Bush Doctrine Research Articles

President Obama's 2010 United States National Security Strategy and International Law on the Use of Force

At first sight, President Obama's 2010 United States National Security Strategy provides a marked contrast with George W. Bush's 2002 and 2006 Security Strategies. Its main emphasis is on engagement with the international community through a multilateral approach. The section Use of Force stresses that force should be used only as a last resort. But it leaves certain issues unclear. It does not expressly reject the earlier “Bush doctrine” of pre-emptive self-defense. It seems to raise the possibility of unilateral humanitarian intervention. And there are many continuities. Although Obama abandons the language of the “global war on terror”, he still maintains that the United States is at war with “a far-reaching network of violence and terror”. This article considers the implications for international law on the use of force.

Anti-Americanism: Myth or Reality?

Americanism and the American World Order. By Giacamo Chiozza. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009. 235 pp., $60.00 hardcover (ISBN-13: 978-0-801-89206-6), $25.00 paperback (ISBN-13: 978-0-801-89208-0). When President Obama took office in January 2009, one of his top foreign policy priorities was to counter the high levels of anti-Americanism in global public opinion that, in his view, isolated the United States and threatened its national security. Obama's emphasis on soft power, public diplomacy, and multilateral engagement helped stem this tide (British Broadcasting Company 2010). Still, mass publics in many countries remain wary of the US government and its foreign policies long after the Bush Doctrine, Abu Ghraib, and other legacies of the previous administration. The protracted spike in anti-Americanism, while worrying policy makers, has also drawn the attention of scholars who have explored the roots (Kohut and Stokes 2006; Rubin and Rubin 2004) and variation (Katzenstein and Keohane 2007; Singh 2006) of these attitudes. In Anti-Americanism and the American Order , Giacomo Chiozza enhances this scholarly literature by firming up the empirical foundations of this phenomenon. Specifically, Chiozza disaggregates the closely followed Pew Global Attitude Surveys of 2002 and 2004 and identifies the underlying determinants of individual attitudes across dozens of industrialized and developing countries. While his study reveals multiple, overlapping grievances regarding US policies, it …

From Woodrow Wilson in 1902 to the Bush doctrine in 2002: Democracy promotion as imperialism

The secular notion of American exceptionalism divorced from explicit racial or religious expression and based on governmental institutions and civic virtue – America as ‘the last, best hope of earth’ (Lincoln), America as ‘the ark of the liberties of the world’ (Melville) – goes back to the American Revolution. Nevertheless, before Wilson the conceptual framework that could explain the rightness of American global expansion in terms of bringing democratic government to others had not been well formulated. With Wilson, by contrast, the United States for the first time could present in secular terms, concepts argued from a cultural and historical perspective that made the expansion of American influence around the globe legitimate, not only in terms of national security but to the benefit of all mankind. Here is the key, I would propose, to the self-confidence and self-righteousness, which has been the hallmark of American foreign policy for a century now. Democracy promotion (associated with open markets economically and multilateralism) reflected America's cultural superiority (inherited from racial thinking), as well as its mission to help others (descended from its religious background). In Wilson's hands, an enduring framework for American foreign policy was born, one that remains with us to this day.

US Foreign Policy in Context: National ideology from the founders to the Bush Doctrine

US Foreign Policy in Context: National ideology from the founders to the Bush Doctrine

National Security in the Obama Administration: Reassessing the Bush Doctrine – By Stanley Renshon

National Security in the Obama Administration: Reassessing the Bush Doctrine – By Stanley Renshon

The Coalition of the Unwilling: Contentious Politics, Political Opportunity Structures, and Challenges for the Contemporary Peace Movement

The Bush Doctrine, which was installed after the 9-11 attacks on the United States under the guise of the war on terrorism, postulated a vision of the United States as the world’s unchallenged superpower and the invasion of Iraq became one of the central fronts of this war. After failing to get approval by the United Nations for the invasion, the Bush Administration’s attempt to assemble a coalition of the willing became critical to the battle for public opinion to back the war. While the administration was able to garner some support, the coalition eventually unravelled and all troops are expected to depart by 2011 in what is perceived by many as a failure of U.S. foreign policy. This article discusses how different strands of social movement theory, including resource mobilization and the political process model, can be combined to examine how the coalition of the unwilling emerged and what effect it had on the failure of the United States to sustain support for the Iraq war. It contributes to the literature on social movements by assessing the ways in which structural- and micro-level mobilization efforts are often interconnected in order to explain both the how and the why of social movements, usually treated separately in much of the extant research.

