Promised Land, Crusader State: The American Encounter with the World Since 1776 [Hardcover]

Walter McDougall (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 29, 1997

Promised Land, Crusader State, by the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Walter McDougall, is an iconoclastic reinterpretation of the traditions that have shaped U.S. foreign policy from 1776 to the present. Entertaining, fast-paced, and learned, it exposes the myths that obscure the real meaning of such concepts as American Exceptionalism, Isolationism, Manifest Destiny, Wilsonianism, and Containment. Taking up the torch of George Kennan, McDougall proposes nothing less than to cleanse the vocabulary of our sterile post-Cold War debate on America's role in the world. Looking back over two centuries, he draws a striking contrast between America as a Promised Land, a vision that inspired the "Old Testament" of our diplomatic wisdom through the nineteenth century, and the contrary vision of America as a Crusader State, which inspired the "New Testament" of our foreign policy beginning at the time of the Spanish-American War and reaching its fulfillment in Vietnam. To this day, these two vi

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

When the Cold War ended and left the United States without one clear, monolithic enemy or ideology to battle, a hint of confusion and indecisiveness entered U.S. foreign policy, revealing weaknesses in the American diplomatic tradition. However, According to Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Walter A. McDougall, this confusion was not a result of the Cold War, but rather made more visible by the absence of a looming conflict. Reaching back to 1776 to analyze the foreign policy decisions made during the U.S. progression to superpower, McDougall reveals the numerous paradoxes present in American foreign policy.

Beginning with the original intentions of the Founding Fathers and the various interpretations of those ideals over the years, he deconstructs the role of the U.S. in global affairs, questioning both the logic and motives of how the nation deals with friend and foe. One of McDougall's major contentions centers on efforts to affect other countries' policies and governments by projecting U.S. standards or choices on them. He is particularly concerned with what he views as an overextension of resources and wisdom, and the glaring hypocrisy such efforts reveal. He points to several examples of how time and energy was wasted trying to change those who were uninterested or unwilling. As McDougall points out lucidly and convincingly in Promised Land, Crusader State: The American Encounter With the World Since 1776, one nation cannot cure the major ills of another, and the price of such an attempt is too great to risk.

From Library Journal

Pulitzer Prize-winning historian McDougall renders a service here to students of diplomatic history and general readers alike. In a concise analysis of U.S. diplomatic history, he defines terms such as "isolationism," which are bandied about so casually in post-Cold War debates on U.S. foreign policy. Adapted from his lectures at the University of Pennsylvania, this supremely readable book is presented in conversational style. McDougall divides American diplomatic history into novel "Old Testament" and "New Testament" phases. The Old Testament, which centered on safeguarding liberty at home, extended from the Revolution to the 1890s; the New Testament, featuring crusades abroad, extends from the Spanish-American War to the present. Within the two phases, he identifies eight schools of thought that battle for supremacy today. The challenge for the future is to decide which intellectual currents in America's view of the world should be retained in crafting a new foreign policy. An important work; strongly recommended for all libraries.?James Holmes, Fletcher Sch. of Diplomacy, Tufts Univ., Medford, Mass.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 286 pages
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin (April 29, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0395830850
• ISBN-13: 978-0395830857
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.5 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #378,525 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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24 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a pivotal text, October 13, 2000

By 

Orrin C. Judd "brothersjudddotcom" (Hanover, NH USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Promised Land, Crusader State: The American Encounter with the World Since 1776 (Hardcover)

Since America won the Cold War, there has been great confusion over what principles should guide our Foreign Policy. The options range from the isolationism of Pat Buchanan to the interventionist nation-building of Bill Clinton. Anyone wishing to understand the ongoing arguments should read this terrific book. McDougall's compelling thesis is that there is a fundamental dichotomy in US Foreign Policy, with two competing doctrines each influenced by four different themes. There is the Promised Land (or Old Testament) impulse, which is based on four key traditions:

OLD TESTAMENT (Promised Land) Exceptionalism (focus on liberty at home, avoiding entangling alliances) Unilateralism (as opposed to isolationism) The American System (Monroe Doctrine) Expansionism (Manifest Destiny)

This was the prevailing approach to foreign policy--designed to protect America's liberty and independence from the outside world--until 1898 and the Spanish American War, at which point a New Testament gained ascendancy, likewise guided by four traditions:

NEW TESTAMENT (Crusader State) Progressive Imperialism Liberal Internationalism (Wilsonianism) Containment Global Meliorism (reforming other nations internal problems)

The adoption of the New Testament policy marked the triumph of the "do-gooder impulse" and represented America's desire to influence the rest of the world and try to make it a "better" place. Given this context, we can see that Buchanan and Clinton are representatives of two great historic trends in American thought; what remains is for us to decide between the two.

