
same
time,
there
is
a
danger
that
the
discussion
will
become
enmeshed
in
personalities,
sur-
face
phenomena,
prejudice,
emotions and
other
irrelevancies.
It
is
useful
from time
to
time
to
restore
our perspective
by
recalling
some
of
the
basic
factors
that
determine
the
conduct
of
American
foreign
policy.
As
everyone
knows,
the
United
States
is
a
relative
newcomer
to
the
active
arena
of
world
politics.
From
the
close
of
the
Napoleonic
Wars
in
1815
until
the
outbreak
of
the
first
world
war
in
1914
the
republic
was
not
a
serious
factor
in
the
calcula-
tion
of
the
world
balance
of
power.
Americans
believed
through-
out
this
period
in
the
doctrine
of
the
two
spheres,
that
the
western
hemisphere
was
immune, and
must
be
kept
immune,
from
the
"bad
old
world"
across
the
Atlantic.
As
Mary
Baker
Eddy
put
it,
"I
believe
in
God,
the
Constitution
and
the
Monroe
Doctrine." America
was
a
specially
favoured
place,
where
evil
practices,
such
as
the
balance
of
power,
"power
politics,"
and
despotism
happily
did
not
exist.
The
task
of
foreign
policy
was
to
keep
things
that
way.
Americans tended
to
sentimentalize
their
history,
to
believe
that
they
had
always been
motivated
by
benevolent
ideals,
that
their
great
material
success was
attribut-
able
to
unique
virtue
and
that,
in
fact,
they
were
not
as other
people.
In
the
twentieth
century
this
happy
situation
came
to
an
end.
Americans
discovered
for
the
first
time
in
1914-17,
and
then
far
more
threateningly
in
1940-41,
that
the
state
of
the
balance
of
power in
Europe,
and
even
in
Asia,
had
a
direct
effect
upon
American
security.
What
Americans
had
hitherto
chosen
to
*Assistant
professor
of
history,
University
of
Toronto; member, editorial
committee,
Canadian
Historical
Review.
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