The Myth of American Isolationism

Abstract

International relations scholarship often describes America's foreign policy tradition as having isolationist tendencies or an isolationist dimension, a characterization derived most directly from American security policy in the 1920s and 1930s. This article offers a critique of this characterization. American diplomacy in the 1920s was subtle but ambitious and effective. American policy in the years leading up to the bombing of Pearl Harbor was in fact quite responsive to events on the European continent. In short, American isolationism is a myth.

The structure of foreign policy attitudes in transatlantic perspective: Comparing the United States, United Kingdom, France and Germany

“…Interestingly, the United Kingdom, France and Germany score higher on isolationism than the United States. While isolationism has been a recurring theme in the history of American foreign policy (and the study of American foreign policy attitudes), these results indicate that the American public is not, in cross‐national perspective, especially isolationist (Braumoeller ; Kertzer ; Nincic ). The United Kingdom, France and Germany also score lower on MI than the United States.…”

“…In accord with other recent scholarship (Kertzer ; Rathbun ), we find an isolationist posture that is distinct from MI and CI. This finding is important because it means that isolationism is not simply the joint negation of the latter two concepts (Braumoeller ; Urbatsch ). Further, our data reveal that ‘liberal internationalism’ (often used synonymously with cooperative internationalism) may be better explained as two separate (but related) constructs.…”

Old Paradigms in History Die Hard in Political Science: US Foreign Policy and American Exceptionalism

“…Whether the United States was isolationist during the 1930s is a different debate, one that most recently has been critically examined by Braumoeller (2010). and Ikenberry's arguments link the liberal founding with support for a liberal international order.…”

Owning worldwide principles: The case of American exceptionalism

“…Some have seen signs of a new spirit of isolationism gaining momentum in American political thought in the 1990s (Bienen, 1992; Schlesinger, 1995; Weidenbaum, 1996) and in the early 2000s (see Quinn, 2007). Then again, based on studies by Braumoeller (2010) and Quinn (2007) one can make the claim that despite having some supporters isolationism has not really been a dominant ideology in American politics at least for the last hundred years. Instead, there has been a strong inclination towards liberal universalist discourse among American decision makers.…”