US Foreign Policy US Latin American Relations

1
US Foreign Policy/US Latin American Relations

• Intimate Ties, bitter struggles

2
Identity and Difference Theme

• What was the nature of US and Latin American
  relations in regard to identity and differences?
• David Ryans US Foreign Policy
• Fringe of Post-modernist
• Post-Modernism
• Michael Hunts Ideology and US Foreign Policy
• Ideological perspective

3
General Statements of US Foreign Policy

• Hegels dialectic process
• Dialectic produced words like freedom replacing
  God in terms of how history moves forward
• US was predicated on how humans control their
  environment
• Based on Liberal principles
• Karl Marx comes into the picture
• Classes revolted against each other-created a
  struggle
• Hunt argues that there was a strong strand for
  materialism
• Democracy, Liberty were brought to the table
• Secular Evangelicalism Others need democracy

4
What were the Ideals?

• Liberty, democracy, self-determination backed up
  by a strong state
• Progressivism Characterized the ideals
• Late 19th century materialism influenced US
  policy
• Interdependence between US and Latin America was
  rarely equal
• Economic prosperity
• US desired to infiltrate the economic/Material
  way of life in Latin America by means of economic
  prosperity-indirectly
• Spread liberty, justice, equality, by force

5
Justification for US Foreign Policy

• Cultural Superiority
• Moral superiority
• Philosophical superiorty
• Hegemony notion of direct/deliberate political
  control and dominance while interfering with
  another country
• US Foreign Policy
• Declaration of Independence
• Negative liberty
• Lead to isolation leave me alone (negativity)
• Monroe Doctrine
• Negative liberty
• Open Door Policy
• Wilsons Fourteen Points/Atlantic Charter/Truman
  Doctrine/Bill Clintons Strategy for Engagement
  and Enlargement

6
The History (US Foreign Policy)

• Declaration of Independence
• Limited to White Males
• Brought the conflict of Slaves and Whites
• Madison Period
• MANIFEST DESTINY
• Declaring idea and using materialism and
  hegemonic ideals to make it work
• Bring enlightenment to these people (who didnt
  need it)
• Its our destiny
• Empire by Invitation
• Economic ideas brought to the table to enhance
  democray

7
Evocative Notions

• KKK- Ku Klux Klan
• McCarthyism
• Anti-Communism
• Racial Discrimination
• Internment of Japanese in WWII
• Genocide of Indians

8
US Ideals

• Defined itself as different from the rest of the
  world
• Isolationism
• We should worry about ourselves
• Spanish-American War
• World is corrupt and unenlightened
• US would pay any price and bear any burden to
  assure the survival and success of Liberty-JFK

9
20th Century

• The American Century
• Question Jeffersons quote empire of liberty
  (negative) and Empire for liberty (propagate US
  values)
• Statement was violated regularly (Latin America
• US culture was expansionist and messianic (became
  the god of the 20th century)
• Stood for good and bad
• Stood for liberty and illiberty
• Crushing resistance

10
How do democracies go about conducting foreign
policy ini a democratic way?

• THEY DONT
• US identity was expressed in foreign affairs
• Foreign policy stood as the uncontestable truth
• Expressed in Thomas Paines works
• Expression of all mankind
• Liberty and justice of all
• Gettysburg Address
• http//showcase.netins.net/web/creative/lincoln/sp
  eeches/gettysburg.htm

11
David Ryans belief

• There is the subject of history and the object of
  history
• Object Center of historythe Viewed
• Subject The viewer of historythe recipient
• SubjectculturedObjectOther
• Needs to be applied to normal world
• Some cultures are stronger, therefore superior

12
US Problems

• Relatively new
• Had to work hard to form an identity
• No uniform culture (multicultural)
• No shared beliefs
• No common stories
• We had to invent these ideals
• Ideals were expressed in the values of the
  Enlightenment
• We have to invent
• Reasons
• DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE
• Our story
• Our identity/symbol

13
Michael Hunts Perspective

• The tension between national morale and foreign
  ideology is obvious.
• In fact, he argues, McKinley was eager to join
  war because of problems at home
• Keep up national morale
• Realist historians McKinley was astute and
  under-rated president
• Remembered by different perspectives

14
National Pride Connected to Foreign Policy

• George Kennon
• We ought to realists
• Be concerned with foreign affairs
• the worst thing you can be is wishy-washy in
  foreign poiicy terms
• Moralism v Legalism are enemiesof foreign policy
• Cannot have moralism without power

15
What is driving US policy?

• Mainly, ideals

16
George Kennon Ideals

• Accused McKinley of not being tough enough
• 1898-US Maine is sunk, starting Spanish-American
  War
• McKinley should have thought about going into
  Latin America through rational thinking
• Public had no business in foreign affairs

17
William Appleman Williams

• The historian who looked closely at the economic
  interests of foreign policy
• Understood informal Open Door imperialism
• The Tragedy
• US becomes involved in much more subtle ways
• Indirect nature of foreign policy in regard to
  economics

18
Michael Hunts 3 ideas of Foreign Policy

• Founding Fathers era
• early days of the Articles of Confederation
• Quest for national greatness
• More or less lasted from the 1790s to the 1890s
• Revolutionary era
• The struggle of white Americans to maintain
  supremacy
• Race portion of US policies
• The extent to which one can politically and
  socially control change in other countries
• Leads to current times
• Hegemonic period
• What we do when other countries do what we do not
  like

19
Founding Father era

• National greatness
• Thomas Paine
• Concept of independence
• Thomas Jeffersons Declaration of Independence
• Anti-European/Anti-Royal
• Alexander Hamilton had a different view from
  Jefferson
• Saw a more general notion
• National greatness where liberty was less
  extensive
• Not like by many
• John Adams a brat

20

• Hamilton would have allowed LA purchase
• Jackson,Houston, Polk were in a sense later-day
  Jeffersonians
• Manifest Destiny
• National Greatness was eternal
• Little interaction with Latin America
• Influence on individual autonomy
• Expressed in Mexican War
• Against foreign countries
• Expansion came with problems
• Slavery
• What to do?
• US became divided

21

• Focused at the end on Reconstruction
• How to united Union
• 1880s Vision of liberty and greatness resurfaces
• Takes a hold national pride
• Go against European powers
• Do it in Pacific, East Asia
• New technology develops
• World seemed smaller
• American life was transformed
• Industrialization, emigration
• Massive numbers of people
• Find new market abroad
• Henry Cabot Lodge
• Americans basically need to awaken to their
  place as on of the great nations of the world
• Found its expression in McKinley
• 1900Platt AmendmentAmerica could get involved
  in Cuba
• Annexes Hawaii, Enters Puerto Rico, and
  Philippines
• Spanish-American War splendid little war
• Fought boxer rebellion

22

• Era of imperialism
• Critics
• Southern democrats
• Did not want Puerto Rico
• Nor Hawaii
• Competition
• Intellectuals
• Runs counter to their thinking
• Come together as the Anti-Imperialist League
  (1898)
• Filipino resistance to occupation (200,000
  casualties)
• Incompatibility with liberty of America
• Michael Hunt McKinley merely walked the path
  Jefferson had marked out
• Jefferson with LouisianaMcKinley with foreign
  policy
• There is no change all we want in natl
  greatness

23
Did Liberty Sanctify Greatness?

• Michael Hunt
• McKinley was trying to divert attention from the
  domestic problem