Synopsis
Opposing the Crusader State: Alternatives to Global Interventionism, edited by Robert Higgs and Carl Close, examines the history of American noninterventionism and its relevance in today's world.
For more than a century U.S. foreign policy—whether conducted by Democrats or Republicans, liberals or conservatives—has been based on the assumption that Americans' interests are served best by intervening abroad to secure open markets for U.S. exports, fight potential enemies far from American shores, or engage in democratic nation building. Before the twentieth century, however, a foreign policy of nonintervention was widely considered more desirable, and Washington’s and Jefferson's advice that the republic avoid foreign entanglements was largely heeded.
Arguing that interventionism is not an appropriate “default setting” for U.S. foreign policy, the book’s contributors clarify widespread misunderstandings about noninterventionism, question the wisdom of nation building, debate the validity of democratic-peace theory, and make the case for pursuing a peace strategy based on private-property rights and free trade.
"Readers will come away from this book with a richer understanding of the noninterventionist movements in U.S. history," write Higgs and Close in the book’s introduction. "Most important, perhaps, they will have a firmer understanding of why many classical liberals embrace the strengthening of commercial ties between all countries as a means of avoiding war."
About the Author
Robert Higgs is Retired Senior Fellow in Political Economy, Founding Editor and former Editor at Large of the Independent Institute’s quarterly journal The Independent Review: A Journal of Political Economy. He received his Ph.D. in economics from Johns Hopkins University, and he has taught at the University of Washington, Lafayette College, Seattle University, the University of Economics, Prague, and George Mason University. He has been a visiting scholar at Oxford University and Stanford University, and a fellow for the Hoover Institution and the National Science Foundation. His many books include Crisis and Leviathan; Depression, War, and Cold War; After Leviathan; Delusions of Power; Neither Liberty Nor Safety; Resurgence of the Warfare State; Taking a Stand; and multiple edited collections.
Carl P. Close is a former Research Fellow and former Executive Editor for Acquisitions and Content at the Independent Institute and former Assistant Editor of The Independent Review. Starting in 1999 he wrote Independent's weekly email newsletter, The Lighthouse. He is also co-editor (with Robert Higgs) of Re-Thinking Green: Alternatives to Environmental Bureaucracy, The Challenge of Liberty: Classical Liberalism Today, and Opposing the Crusader State: Alternatives to Global Interventionism. Prior to joining Independent Institute, he worked in various capacities in the financial services industry.
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