After presenting the historic development of each of the eight traditions, McDougall concludes with a chapter on whether each would serve us well now. The only New Testament tradition that he sees any value in is Containment. In fact, he treats Containment well throughout the book. It seems as if he's a little overawed by George Kennan (the father of Containment). In particular, he gives the policy credit for defeating the Soviet Union. While he does criticize the price paid (huge debt, internal dissent, etc.), I believe that he overestimates the policy. First of all, if containment did work, it too 36 years to do so and that is simply too long. Second, it would seem that you have to consider the Reagan Era policy to be quite different than what had come before, especially the active support of counterrevolutionary movements in Soviet Bloc countries (Afghanistan, Nicaragua, Angola). Generally, the discussion of how US policy won the Cold War is somewhat weak.

But his final conclusions, that we should return to the Old Testament--taking care of our own internal problems; being prepared to act unilaterally, if at all; remaining strong enough to deter challenges; and thereby, continuing to fulfill our unique destiny--is cogent and extremely powerful. This is a pivotal text for understanding our role in the world, past, present and future.

GRADE: A

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars America's varied doctrines of dealing with the world, October 4, 2004

By 

Craig Matteson (Saline, MI) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Promised Land, Crusader State: The American Encounter with the World Since 1776 (Paperback)

I first saw Walter McDougall on the C-SPAN Booknotes show discussing this book in 1997. He impressed me so much that I went online and ordered it from Amazon instantly. It is a great read because McDougall writes clearly, concisely, and with a rare vividness for a scholar.

This is not a book of American History per se. It is a book about American's developing and changing doctrines of how to deal with the world beyond our borders. McDougall discusses eight doctrines with four under the "Old Testament" heading (when America was basically turned inward and worried only about the Western Hemisphere), and four under the "New Testament" (when America became a player on the world stage and, briefly, a colonial power).

Understanding these doctrines is essential to understanding America's changing place in the world. These doctrines conflict with each other and yet the all still echo through history to our present. This leads to some of the complexity in our present political relationships with the world and our own muddled sense of ourselves and our role in the world. Certainly, America has done some wonderful things for the world, but the wake of our great ship of state has also made navigation tough for some of the smaller barks trying to stay afloat in the storms of history.

This is a fine book and a great read. I encourage everyone, especially students and young people, to read it carefully and to consider seriously the arguments Prof. McDougall has put forth. You will be better off whether or not you end up agreeing with him.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Making sense of US Foreign Policy Schizophrenia, January 18, 2004

By 

N. Tsafos (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Promised Land, Crusader State: The American Encounter with the World Since 1776 (Paperback)

To many observers, American foreign policy appears schizophrenic--an odd mix of high-minded idealism and crass realism. On one end, American hegemony has coincided with an unprecedented degree of geopolitical stability and material prosperity; on the other, America has started fights when none existed and has meddled where it did not belong. In other words, some see America as a beacon, others as a beast. It is little wonder that the exercise of American power, most lately in Iraq, has proven so controversial.

This ambivalence was well captured by Senator Fulbright who wrote that, "The inconstancy of American foreign policy is not an accident but an expression of two distinct sides of the American character. Both are characterized by a kind of moralism, but one is the morality of decent instincts tempered by the knowledge of human imperfection and the other is the morality of absolute self-assurance fired by the crusader spirit." Walter McDougall, of the University of Pennsylvania, tries to cast light into these American contradictions by looking into the Old ("Promised Land") and New Testament ("Crusader State") of its foreign policy.

Mr. McDougall's purpose is to dispel certain myths surrounding American foreign policy and unify seemingly inconsistent traditions. The former goal is achieved through a meticulous reading of primary and secondary sources; for example, Mr. McDougall renames the hallowed principles of the Old Testament: Liberty for Exceptionalism, Unilateralism for Isolationism, Expansionism for Manifest Destiny, and the American System for the Monroe Doctrine. The New Testament is similarly described in four traditions: Progressive Imperialism, Wilsonianism, Containment, and Global Meliorism.

What connects these diverse traditions is the belief that foreign policy should never compromise liberty at home. What is more, these traditions coexist in the American mind and influence its foreign policy. In that sense, argues Mr. McDougall, simple dichotomies between realism and idealism miss the mark; American foreign policy is at the same time "good, bad and ugly." Only after appreciating this reality can one hope of understanding the basic tenets of American foreign policy and make sense of its apparent schizophrenia.