American Interventionism after the Cold War

Module code: PL7500

This module will consider the utility of intervention - military and non-military - for the United States in the modern, post-Cold War era. Is U.S. interventionism reactive or the product of a coordinated world view? Is the U.S. better understood as a conservative, isolationist power or as a liberal, activist power?

The impact of 9/11 on U.S. foreign policy is a central concern of the module. Several cases studies of American intervention – from Somalia and Haiti to Afghanistan and Iraq, and the competing interpretations of these actions – form the basis for discussion and research.