Due to the course of U.S. foreign policy under President Trump, everybody seems to be talking about American imperialism these days. While the issue of imperialism most certainly is back, it is no new topic in U.S. history and historiography. Debates about whether there is, was, or ever has been an American imperialism, what defines the character of a specifically American imperialism (in contrast to European imperialisms), the American Way of Empire, and the connection between American values and U.S. expansion are rich, complex, and controversial. Taking U.S. history from the American Revolution to Donald Trump into consideration, the lecture will critically examine and reflect on the problem of imperialism in U.S. history. We will discuss topics such as Thomas Jefferson’s idea of an "Empire of Liberty," the Manifest Destiny exceptionalism of westward expansion, the U.S.’ economic penetration of overseas markets in the last third of the nineteenth century, the American Cold War empire of the twentieth century, and the problem of imperialism under the auspices of globalization and the ‘War on Terror.’
Recommended readings: William Earl Weeks, Dimensions of the Early American Empire, 1754-1865 (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2013); Walter LaFeber, The American Search for Opportunity, 1865-1913 (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2013); Akira Iriye, The Globalizing of America, 1913-1945 (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2013); Warren I. Cohen, Challenges to American Primacy, 1945 to the Present (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2013); Jasper Trautsch, The Genesis of America: U.S. Foreign Policy and the Formation of National Identity, 1793-1815 (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2018); Mary Nolan, The Transatlantic Century: Europe and the United States, 1890-2010 (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2012); John L. Gaddis, We Now Know: Rethinking Cold War History(Oxford: Oxford UP, 1997); Odd A. Westad, Cold War: A World History (New York: BasicBooks, 2019).
