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POLI/SCCC 101-sec 501 HONORS COLLEGE
"CONTROVERSIES IN WORLD
POLITICS:
GLOBALIZATION AND THE FUTURE OF U.S. FOREIGN POLICY"
FALL 2004
REQUIRED READINGS:
Stephen Kinzer, "Guatemala: The Unfinished Peace," New York Review of Books (June 21, 2001), p. 61-63 [requires adobe acrobat reader to open; should have; can down load for from internet]
Alexander Stille, “The Betrayal of History,” New York Review of Books (June 11, 1998), pp. 15-20 [requires adobe acrobate reader]
David Van Biema, “The Legacy of Abraham,” Newsweek (September 30, 2002), pp. 64-75 [requires adobe acrobat reader]
"Time of Indifference," New York Review of Books (April 12, 2001), by Helen Epstein. A powerful book review essay of growing poverty and inequality throughout the world, raising important questions about the implications of increasing western liberal globalization.
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President
Bush, "West Point Address," (June 1, 2002).
An overview of the Bush Administration's global war on
terrorism and the Bush Doctrine.
A condensed version of The National Security Strategy of the
United States of America. The National Security Strategy of the United States of America ( September 2002). |
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"Five Wars of Globalization," Foreign Policy (January/February 2003), by Moises Naim. The illegal trade in drugs, arms, intellectual property, people, and money is booming. Like the war on terrorism, the fight to control these illicit markets pits governments against agile, stateless, and resourceful networks empowered by globalization. Governments will continue to lose these wars until they adopt new strategies to deal with a larger, unprecedented struggle that now shapes the world as much as confrontations between nation-states once did.
"Blind
Into Baghdad:The
U.S. occupation of Iraq is a debacle not because the government did no planning
but because a vast amount of expert planning was willfully ignored by the people
in charge. The inside story of a historic failure.. The
Atlantic Monthly (January/February 2004)
by James Fallows.
More insightful, informative,
eye-opening, illustrative and devastating than the first or second Woodward
books, the Clarke book, the Oneil Book or any other book or article that I am
aware of (in my humble opinion). From one of the truly top American journalists,
comes a fabulous and disturbing article, presented in Fallows' typically
well-written and professional way. Fallows demonstrates how little we know
and how much we should know. It sheds light on the administration, it's
foreign policy process, it's general approach and attitude, and why post-war
Iraq is turning into a quagmire. To give you a little preview, as
Fallows states: "The Administration will be admired in retrospect for how
much knowledge it created about the challenge it was taking on. . . . But the
Administration will be condemned for what it did with what was known. The
problems the United States has encountered are precisely the ones its own expert
agencies warned against. . . . What David Halberstam said of Robert McNamara in
The Best and the Brightest is true of those at OSD (the Office of Secretary
of Defense, such as Rumsfeld, Wolfowitze, and including others civilians such as
Cheney) as well: they were brilliant, and they were fools." The article
also has some links to some interesting relevant articles and cartoons.
See also
"Bluebrint for a Mess," New York Times Magazine
(November 2, 2003), by David Rieff. An excellent earlier
overview of the policymaking process that contributed to the postwar
reconstruction mess. Similar to Fallows but has some additional
information.
SEE ALSO TO THE POINT
FOR ADDITIONAL READINGS