America's Role in Nation-Building

America's Role in Nation-Building
Author: James Dobbins
Publisher: Rand Corporation
Total Pages: 281
Release: 2003-08-01
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0833034863

The post-World War II occupations of Germany and Japan set standards for postconflict nation-building that have not since been matched. Only in recent years has the United States has felt the need to participate in similar transformations, but it is now facing one of the most challenging prospects since the 1940s: Iraq. The authors review seven case studies--Germany, Japan, Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia, Kosovo, and Afghanistan--and seek lessons about what worked well and what did not. Then, they examine the Iraq situation in light of these lessons. Success in Iraq will require an extensive commitment of financial, military, and political resources for a long time. The United States cannot afford to contemplate early exit strategies and cannot afford to leave the job half completed.

Why Nation-Building Matters

Why Nation-Building Matters
Author: Keith W. Mines
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
Total Pages: 401
Release: 2020-08
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1640122826

Why Nation-Building Matters establishes a framework for building security forces, economic development, and political consolidation that blends soft and hard power into a deployable and effective package.

To Build as Well as Destroy

To Build as Well as Destroy
Author: Andrew J. Gawthorpe
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Total Pages: 348
Release: 2018-12-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 1501712098

For years, the so-called better-war school of thought has argued that the United States built a legitimate and viable non-Communist state in South Vietnam in the latter years of the Vietnam War and that it was only the military abandonment of this state that brought down the Republic of Vietnam. But Andrew J. Gawthorpe, through a detailed and incisive analysis, shows that, in fact, the United States failed in its efforts at nation building and had not established a durable state in South Vietnam. Drawing on newly opened archival collections and previously unexamined oral histories with dozens of U.S. military officers and government officials, To Build as Well as Destroy demonstrates that the United States never came close to achieving victory in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Gawthorpe tells a story of policy aspirations and practical failures that stretches from Washington, D.C., to the Vietnamese villages in which the United States implemented its nationbuilding strategy through the Office of Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development Support known as CORDS. Structural factors that could not have been overcome by the further application of military power thwarted U.S. efforts to build a viable set of non-Communist political, economic, and social institutions in South Vietnam. To Build as Well as Destroy provides the most comprehensive account yet of the largest and best-resourced nation-building program in U.S. history. Gawthorpe's analysis helps contemporary policy makers, diplomats, and military officers understand the reasons for this failure. At a moment in time when American strategists are grappling with military and political challenges in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria, revisiting the historical lessons of Vietnam is a worthy endeavor.

The Military as an Economic Actor

The Military as an Economic Actor
Author: J. Brömmelhörster
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 236
Release: 2003-11-04
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1403944008

Armed forces across the globe engage in economic activities both in times of war and peace. This book provides a critical analysis of this phenomenon, comparing experiences with 'military business' from four continents (Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America). Taking an interdisciplinary approach, the volume shows the implications of 'military business' for civil-military relations, good governance and international development policies.

Economic Security: Neglected Dimension of National Security ?

Economic Security: Neglected Dimension of National Security ?
Author: National Defense University (U S )
Publisher: Government Printing Office
Total Pages: 132
Release: 2011-12-27
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN:

On August 24-25, 2010, the National Defense University held a conference titled “Economic Security: Neglected Dimension of National Security?” to explore the economic element of national power. This special collection of selected papers from the conference represents the view of several keynote speakers and participants in six panel discussions. It explores the complexity surrounding this subject and examines the major elements that, interacting as a system, define the economic component of national security.

Nation Building in South Korea

Nation Building in South Korea
Author: Gregg Brazinsky
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com
Total Pages: 590
Release: 2009-09-14
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1458723178

Brazinsky explains why South Korea was one of the few postcolonial nations that achieved rapid economic development and democratization by the end of the twentieth century. He contends that a distinctive combination of American initiatives and Korean agency enabled South Korea's stunning transformation. Expanding the framework of traditional diplomatic history, Brazinsky examines not only state-to-state relations, but also the social and cultural interactions between Americans and South Koreans. He shows how Koreans adapted, resisted, and transformed American influence and promoted socioeconomic change that suited their own aspirations. Ultimately, Brazinsky argues, Koreans' capacity to tailor American institutions and ideas to their own purposes was the most important factor in the making of a democratic South Korea.

US Nation-Building in Afghanistan

US Nation-Building in Afghanistan
Author: Conor Keane
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 353
Release: 2016-03-31
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1317003187

Why has the US so dramatically failed in Afghanistan since 2001? Dominant explanations have ignored the bureaucratic divisions and personality conflicts inside the US state. This book rectifies this weakness in commentary on Afghanistan by exploring the significant role of these divisions in the US’s difficulties in the country that meant the battle was virtually lost before it even began. The main objective of the book is to deepen readers understanding of the impact of bureaucratic politics on nation-building in Afghanistan, focusing primarily on the Bush Administration. It rejects the ’rational actor’ model, according to which the US functions as a coherent, monolithic agent. Instead, internal divisions within the foreign policy bureaucracy are explored, to build up a picture of the internal tensions and contradictions that bedevilled US nation-building efforts. The book also contributes to the vexed issue of whether or not the US should engage in nation-building at all, and if so under what conditions.

The evolving role of nation-building in US foreign policy

The evolving role of nation-building in US foreign policy
Author: Thomas Seitz
Publisher: Manchester University Press
Total Pages: 184
Release: 2017-10-03
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 152613067X

How and why did the United States get involved in nation-building overseas, and how have these policies evolved? How has Washington understood the relationship between development abroad and security at home, and how has this translated into policy? What is the relationship between security, order and development in nation-building and stabilisation efforts? This book explores the processes through which nation-building approaches originated and developed over the last seven decades as well as the concepts and motivations that shaped them. Weaving together International Relations theory and a rich history drawing mainly on declassified documents, interviews and other primary sources, this book contributes to theoretical discussions of nation-building while offering a critique of Realist and Critical Security School analyses of US policy in the developing world. Ultimately, the book illuminates lessons relevant to today’s nation-building, crisis management, stability, 'good governance' and reconstruction missions.

The Republic of Vietnam, 1955–1975

The Republic of Vietnam, 1955–1975
Author: Tuong Vu
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Total Pages: 359
Release: 2020-01-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 1501745158

Through the voices of senior officials, teachers, soldiers, journalists, and artists, The Republic of Vietnam, 1955–1975, presents us with an interpretation of "South Vietnam" as a passionately imagined nation in the minds of ordinary Vietnamese, rather than merely as an expeditious political construct of the United States government. The moving and honest memoirs collected, translated, and edited here by Tuong Vu and Sean Fear describe the experiences of war, politics, and everyday life for people from many walks of life during the fraught years of Vietnam's Second Republic, leading up to and encompassing what Americans generally call the "Vietnam War." The voices gift the reader a sense of the authors' experiences in the Republic and their ideas about the nation during that time. The light and careful editing hand of Vu and Fear reveals that far from a Cold War proxy struggle, the conflict in Vietnam featured a true ideological divide between the communist North and the non-communist South.