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Begin New Search Topic Foreign Policy Political Geography United States Content Type Special Report

1. America First: The Past and Future of an Idea

Author:
Melvyn P. Leffler and William Hitchcock
Publication Date:
09-2018
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
The Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR)
Abstract:
Like many historians, I was stunned a couple of years ago when Donald Trump started campaigning on the platform of America First. For me, America First was associated with the insularity, isolationism, unilateralism, nativism, anti-Semitism, and appeasement policies that President Franklin D. Roosevelt struggled to overcome in 1940 and 1941. Why, I asked myself, would anyone want to associate himself with that discredited movement, a movement that seemed eviscerated after the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941? Did Trump understand or know about that movement?
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, History, and Diplomatic History
Political Geography:
United States

2. Designing Our Secure Future: Inaugural Convening, Ottawa, Canada

Publication Date:
01-2017
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Our Secure Future
Abstract:
Our Secure Future (OSF) believes that women’s full participation in society makes the crucial difference in achieving more effective governance and lasting peace. OSF aims to strengthen the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) movement by amplifying women’s voices, strengthening the global network of women peacebuilders, and promoting committed action by multiple stakeholders to turn policy into practice. Founded in 2016 with a mission to strengthen the Women, Peace and Security movement to enable effective policy-related decision-making for a more just and peaceful world, we set out to understand how best to achieve our vision of achieving a more peaceful future transformed by women’s full participation. After a series of consultations with multiple stakeholders in the WPS field during the summer and fall of 2016, we found that the issues of developing a shared vision for the Women, Peace and Security agenda and collaborating on common narratives were recurrently named as being critical to making progress in this field. The overwhelming feedback pointed to the nee
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Gender Issues, Women, and WPS
Political Geography:
United States and Global Focus

3. Remaking Bagram: The Creation of an Afghan Internment Regime and the Divide over U.S. Detention Power

Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Open Society Foundations
Abstract:
This report by the Open Society Foundations highlights concerns about the transition of the U.S. detention facility in Bagram, Afghanistan, from U.S. to Afghan control. Remaking Bagram exposes a deep divide between U.S. and Afghan officials on the eve of the planned handover that puts U.S. intentions to maintain detention authority in Afghanistan against the Afghan government’s insistence that Afghans can no longer be detained by the United States on “Afghan soil.” Remaking Bagram, which was released on September 6, also highlights the Afghan government’s efforts to take custody of detainees held by the United States by creating an Afghan internment regime that would detain individuals without trial. Many Afghan legal experts call this new system unconstitutional and have expressed fears that it is susceptible to abuse.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Military Affairs, Military Intervention, State Building, and Detention
Political Geography:
Afghanistan and United States

4. The Agenda for the EU-US strategic partnership

Author:
Álvaro de Vasconcelos (ed)
Publication Date:
10-2011
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
European Union Institute for Security Studies
Abstract:
Nothing is perhaps more fundamental to EU foreign policy than the imperative of defining a common agenda with the US. Unfortunately, however, in Europe relations with the United States are marked by ideological divergences or antagonisms which are largely a legacy of the Cold War era. But such a rift is clearly dysfunctional in a polycentric world, which is no longer characterised by a bipolar world order, but by the need to define much larger coalitions, across ideological divides, than just the Euro-American one.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Cold War, and Bilateral Relations
Political Geography:
United States, America, and Europe

5. The Constitutional History of U.S. Foreign Policy: 222 Years of Tension in the Twilight Zone

Author:
Walter A. McDougall
Publication Date:
09-2010
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Foreign Policy Research Institute
Abstract:
In 1973, Congress passed the infamous War Powers Resolution (WPR), over Richard Nixon’s veto. It was perhaps the most ambitious Congressional effort to bridle the President since the battle with Andrew Johnson over Reconstruction. The WPR is worth reading—once—then forgetting, because its convoluted, contradictory, and doubtless unconstitutional mix of instructions, restrictions, and ticking clocks has never been honored by any administration or upheld by any court. Presidents Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush all dispatched U.S. forces into combat situations without paying more than lip service to the WPR. In 1990, following Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait, President Bush stationed 100,000 personnel in Saudi Arabia. He sought no authorization and, in fact, informed just one member of Congress: Senator Sam Nunn (D., Ga.). When he then prepared Operation Desert Storm to liberate Kuwait, 54 Congressmen led by the chairman of House Armed Services Committee, Berkeley radical Ron Dellums (D., Calif.), filed for an injunction to stop the war. U.S. District Judge Harold H. Greene ran for cover. Noting that 54 fell far short of a majority, he judged the case “not ripe for judicial determination.”
Topic:
Foreign Policy, War, Governance, Law, and Constitution
Political Geography:
United States

6. Restoring American Leadership

Publication Date:
04-2005
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Open Society Foundations
Abstract:
Cosponsored by the Open Society Foundations and the Security and Peace Institute (a joint program of the Center for American Progress and The Century Foundation), Restoring American Leadership: 13 Cooperative Steps to Advance Social Progress offers a starting point for restoring America's international alliances. The papers in the report, written by experts in 13 fields, recommend how President George W. Bush can make progress in areas where his personal commitment to action is needed and where global alliances can help strengthen the national security goals of the United States. Restoring American Leadership covers a wide range of topics, from international cooperation in the war on terror, to curbing proliferation of nuclear weapons, to advancing the rights of women across the globe. Each paper offers a specific set of recommendations for executive action by the president consistent with his stated values, as well as a brief overview of the administration's position on the issue to date.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, International Cooperation, Leadership, and War on Terror
Political Geography:
United States and Global Focus