Quaker Ways in Foreign Policy

Quaker Ways in Foreign Policy
Author: Robert O. Byrd
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Total Pages: 391
Release: 1960-12-15
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1442651164

For three hundred years the Society of Friends, or Quakers, has been forwarding to governments recommendations on foreign policy, and it has often been in the vanguard of thought in its social and political views. In this study, Dr. Byrd brings together and states carefully and accurately those beliefs, principles, attitudes, and practices which have been fundamental to the Quaker approach. He illustrates and verifies his statement by an analytical Friends acting in official and semi-official capacities, which relate to foreign policy and international relations. Dr. Byrd’s systematic exposition of the modern Quaker’s theory of international relations offers a stimulating antidote to the realpolitik school of thought. His account of the Quaker interest in international affairs from 1647 to the present underlines for the diplomatic historian the role of morality in diplomacy, the influence of public opinion upon policy, and the part played by groups like Friends in shaping public attitudes. As Hans J. Morgenthau comments in his Foreword, “In a world which uses Christian ethics for un-Christian ends it is indeed moving to follow the historical trail of a Christian sect which seeks to transform itself and political society in the image of Christian teaching. . . . In their convictions, achievements, and sufferings the Quakers bear witness to the teachings of Christianity; in their failures they bear witness to the insuperable stubbornness of the human condition. . . . not the least of the merits of Professor Byrd’s book is his ability to convey through the movement of his mind and pen something of that moving quality which makes the Quaker approach to foreign policy, if nothing else, a noble experiment in Christian living.”

Special Providence

Special Providence
Author: Walter Russell Mead
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 392
Release: 2013-05-13
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1136758674

"God has a special providence for fools, drunks and the United States of America."--Otto von Bismarck America's response to the September 11 attacks spotlighted many of the country's longstanding goals on the world stage: to protect liberty at home, to secure America's economic interests, to spread democracy in totalitarian regimes and to vanquish the enemy utterly. One of America's leading foreign policy thinkers, Walter Russell Mead, argues that these diverse, conflicting impulses have in fact been the key to the U.S.'s success in the world. In a sweeping new synthesis, Mead uncovers four distinct historical patterns in foreign policy, each exemplified by a towering figure from our past. Wilsonians are moral missionaries, making the world safe for democracy by creating international watchdogs like the U.N. Hamiltonians likewise support international engagement, but their goal is to open foreign markets and expand the economy. Populist Jacksonians support a strong military, one that should be used rarely, but then with overwhelming force to bring the enemy to its knees. Jeffersonians, concerned primarily with liberty at home, are suspicious of both big military and large-scale international projects. A striking new vision of America's place in the world, Special Providence transcends stale debates about realists vs. idealists and hawks vs. doves to provide a revolutionary, nuanced, historically-grounded view of American foreign policy.

Quaker Experiences in International Conciliation

Quaker Experiences in International Conciliation
Author: C. H. Mike Yarrow
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 346
Release: 1978-01-01
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780300022605

As far back as the early 1900s, the Quakers have been engaged in a program of quiet private diplomacy that won them a Nobel Peace Prize in 1947. During the turbulent 1960s, hey acted as unofficial conciliators in several tense situations. This comprehensive study of Quaker peace-making activities focuses primarily on the variety and effectiveness of their efforts in Berlin from 1960 to 1073, in India / Pakistan in 1965, and in Nigeria from 1967 to 1970.

Religions in Movement

Religions in Movement
Author: Robert Hefner
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 331
Release: 2013-10-23
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1136681000

There has long been a debate about implications of globalization for the survival of the world of sovereign nation-states, and the role of nationalism as both an agent of and a response to globalization. In contrast, until recently there has been much less debate about the fate of religion. ‘Globalization’ has been viewed as part of the rationalization process, which has already relegated religion to the dustbin of history, just as it threatens the nation, as the world moves toward a cosmopolitan ethics and politics. The chapters in this book, however, make the case for the salience and resilience of religion, often in conjunction with nationalism, in the contemporary world in several ways. This book highlights the diverse ways in which religions first and foremost make use of the traditional power and communication channels available to them, like strategies of conversion, the preservation of traditional value systems, and the intertwining of religious and political power. Nevertheless, challenged by a more culturally and religiously diversified societies and by the growth of new religious sects, contemporary religions are also forced to let go of these well known strategies of preservation and formulate new ways of establishing their position in local contexts. This collection of essays by established and emerging scholars brings together theory-driven and empirically-based research and case-studies about the global and bottom-up strategies of religions and religious traditions in Europe and beyond to rethink their positions in their local communities and in the world.

