Taming American Power: The Global Response to U.S. Primacy

Front Cover
Norton, 2005 - History - 320 pages
How firm is America's grasp on global supremacy?

The United States currently wields unprecedented global power. Americans often assume that their global role is benevolent and their dominant position unchallenged, but other states are increasingly worried about U.S. dominance and are beginning to turn their concerns into action.

In this elegant and provocative new book, Kennedy School professor and renowned scholar Stephen M. Walt analyzes the different strategies that states employ to counter U.S. power or to harness it for their own ends. These responses threaten America's ability to achieve its foreign policy goals and may eventually undermine its dominant position. To prevent this, Walt argues, the United States must adopt a foreign policy that other states welcome, rather than one that reinforces their fear of American power.

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About the author (2005)

Stephen M. Walt is the academic dean and the Robert and Ren e Belfer Professor of International Affairs at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. He lives in Brookline, Massachusetts.

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