A Unipolar World, If You Can Keep It: A Review of American Foreign Policy, 1989-2001

Abstract

Bill Clinton left office in 2001 with the highest approval rating of any president in American history. A quarter century later, his presidency seems to be rarely talked about. Yet as Donald Trump’s second presidency continues to raise questions about the future of American foreign and trade policy, it is more important than ever to come to terms with the origins of our present world system and the presidency of the man who governed when the world seemed new.

It is often talked about that after the Second World War, the United States formalized its superpower status by creating institutions and structures such as NATO, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the United Nations, and a network of alliances across the world that ensured ours was a planet that was linked by the American dollar and protected by the American nuclear triad. Those structures allowed the United States to eventually emerge victorious in the Cold War. Today, the efficacy, and indeed, the legitimacy, of these systems is increasingly called into question by the very nation that created them. For this, the American people have the 1990s to thank, because it was this decade that added fuel to the neoconservative challenge and eventually helped give rise to Donal Trump. This thesis attempts to better understand this crucial time for America and the world.

This thesis draws on both scholarly research and primary sources — including speeches, government documents, and newspaper articles — to understand the somewhat forgotten presidency and foreign policy of Bill Clinton. I arrive at several conclusions. George H.W. Bush made important strategic choices that definitively made America the leader of the new unipolar world. Contrary to much scholarly discourse, Bill Clinton’s foreign policy had a coherent strategy, and he deserves credit for his largely successful engagement with the world. Clinton’s ideology did not vary drastically from the neoconservative critique that rose up in response to his perceived failings, but the foreign policy of George W. Bush still represented a paradigm shift in American foreign policy. The neoconservative project was idealist, but unlike Clinton, it was unable to reign in its ambitions to fit the limits of American power. Bush brought a more unilateral and confrontational posture to the world stage, which stands in sharp contrast to the emphasis on cooperation under Clinton. And finally, the events of the Clinton presidency help better explain the rise of the neoconservatives and the War on Terror, the success of Donald Trump and his political movement, and the current competition between the United States and China.