Continuity and rupture in the discourse and practice of American Imperialism in the 20th century

Continuity and Rupture in the Discourse and Practice of American Imperialism in the 20th Century Name Course Institution Date Continuity and Rupture in the Discourse and Practice of American Imperialism in the 20th Century The history of American imperialism can be described as both a continuity and a discontinuity, where the different shifts in ideologies and politics have shaped the ways in which the United States continues to justify itself as a civilizing mission and its exceptionalism and global policing. In other historical moments, big moral, political, and legal dilemmas have emerged and have ravaged the imperialist discourse that has been in force, creating a breach in the imperial path of the nation. Whereas the likes of Rudyard Kipling and Ronald Reagan continued to peddle the politics of American obligation founded upon ideas of racial superiority and the democratic destiny of the nation, critics such as Randolph Bourne, Malcolm X, and the Supreme Court in the Brown v. Board of Education provided varying insights. Whether there existed an American imperialism with all the complex interactions between racial, economic, and political ideologies, or whether it was an imperialism only involved in world affairs, both these continuities and discontinuities are analyzed using the primary sources, as with the coming of world powers becoming imperial powers. In the following essay, important historical junctures will be analyzed to determine how the American imperialist identity has been developed out of continuity and rupture. Therefore, continuity is the defining quality of the establishment of American imperialist identity by the continuous ideological support of such concepts of power as the civilization mission and the American exceptionalism, whereas discontinuity is symbolized with the moral, political, and juridical critiques on the American image of virtue, which further made it reconsider both its domestic and international identity. Continuity The postulates of American imperialism have had a very constant impact on ideologies; beliefs of racial and civilizational superiority, American exceptionalism, and the urge towards economic dominance. Through such ideologies, there is the justification of expansionist policies, be it in its early days of American territorial expansion, or the latest interventions in the 20th century. A discourse of American imperialism has always been supported by a vision of racial/civilizational superiority and the feeling of the exceptionalism of the nation. This can be seen in the poem of the same name, The White Man His Burden by Rudyard Kipling in 1899, which offered a direct entreaty to the United States to colonize the Philippines. The poet presents imperialism not in terms of gaining selfish benefits, but as a bitter, hard, and needful task in getting up the burden of the ‘White Man’, and tending the subjugated peoples in their own best interests. This ideology places that American power is on the good side and it is a mission to civilize newcomers, sullen people who are half-devil and half-child.[Ignatieff, Michael. The American Empire: The Burden. 2005.] [Kipling, Rudyard. "The White Man's Burden." McClure’s Magazine, February 1899.] The feeling of American exceptionalism persisted into the 20th century. A recent illustration of such continuity was the speech of President Ronald Reagan in 1987 at the Brandenburg Gate. Reagan also defined the purpose of the United States as a world moral leader and policeman by relying on a Manichean conflict between the free world and the Soviet Union. The most famous quote of the speech, the imperative: Mr. Gorbachev, Tear Down this Wall cast American values of freedom and capitalism as the historical destination that was bound to occur and was the best course of history, something that would become more popularized in the future by Francis Fukuyama. Fukuyama made such an argument in one of his 1989 essays, The End of History, which reaffirmed the idea of American exceptionalism and its mission of bringing the most sophisticated system of world politics and world economics, Western liberal democracy. According to this story, the global influence of America is not imperialist but a relational outcome of historic development.[Reagan, Ronald. "Brandenburg Gate Speech ("Tear down this wall")." June 12, 1987.] [Fukuyama, Francis. "The End of History?" The National Interest, Summer 1989, 3–18.] Turner, in his influential essay, defines the American frontier as one of the driving factors in establishing American identity, especially through the perspective of creating an individualistic culture, a democratic culture, and the state of self-reliance. The idea of a frontier allowed the prolonged development towards the west to take place, which is closely related to the idea of American exceptionalism. The entry of the frontier to die to Turner marked the close of the conquest of the American West to the closing of the frontier in 1890, not only ending a specific period of American history but also giving credence to the notion that the greatness of America was embedded in ever-expanding conquests across the wilderness and its inhabitants.[Turner, Frederick, J. The Significance of the Frontier in American History (1893).] The frontier thesis of Turner is part of the analysis of American imperialism, as it sets the stage for expansion not as an imperialist effort but as an impending and ethical goal. He argues on the premise that the US promotion of democracy, liberty, and capitalism all over the world and the movement of the US across the continent was their destiny. This expansionist logic was also developed worldwide to incorporate other national territories, as later manifested in justifications of getting hold of territories such as the Philippines and Puerto Rico. The ideology of Turner has remained part and parcel of continuity in the American imperialism process, just as the frontier was perceived to be the force of civilization; in the same way, the American influence in the international arena was put forward as the force of civilization.[Turner (1893).] Also, the famous poem written by Kipling summarizes the racial and civilizational discourses that were woven into the fabric of American imperialism at the turn of the century. In The White Man's Burden, Kipling addresses the moral obligation of the Western powers, and especially the American nation, to enslave the non-Western populations by treating them as half-devil and half-child. A similar justification of imperialism is the notion that it was the task of the enlightened West to civilize and dominate the so-called primitives in the East. The verse presents the t...