The American Era: Power and Strategy for the 21st Century [Hardcover]

Robert J. Lieber (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0521857376 | ISBN-13: 978-0521857376 | Publication Date: September 12, 2005

The American Era makes a provocative argument about America's world role. It establishes the rationale for a grand strategy that recognizes American preponderance as necessary and desirable for coping with the perils of the post-9/11 world. First, militant Islamic terrorism plus weapons of mass destruction pose a threat of an entirely new magnitude and require us to alter the way we think about the preemptive and even preventive use of force. Second, the UN and other international bodies are habitually incapable of acting on the most urgent and deadly problems. Third, in an international system with no true central authority, other countries will inevitably look for leadership to the U.S. If America, as the world's foremost power, does not take the lead in confronting the most dangerous threats, no one else is likely to have the ability or the will to do so. Thus, at a time when threats from terrorism and weapons of mass destruction are a reality, and when such values as human rights, liberty and stability cannot be reliably assured by institutions such as the UN and the European Union, active intervention on those issues that matter most becomes a necessity, not an option. Robert J. Lieber is currently Professor of Government and International Affairs at Georgetown University. He is an expert on American foreign policy and U.S. relations with the Middle East and Europe. He received his undergraduate education at the University of Wisconsin and his Ph.D. at Harvard and has held fellowships from the Guggenheim, Rockefeller and Ford Foundations, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Lieber has taught at Harvard, Oxford and the University of California, Davis, and has been Visiting Fellow at St. Antony's College Oxford, the Harvard Center for International Affairs, the Atlantic Institute in Paris, the Brooking Institution in Washington, and Fudan University in Shanghai.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"This may be the best book on American foreign policy written since Sept. 11. Robert Lieber is a scholar with deep insight, broad knowledge, and, what is lacking in most discussions of world affairs today, common sense. Anyone thinking seriously global affairs today and in the coming years should begin with this smart and sober work."
Robert Kagan, author, Of Paradise and Power: America and Europe in the New World Order

"Robert Lieber has written a first-rate book...A work of scholarship, yet accessible to a wider readership, a work of judgment, yet anchored in the data and the objective world...a book of quality by a scholar of genuine depth and authority."
Fouad Ajami, Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University

"A powerful book with truly global scope. Lieber is not only a specialist on U.S. foreign policy, he has deep knowledge of Europe, the Middle East, global energy, and security affairs...Lieber recognizes the costs and limits of military force, but he argues, without apologies, for the prudent use of American military power to safeguard the U.S. and, indeed, the world."
Charles Lipson, University of Chicago

"With its powerful thesis and compelling arguments, Robert Lieber's The American Era is destined to become a key text in the global debate about American foreign policy."
Michael Mandelbaum, author of The Ideas That Conquered the World: Peace, Democracy and Free Markets in the Twenty-First Century

"[The American Era is ] a wonderful, elegant and compelling analysis in every respect... It will become compulsory reading on my Masters US Foreign Policy course next year and, I believe, should be read - and hopefully understood! - by anyone interested in American foreign policy. It really represents a magnificent achievement and is a work of exemplary scholarship. I hope and trust it receives the positive impact, reviews and sales that it thoroughly deserves."
Robert Singh, Birbeck College, University of London

"Distracted by the red-hot partisan debate over Iraq, one can easily lose sight of the underlying strategic imperative that now guides American foreign policy. Robert Lieber's The American Era: Power and Strategy for the 21st Century serves as an invaluable primer on the nature of that imperative, outlining in a comprehensive but accessible fashion the continuing need for American global leadership."
Gary Schmitt, The Weekly Standard

"Lieber has produced an elegantly written and readable book. It is a welcome and, in many respects, authoritative addition to the growing literature on recent American foreign policy."
International Affairs

"Mr. Lieber's book gives a comprehensive and in-depth explanation of the foundations for the strategy and actions of the administration, of interest to its supporters. At the same time, the book will compel critics to consider the best arguments that can be made for the administration's international policies."
The Washington Times

"Robert Lieber's The American Era: Power and Strategy for the 21st Century is a brief but compelling review of American foreign policy over the last five years, and pretty much demolishes the idea that we are roundly hated or that we are culpable for various alleged sins. A sober and very readable account by a Georgetown University scholar whose intellectual integrity and knowledge shine through on every page."
Victor Davis Hanson, senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. His latest book is A War Like No Other. How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War.

