Power, Profit and Prestige

Question 1

What were the opinion on European leaderships after I and II world war?

Answer 1

That highlighted the Eu inability to manange power.

Those events confirmed the Walter Lippman statement (1939) that the “power control has crossed the Atlantic.”. Global american leadership was real.

Question 2

What was US principal instrument of influence?

And what consequens it has on British autonomy?

Answer 2

The lend-lease programme.

GB received US aid just to fight the war, not to maintein its colonial power. US waited until GB closing to bank rupt before any assistance was given.

Question 3

Why the US anti-colonial position became more and more ambiguous after 1945?

Answer 3

Because US promised to the colonies the independence and to its Eu allies that they woul recover their power on the colonies after the war.

At the end they were very carefull to stimulate colonial self-determination. They were feared by the idea of loose their accesses to colonies row materials, expecially oil.

Question 4

What was the Pax Americana?

Answer 4

Pax Americana waere the contictions on which US granted aid and protection.

It demostrated that imperialism could be reached with just a combination of
- military alliaes and
- world economy opened up to trade, investment and information.
(fear of URSS and Comunism –> everyone seeking for US protection)

Question 5

what means “tripartite imperial system” in US foreign policy?

Answer 5

It is the multilateral system of accords that US put in place for its hegemony.

• in Western Europe it supported pluralist policies and liberal democratic states(exception for Sp, Por, Gre, It)
• northeast Asia it rested on semi-sovereign authoritarian or semi-democratic developmental states.
• colonies it rested on interventionism and predatory imperial politics.

Question 6

1956 Suez crisis: which side did US take? What did Fr e GB decided after?

Answer 6

US used coercive economic and diplomatic instument to force Anglo-Frech_Isdael forces to withdraw.

GB and FR respectively aligning with and separating form US. They tried to restore the position they had in past but didn’t succeed.

Question 7

What was French Third way?

Answer 7

It was supperted by the ex general and President Gaulles, who wanted an predominant leadership in continental Europe.

Question 8

The US built a hierarchical system that implied also Eu. Why is that happend?

Answer 8

European states were willing to give up on their political authority to gain US protection, fallowing a Cold War security interest.
So the benefit outnumbered the costs of loosing the political autonomy.

Question 9

What was the Keynesian compromise within the Atlantic system?

Answer 9

it consisted in the "socail state", that give recognition to the labor and employee on a political level. 
It permitted to curbing class conflict.

Question 10

Who was George Kennan and what he suggested about Asia?

Answer 10

George Kennan was an important polititian (he is also note as the autor of the containment policy) whose suggested that US could’t aim to human rights in Asia ex colonies, it had to seek to mantain disparity because he feared the great numeber of Asian population.

Also he considered Asian people as a inferior race.

Question 11

What were the differences between the traspacific alliance system and the trasatlantic hegemonic system?

Answer 11

There were 3 main differencies:

1. Unit for democracy.
   The Pax Americana in Asia was consistently illiberal. (es Japan)
2. Single Market Dependency.
   Birateral relations with Woshington, rather than orizontal integration. Open market but only with US.
3. War Making State Building.
   America was almost constantly in war: it was not cold war (Korea, Vietnam).

Question 12

When the decline of US hegemony starts to be perceive?

Answer 12

1. When URSS created its nuclear weapon.
2. With the Vietnam war.
3. During the 1960/70 crisis, break down of Bretton Wood system and oil price hikes by OPEC.
4. Non-alligned countries.

Question 13

What was the main US concern after USSR fall?

Answer 13

Japan, forthanks to the technological leadership role it gained.

Question 14

wHAT WAS THE DERECTION THAT vOLCKER SUGGESTED IN 1971?

Answer 14

Act to restore american predominance.

Question 15

What were the three tipes of dependency relations?

Answer 15

1. The condiction of dependence of the peripherical economy
2. The European NATO
3. The single marke dependence of the Asian countries.

Question 16

What consequences the 1979/83 monetary shok brings to Latin America countries?

What was the dilemma the post colonial countries has to face after 1979/83 crisis?

Answer 16

large number od dollar- denominated debt. calling into question regional neo corporatist.

The dilemma was between the exit from the dominant economic system or stay and take the risck of a greater vulnerability.
It derived from the structure of dependence borne in post colonial societies.

Question 17

At the end of 1960, US was looasinf power. What options it had?

Answer 17

1.Neo-liberal globalism
It proposed a shift in the hierarchy priorities from military security to trade. Rather on focusing on power, it woul focused on economic interes, human rights, democratisation and humanitarian ibterventions.

2. Realism.
   primus inter pares: US should use a selective force to mantain the status quo. It wished a gradually replacement of the military power with econmic power.
3. Imperialism.
   It seen the US like the standard of moral, political and military might and right. It does not have to hide its aims. It had to built a world under American controls.

The imperialism view win with Nixon.

Question 18

What are the main characteristics of George W Bush imperialism?

Answer 18

a) Mantain a balance of power favorable to US.
b) oppose to states that are seeking hegemony and could rapresent a thereat to US security.
c) promoting a international eco and mo system conducive by American economic prosperity
d) encourage democratisation where possible and strenghten the fremeworks and morms of international order. Military power had to play a important role.