The 2010 United States National Security Strategy and the Obama Doctrine of 'Necessary Force'

On 27 May 2010 President Barack Obama released his administration’s first National Security Strategy. After the controversial nature of his predecessor’s Strategies of 2002 and 2006 where the Bush doctrine of self-defence was advanced, President Obama’s was a notable publication. However, as this article argues, of more significance was the formal enunciation in this document of what is described here as the Obama doctrine of ‘necessary force’. Whilst the two arms of the Bush doctrine, that is, pre-emptive self-defence and the ‘harbouring’ standard of attribution, failed to find a place within the jus ad bellum during the Bush presidency, President Obama has apparently continued to endorse them. Furthermore, the doctrine of ‘necessary force’ has incorporated unilateral forcible humanitarian intervention under what appears to be a revised version of the ‘just war’ doctrine. Indeed, whilst invoking the ‘standards’ governing the resort to force and the concepts of ‘necessity’ and ‘last resort’, the Obama doctrine, this article argues, is more vague and open to unilateral possibilities than the Bush doctrine and ultimately cannot be reconciled with the contemporary limits imposed by the jus ad bellum. Furthermore, it invokes 21st century security threats in a rejection of the contemporary regime regulating the use of force.

Should Realism Return to its Roots?

Hans Morgenthau: Realism and Beyond. By William E. Scheuerman Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2009. 257 pp., $24.95 paperback (ISBN 13: 978-0-745-63636-8). Political Thought and International Relations: Variations on a Realist Theme. Edited by Duncan Bell. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. 245 pp., $100.00 hardcover (ISBN 13: 978-0-199-55627-4). Rethinking Realism in International Relations: Between Tradition and Innovation. Edited by Annette Freyberg-Inan, Ewan Harrison, Patrick James. Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009. 305 pp., $30.00 paperback (ISBN 13: 978-0-801-89286-8). Realism has undergone a bit of a revival as of late. Partly, this can be attributed to outspoken opposition among realists to the Iraq War, and the Bush Doctrine that spawned it. Warnings by Mearsheimer and Walt (2003), among others, that war with Iraq was not in America's national interest appear prescient today, even if they were largely ignored at the time. And, among pundits, a lively debate has sprung up about the extent to which the Obama administration is pursuing a realist foreign policy, now that the neoconservative one espoused by the Bush administration has been momentarily discredited. The academy cannot help but reflect these popular trends, however imperfectly, and so one finds there a growing literature reassessing the realist canon and its contributions to the field of International Relations (IR) and political thought more generally. This is not to say that all is well with realism. Indeed, there appears to be a developing consensus in the literature that, however, influential it remains, the realist tradition is due for an overhaul. Much of the dissatisfaction is directed at the structural turn that realist theorizing took with the publication of Kenneth Waltz's Theory of International Politics (Waltz 1979). Richard Ned Lebow puts the issue most forcefully: “There is widespread recognition that the realist tradition reached its nadir in neorealism. In his unsuccessful effort to transform realism into a scientific theory, Kenneth Waltz, father of neorealism, denuded the realist tradition of its complexity and subtlety, appreciation of agency, and understanding that power is most readily transformed into influence when it is both masked and embedded in a generally accepted system of norms” (Lebow 2009:26). Given neorealism's fatal shortcomings, Ned Lebow recommends that scholars return to the tradition's classical roots, to luminaries such as Thucydides, E.H. Carr, and Hans Morgenthau, all …

Compassionate Conservatism VS Bush Doctrine CONSERVATISME COMPATISSANT VS DOCTRINE BUSH