How the Quakers Invented America

How the Quakers Invented America
Author: David Yount
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 204
Release: 2007
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780742558335

Shows how the Quakers shaped the basic distinctive features of American life from the days of the founders and the colonies through the Revolution and up to the civil rights movement; also points out how Quaker values like freedom, equality, straightforwardness, and spirituality can be seen in modern day peace advocates.--From publisher description.

Quakers in the Israeli Palestinian Conflict

Quakers in the Israeli Palestinian Conflict
Author: Nancy Gallagher
Publisher: American University in Cairo Press
Total Pages: 212
Release: 2007-09-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1617973769

The Israeli Palestinian conflict has resulted in the longest-standing refugee crisis in the world today. Based on new archival research and interviews with surviving participants, this book considers one early effort to resolve that crisis while offering helpful lessons for current efforts at conflict resolution in the Middle East and elsewhere. When war broke out in Palestine in 1948, the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), a Quaker service organization, had just won the Nobel Peace Prize for its peacemaking endeavors and its service to war refugees during the Second World War. On the basis of that experience, the United Nations invited the highly visible AFSC to provide humanitarian relief to Arab refugees in Gaza. The AFSC also sent volunteers to work in Israel, where they hoped to serve both Arabs and Jews. Its long-term goal was repatriation of the refugees and conciliation and coexistence between Israelis and Palestinians. As eyewitnesses to some of the major events of the conflict, the AFSC volunteers came to understand it better than most outsiders at the time. By examining these early efforts at peacemaking and assistance, historian Nancy Gallagher has uncovered essential insights for today's peacemakers, human rights activists, and humanitarian NGOs.

Towards A New Christian Political Realism

Towards A New Christian Political Realism
Author: Simon Polinder
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 278
Release: 2024-07-24
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1040103596

Towards A New Christian Political Realism presents a new theoretical approach to understanding the role of religion in international relations, considering the strengths of Christian realism, classical realism, and neorealism, as well as the literature about the relevance of religion for IR. The book discusses the resurgence of religion and how it has become ‘public’ in the world since around the 1960s. It extensively describes the role religion plays in Hans Morgenthau’s classical realism and Kenneth Waltz’s neorealism and how both thinkers are indebted to an Augustinian way of thinking that has influenced political realism through Reinhold Niebuhr’s Christian realism. The book presents an alternative approach inspired by the Amsterdam School of Philosophy: a new Christian political realism. It incorporates the theological inspiration of political realism and the necessity of theorizing while doing justice to the relevance and manifold manifestations of religion in international relations. This book will be of interest to scholars and higher-level students of International Relations, the Amsterdam School of Philosophy, Classical Realism, Neorealism, Christian Realism, and Religious Studies, as well as practitioners working in the field of International Relations.

The Quakers in America

The Quakers in America
Author: Thomas D. Hamm
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 306
Release: 2003
Genre: History
ISBN: 0231123639

