The US in the World to 1945

3 Credits · Level: Undergraduate

Born in 1775 as a loose confederation of former British colonies on the periphery of the Atlantic World, the United States rose to a position of world superpower over the course of 170 years. How can we account for this remarkable development in world history? While we tend to take an exclusive look at the United States to understand its history, we cannot understand its evolution without understandings its complex and multilayered interactions with the rest of the world. In this course, we will explore how the United States’ security environment, government capabilities, economic interests, social changes, and cultural forces changed over time and, combined together, powerfully shaped the shifting course of U.S. foreign relations through 1945. We will also examine how the United States developed and exercised hard power, soft power, and economic power in achieving its key policy objectives. The key events covered in the course include: the American Revolution, the War of 1812, territorial expansion, the Civil War, the Spanish-American War, the entry into the China market, and the two world wars. In examining these events, we will ask: What drove U.S. foreign policy? Why did the United States go to war? How did it make peace? Was the United States isolationist before 1945? If not, what was it?