America in the World - A History of U.S. Diplomacy and Foreign Policy
Ranging from Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, and Thomas Jefferson to Henry Kissinger, Ronald Reagan, and James Baker, America in the World tells the vibrant story of American diplomacy. Recounting the actors and events of U.S. foreign policy, Zoellick identifies five traditions that have emerged from America's encounters with the world: the importance of North America; the special roles trading, transnational, and technological relations play in defining ties with others; changing attitudes toward alliances and ways of ordering connections among states; the need for public support, especially through Congress; and the belief that American policy should serve a larger purpose.
Session I - A New American Era: Continental Territory, Financial Power, Neutral Independence, and a Republican Union Topics: Alexander Hamilton: Architect of American Power; John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay: American Realism and the American System Reading: pp. 1-26, 47-68 (Introduction, ch. 1 and 3)
Session II - The United States and the Global Order Topics: Theodore Roosevelt: Balancer of Power; Woodrow Wilson: The Political Scientist Abroad Reading: pp. 112-165 (Ch. 6 and 7)
Session III - Interwar Internationalists Topics: Charles Evans Hughes: Arms Control and the Washington Conference; Elihu Root: International Law Reading: pp. 168-219 (Ch. 8 and 9)
Session IV - A New Order of American Alliances Topics: Architects of the American Alliance System; Vannevar Bush: Inventor of the Future Reading: pp. 240-315 (Ch. 11 and 12)
Session V - A New Order of American Alliances continued... Topics: John F. Kennedy: The Crisis Manager; Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger: American Realpolitik; Ronald Reagan: The Revivalist Reading: pp. 315-337, 363-416 (Ch. 13, 15, and 16)
Session VI - An End and a Beginning Topics: George H. W. Bush: Alliance Leader; Five Traditions of American Diplomacy; From Traditions to Today Reading: pp. 418-472 (Ch. 17, 18, and afterward)
Additional Reading Dean Acheson. Present at the Creation: My Years at the State Department. William J. Burns. The Back Channel: A Memoir of American Diplomacy and the Case for Its Renewal. Walter Russell Mead. Special Providence: American Foreign Policy and How It Changed the World.