"Mr. Lieber's book gives a comprehensive and in-depth explanation of the foundations for the strategy and actions of the administration, of interest to its supporters. At the same time, the book will compel critics to consider the best arguments that can be made for the administration's international policies." - W. Bruce Weinrod

Book Description

This controversial book addresses the world role America has begun to undertake in light of recent terrorist events. If America does not respond actively to terrorist threats, no one else is likely to take the initiative. In such a time when threats from terrorism and Weapons of Mass Destruction are a reality, and when human rights, peace, and stability cannot be assured by institutions like the U.N. and European Union, global activism on the part of the U.S. becomes a necessity, not something about which to be apologetic.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 268 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press (September 12, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521857376
• ISBN-13: 978-0521857376
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,251,951 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Intellectual integrity, deep understanding, clearly written: the ideal book to explain the American role in the world of today, August 3, 2009

By 

G.W. Shelton (New York, N.Y.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The American Era: Power and Strategy for the 21st Century (Paperback)

Robert Lieber has successfully accomplished what dozens, if not hundreds, of other authors have sought to do: he has written a clear, concise, wise and clear-minded book that explains to the general reader why the United States of America, regardless of which party holds the White House or the Congress, will be the world's major guiding force for the century ahead. He brilliantly explains the arcane and often invisible workings of the various segments of the American government that are responsible for our foreign policy---and shows what the underlying purpose of American foreign policy is. His sharp mind, his crystal clear writing, his vast reading, his conversations around the world with policy makers, scholars and citizens of countries as diverse as those in China and Japan, Iraq and Israel and Germany, the U.K. and France---all add up to a readable, non-partisan book that lays out the challenges and the policies that have shaped and will continue to shape the American role in the 21st century. It takes a real expert to be able to write as beautifully as Lieber does: any fool can obfuscate; Lieber clarifies and sheds the light of his learning, his wisdom and his integrity as a thinker and as a scholar on every page of this splendid book. This should be required reading for (1) every citizen (2) every journalist worldwide (3) every blogger around the world and (4) every friend of yours who wants a clear understanding of the world of today. This is THE book to buy.
Highest recommendation.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great book by a great authority---yet accessible to all readers: full of wisdom, clarity, and uncommon common sense, August 3, 2009

By 

Morris Goldstein (San Francisco, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The American Era: Power and Strategy for the 21st Century (Paperback)

Robert Lieber, whose calm demeanor and great wisdom are familiar to viewers of PBS's THE NEWS HOUR WITH JIM LEHRER among other television programs, is at the very pinnacle of American authorities on foreign policy. In this book, he writes at the top of his form, free of academic jargon (despite his professorship of government and international affairs at Georgetown University), free of the partisan slant that encumbers so many books about America's role in the world, and full of wisdom and clarity. Because of his deep understanding and familiarity with all major political players on the world stage---from the United States to Western Europe to the Middle East to Asia---as well as his profound understanding of globalization and energy issues, Professor Lieber's THE AMERICAN ERA will educate the reader in everything he or she needs to know about the era in which we are all living. This book is a guide for the perplexed---and who among us isn't?---about how the United States is the world's best hope for leadership in the 21st century. In the clearest possible language, he takes up every major source of trouble and anxiety throughout the world, and elucidates the issues facing the West today, including the role of a diminished Europe, the issues raised by Iraq and the Middle East, America's role in Asia, and whether the U.S. is truly "hated" or secretly much appreciated by the nations and peoples of the world. He cuts through the headlines of the moment and shares with the reader decades of careful, insightful understanding of why the world is the way it is. Perhaps Robert Lieber's greatest gift to the reader--- in addition, of course, to his deep intelligence and his ability to summarize succinctly enormous amounts of reading and numbers of conversations with scholars and leaders around the world--- is something even more valuable: uncommon common sense. This is no ivory tower book by an ivory tower thinker: it is a vivid and thoughtful examination of why the United States plays such a critically important role in the 21st century---and why it will continue to do so, despite its many challenges. This is the perfect gift for anyone who wishes to understand the world today. In other words, it is the perfect gift for everyone. Kudos to a great teacher and a superb writer.

4 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hard to improve on the above comments, June 19, 2007

By 

Allan Blackwell (Massachusetts) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The American Era: Power and Strategy for the 21st Century (Paperback)

Written for an informed citizen, this soaring account ought to be
tucked under your arm for awhile. Since 2001, this reader has been
racing through Colin S Gray, Robert Haass, Keith Payne, Robert Kagan,
Robert D Kaplan, and so on. If you need perspective, then this book
cannot be praised enough. Superior.