By Louis W. Pauly
From Centre for International Studies
Abstract: My theme in this paper deals with an important dimension of the psychological and political challenge of recovering our balance and restoring the circumstances under which we all might return to the path of global openness. After 1941, the United States learned how to lead, which means that it somehow, perhaps not completely consciously, came to understand why followers followed. In part, after the war ended, the United States and its major allies institutionalized this knowledge in discrete international organizations, which they pretended to be technical but knew to be profoundly political. Eventually, I will argue, they affected the way Americans think about their own sovereignty. It would be nice to believe that wisdom and foresight found expression in this way; in truth, the twilight struggle of the Cold War probably provided the real incentive.
Bound to Follow? US Foreign Policy, International Reactions, and the New Complexities of Sovereignty