Reagan at Westminster: Foreshadowing the End of the Cold War (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Reagan at Westminster: Foreshadowing the End of the Cold War Valerie Lynn Schrader Reagan at Westminster: Foreshadowing the End of the Cold War. By Robert C. Rowland and John M. Jones . College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2010; pp 160. $40.00 cloth, $19.95 paper. With this book, Rowland and Jones once again offer a valuable rhetorical criticism of Ronald Reagan's rhetoric. Through an examination of perhaps one of the most misunderstood speeches of the twentieth century, Rowland and Jones shed light on Reagan's ideology and policy goals, as well as note how the views expressed in the Westminster Address connect to the George W. Bush administration's decision to enter Iraq. Readers of Rhetoric & Public Affairs will appreciate this book for its thorough execution of rhetorical criticism, its innovative observations about the 40th president's ideology and rhetoric, and its introduction of a new rhetorical lens that the authors call "ultimate definition." The book begins with the text of Reagan's Address to Members of the British Parliament on June 8, 1982. The strategic placement of the speech at the beginning of the book, rather than in an appendix at the end, is effective, not only inviting the reader to read or reread the text before looking at Rowland and Jones's analysis, but also allowing for easy reference, as each paragraph [End Page 575] in the speech is numbered. The introduction that immediately follows offers a convincing rationale for studying the speech in the context of events that occurred later in the 1980s, despite the tepid reaction the speech received at the time it was delivered. Chapter 1 begins by providing readers with a brief historical background of the Cold War, beginning with Kennan's Long Telegram and the Truman Doctrine, covering the policies of containment in the 1950s and détente in the 1970s, and ending with Reagan's views of communism throughout his life. This chapter provides a solid background not only of the history leading up to the Westminster Address, but also trends in Reagan's rhetoric up until the time of the address. Chapter 2 provides readers with a background in Reagan's speechwriting process. Drawing from the Speechwriting Files, Handwriting Files, and Reagan speechwriter Anthony Dolan's Files at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, Rowland and Jones piece together the process used to craft the Westminster Address. They note that although much of the address was written by speechwriters Aram Bakshian and Anthony Dolan, Reagan himself either wrote or edited almost 60 percent of the speech. Rowland and Jones's research is thorough and insightful, and supports their claim that Reagan played an important role in the drafting of the Westminster Address. Chapter 3 describes the specific situation surrounding the speech and offers a unique rhetorical criticism of the Westminster Address. Rowland and Jones argue that Reagan used a dialectical reversal of a key communist argument to turn the tables in favor of liberal democracy. They suggest that Reagan used the principle of universalism to argue that the world would eventually turn to democracy, not communism, because people have an inherent desire to be free. The authors observe that Reagan labeled the Soviet Union as a totalitarian nation while praising the virtues of liberal democracy and advocating for arms control negotiations. Rowland and Jones also address the common criticism that Reagan was strictly a performer. Though they point to a number of organic and familial metaphors in the Westminster Address, acknowledging that Reagan's style and delivery played a role in the persuasiveness of the speech, they stress that the ideas expressed in the address played an even more pivotal role. One of the most noteworthy aspects of this book is Rowland and Jones's concept of the "ultimate definition" (78). Drawing from key works of Kenneth Burke, Richard Weaver, and David Zarefsky, as well as Robert Rowland's recent work with David Frank, Rowland and Jones suggest that [End Page 576] the "ultimate definition lies at the nexus of an operational definition within a coherent narrative, a connotative definition tied to key value terms, and an epistemic definition functioning as a worldview" (78). They observe that...