George W. Bush compared his administration plan for Pre-September the 11th with Post-September the 11th and declared that the first one was designed for internal issues such as helping parents, developing good character in American children, and strengthening a spirit of citizenship and service in the United States; but the second era changed the ways that was planed for past. Defeating evildoers and bringing them to justice shaped the way United States has to pass. In contrast to pre-September the 11th which had been called conditions of peace; the new condition after September the 11th was recognised as war condition and was declared as necessary war that is necessity of United States’ future security and freedom of American children (Bush, 11 October 2001). This article is to study perspective of George W. Bush and his administration on security strategies of the United States in pre-September the 11th (Compassionate Conservatism) and post-September the 11th era (Bush Doctrine).Key words: Compassionate Conservatism; September the 11th; Bush Doctrine; Preventive War; United States; Security

US foreign policy in context: national ideology from the founders to the Bush doctrine

1. Introduction 2. International Relations, History and National Ideology 3. The Founders' Era Consensus:'A Hercules in the Cradle 4. Theodore Roosevelt: 'The Nation that has Dared to be Great' 5. Woodrow Wilson: 'Conquest of the Spirits of Men' 6. The Truman administration:'In the Struggle for Men's Minds, the Conflict is world-wide' 7. The Bush administration:'A Balance of Power that Favours Freedom' Conclusion:the Bush Strategy and National Ideology

Groupthink, Iraq, and the War on Terror: Explaining US Policy Shift toward Iraq

Existing scholarship on the Iraq War decision-making process generally treats the event as a logical extension of pre-existing ideas and policies. This paper considers the Bush administration’s decision to absorb Iraq into the broader War on Terror as a deviation from long-held views of Saddam Hussein. I argue that the decision to incorporate Iraq into the wider post 9 ⁄ 11 mission was pathologically driven by groupthink, which caused a shift in the administration’s view of Saddam from a troubling dictator to an existential threat to US security. Therefore, groupthink can simultaneously explain the defects in the decision-making process and the shift from cautious restraint to accelerated urgency with respect to US relations with Iraq. A wealth of literature has emerged claiming that the US invasion of Iraq was a logical extension of ideas and policies that predated 9 ⁄ 11. Cognitive and psychological explanations attribute the decision to personality profiles or individual and group level pathologies (Houghton 2008). Shannon and Keller (2007) examine Bush’s leadership style as a potential explanation for the US’ violation of international norms. For Kaufmann (2004), structural faults undermined the ‘‘marketplace of ideas,’’ allowing the administration to inflate the Iraqi threat. The international relations discipline also took up the question of the Iraq War, viewing it from the perspective of imperialism and hegemonic stability. For Cox (2004), the Bush Doctrine and the policies that followed cemented the neoconservative drive toward American domination in the post-Cold War world. Layne (2006) describes the post-9 ⁄ 11 grand strategy as one that finds it roots in American hegemony since the 1940s. While the academy generally explained the decision to invade Iraq in somewhat path dependent terms, an abundance of atheoretical literature emerged from journalists, commentators, and, later, key members of the decision-making team that shed light on the intricacies of the decision-making process. For example, Gellman (2009) argues that the administration, in particular Bush and Cheney, began viewing Saddam Hussein as a new kind of threat in the days that followed September 11, 2001. Instead of considering Hussein a troubling dictator––as they had in the past––the Iraqi leader came to represent a new type of threat in the 9 ⁄ 11 milieu. Yet, scholars, journalists, and pundits alike remain fixated on explaining the decision to remove Saddam Hussein from power, rather than the decision to incorporate Iraq into the War on Terror. This paper takes the latter approach. I argue that the decision to conflate Iraq with the threat of terrorism represented a significant departure from long-held images of that state and strategies for dealing with Saddam Hussein as advocated by members of the Bush administration

National security in the Obama administration: reassessing the Bush doctrine

Preface 1. The Obama Presidency and the World He Inherits Part 1: The Bush Doctrine Reconsidered 2. The Evolution of a Post 9/11 National Security Perspective 3. The Real Bush Doctrine 4. The Bush Doctrine: Myths and Criticisms Part 2: The Strategic World After 9/11 5. The New Calculus of Risk 6. Deterrence, Containment and Adversarial Bargaining Post 9/11: North Korea and Iran 7. Dangerous Threats and the Use of Force 8. Strategic Options and the Future of the Bush Doctrine Part 3: The Politics of Post 9/11 National Security 9. The Politics of Risk Assessment 10. The Politics of Post 9/11 National Security: A Profound Worldview Divide 11. Obama's National Security Tasks: Worldview, Leadership and Judgment

