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Apr 16, 2024
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2019-2020 Academic Catalog [Archived Catalog]
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HIST 103 - U.S. and the Contemporary World
Credits: Three (3)
This class investigates the controversies and questions at the heart of modern American diplomacy. World War II made the United States a global hegemonic power, and its decades-long cold war with the USSR prompted new debates and challenges about the use of legitimacy of that power, both at home and abroad. Students will examine U.S. diplomatic decisions from WWII to the present, asking such questions as: what was the legacy of FDR’s conduct in the war, and how have the doctrines of subsequent presidents, from Truman through Trump, shaped U.S intervention abroad? How much power does the president really have in dictatingforeign policy? Was the Cold War avoidable, and how has the threat of nuclearannihilation transformed diplomacy? What grounds, if any, has the U.S. had to intervene in the self-determination of other nations, from Vietnam to Iraq? What moral and ethical considerations shape diplomatic decisions? Students will investigate these and other questions in order to gauge the impact of the U.S. on global diplomacy through the twenty-first century.
General Education Area: Social Science
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