The Quakers in America is a multifaceted history of the Religious Society of Friends and a fascinating study of its culture and controversies today. Lively vignettes of Conservative, Evangelical, Friends General Conference, and Friends United meetings illuminate basic Quaker theology and reflect the group's diversity while also highlighting the fundamental unity within the religion. Quaker culture encompasses a rich tradition of practice even as believers continue to debate whether Quakerism is necessarily Christian, where religious authority should reside, how one transmits faith to children, and how gender and sexuality shape religious belief and behavior. Praised for its rich insight and wide-ranging perspective, The Quakers in America is a penetrating account of an influential, vibrant, and often misunderstood religious sect. Known best for their long-standing commitment to social activism, pacifism, fair treatment for Native Americans, and equality for women, the Quakers have influenced American thought and society far out of proportion to their relatively small numbers. Whether in the foreign policy arena (the American Friends Service Committee), in education (the Friends schools), or in the arts (prominent Quakers profiled in this book include James Turrell, Bonnie Raitt, and James Michener), Quakers have left a lasting imprint on American life. This multifaceted book is a concise history of the Religious Society of Friends; an introduction to its beliefs and practices; and a vivid picture of the culture and controversies of the Friends today. The book opens with lively vignettes of Conservative, Evangelical, Friends General Conference, and Friends United meetings that illuminate basic Quaker concepts and theology and reflect the group's diversity in the wake of the sectarian splintering of the nineteenth century. Yet the book also examines commonalities among American Friends that demonstrate a fundamental unity within the religion: their commitments to worship, the ministry of all believers, decision making based on seeking spiritual consensus rather than voting, a simple lifestyle, and education. Thomas Hamm shows that Quaker culture encompasses a rich tradition of practice even as believers continue to debate a number of central questions: Is Quakerism necessarily Christian? Where should religious authority reside? Is the self sacred? How does one transmit faith to children? How do gender and sexuality shape religious belief and behavior? Hamm's analysis of these debates reveals a vital religion that prizes both unity and diversity.

Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith

Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith
Author: Andrew Preston
Publisher: Anchor
Total Pages: 779
Release: 2012-02-28
Genre: History
ISBN: 0307957608

A richly detailed, profoundly engrossing story of how religion has influenced American foreign relations, told through the stories of the men and women—from presidents to preachers—who have plotted the country’s course in the world. Ever since John Winthrop argued that the Puritans’ new home would be “a city upon a hill,” Americans’ role in the world has been shaped by their belief that God has something special in mind for them. But this is a story that historians have mostly ignored. Now, in the first authoritative work on the subject, Andrew Preston explores the major strains of religious fervor—liberal and conservative, pacifist and militant, internationalist and isolationist—that framed American thinking on international issues from the earliest colonial wars to the twenty-first century. He arrives at some startling conclusions, among them: Abraham Lincoln’s use of religion in the Civil War became the model for subsequent wars of humanitarian intervention; nineteenth-century Protestant missionaries made up the first NGO to advance a global human rights agenda; religious liberty was the centerpiece of Franklin Roosevelt’s strategy to bring the United States into World War II. From George Washington to George W. Bush, from the Puritans to the present, from the colonial wars to the Cold War, religion has been one of America’s most powerful sources of ideas about the wider world. When, just days after 9/11, George W. Bush described America as “a prayerful nation, a nation that prays to an almighty God for protection and for peace,” or when Barack Obama spoke of balancing the “just war and the imperatives of a just peace” in his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, they were echoing four hundred years of religious rhetoric. Preston traces this echo back to its source. Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith is an unprecedented achievement: no one has yet attempted such a bold synthesis of American history. It is also a remarkable work of balance and fair-mindedness about one of the most fraught subjects in America.

God-Optional Religion in Twentieth-Century America

God-Optional Religion in Twentieth-Century America
Author: Isaac Barnes May
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 345
Release: 2022-12-13
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0197624235

"This book is about the relationship between the American religious left and secularization. It explores how three liberal religions -liberal Quakers, Unitarians, and Reconstructionist Jews- attempted to preserve their traditions in the modern world by redefining what it meant to be religious. Between the 1920s and the 1960s, these groups underwent the most massive theological change imaginable, allowing their members to opt not to believe in a personal God. As the God of traditional theism did not seem to fit into a post-Darwinian framework, these traditions took the dramatic step of redefining that concept to make a "God" that did fit, and eventually they went even further by making belief in God a matter of purely personal preference. This book narrates how, over the course of the twentieth century, believing in God and being religious became increasingly disconnected. It documents the continuance of these religious communities even after the theological rationales that originally brought them together disappeared, their communal identities instead becoming focused on humanitarian service and political commitments, which began to replace a shared adherence to theism. The radical religious views of these small liberal denominations became influential among the wider society, and eventually became accepted in American popular culture and law"--