National Security in the Obama Administration: Reassessing the Bush Doctrine by Stanley Renshon

Journal Article National Security in the Obama Administration: Reassessing the Bush Doctrine by Stanley Renshon Get access National Security in the Obama Administration: Reassessing the Bush Doctrine by Stanley Renshon. New York, Routledge, 2009. 291 pp. $34.95. James Goldgeier James Goldgeier The George Washington University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Political Science Quarterly, Volume 125, Issue 3, Fall 2010, Pages 506–508, https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1538-165X.2010.tb02037.x Published: 25 March 2013

The power curse: influence and illusion in world politics

Introduction. A Theory of the Power Curse. The Power Curse Across History. The Bush Doctrine and Power Illusion. In Lieu of Conclusions.

Pre-Emptive Self-Defence Against States Harbouring Terrorists

This Paper analyses the legality of pre‐emptive self‐defence against states harbouring terrorists and elaborates the following aspect: Whether harbouring terrorists entails state responsibility. Therefore, it discusses secondary norms such as attribution rules. This leads to the main question of the Paper, use of pre‐emptive self‐defence against such states, and the legality of it, is looked at through attribution rules and breach of the due diligence obligation. Pre‐emptive self‐defence has enjoyed a new wave of discussion after adoption of US National Security Strategy in 2002. This doctrine has become well-known as “The Bush Doctrine”. The core aspect of this doctrine is: pre‐emptive attack in self‐defence against states harbouring terrorists. Thus, the primary rules of the use of force and the secondary rules of state responsibility stand together. Moreover the correlation of these two sources of law is evident in this regard.

From Brain Image to the Bush Doctrine: Critical Neuroscience and the Political Uses of Neurotechnology

When science is used for a practical purpose it can go wrong in at least three different ways. First, theory can be incorrectly applied. In 1986, NASA had the necessary theory to construct O-rings ...

US Rapprochement with Indonesia: From Problem State to Partner

Over the past decade US relations with Indonesia have undergone a dramatic rapprochement such that today officials in both countries claim relations are at an all time high. Indonesia's transition to democracy and its adoption of effective counter-terrorism strategies laid the basis for the rapprochement. At a time when the Bush Doctrine advocated democracy as an antidote to terrorism, the Indonesian experience appeared to vindicate the logic of US policy. Under the Obama administration, policy towards Indonesia has been driven not only by shared democratic values and interests, but also by recognition that Indonesia is an emerging power that will play an increasingly influential role in global governance. The US and Indonesia are building a Comprehensive Partnership that creates a framework for enhanced security, economic and educational engagement, as well as cooperation on transnational issues such as climate change. For the relationship to reach its full potential, however, a series of obstacles must be overcome.

Understanding the Bush Doctrine: Psychology and Strategy in an Age of Terrorism - By Stanley Renshon and Peter Suedfeld

Understanding the Bush Doctrine: Psychology and Strategy in an Age of Terrorism - By Stanley Renshon and Peter Suedfeld

Power Politics and the Bush Doctrine

Power Politics and the Bush Doctrine

The ‘Bush Doctrine’ as a hegemonic discourse strategy

Even if preventive military counter‐terrorism may sometimes be ethically justifiable, it remains an open question whether the Bush Doctrine presented a discursively coherent account of the relevant normative conditions. With a view towards answering this question, this article critically examines efforts to ground the morally personifying language of the Bush Doctrine in term of hegemonic stability theory. Particular critical attention is paid to the arguments of leading proponents of this brand of game theory, including J. Yoo, E. Posner, A. Sykes, and J. Goldsmith. When examined in their terms, the Bush Doctine is best understood as an ethically hypocritical and shortsighted international discursive strategy. Its use of moralistic language in demonizing ‘rogue states’ for purely amoral purposes is normatively incoherent and discursively unsustainable. If it is a strategically rational piece of international communication, it seems designed to undermine globally shared normative meanings for the sake of short‐term unilateral military advantage.