War Studies Program
Learn the theory, practice, organization, and control of war and military forces.
What shapes the relationships among nations? How has America influenced the international order? Is American power and influence growing or declining? This seminar will address the nature of the world order and America’s role in shaping it.
Image courtesy National Museum of American History
Robert Kagan on the U.S. and the liberal world order
Faculty
Robert Kagan
Robert Kagan is a senior fellow with the Project on International Order and Strategy in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution. He is a contributing columnist at The Washington Post. His most recent book is The New York Times bestseller, The World America Made.
Robert Kagan
Robert Kagan is a Senior Fellow in the Center on the United States and Europe in Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution. He served in the State Department from 1984 to 1988 as a member of the policy planning staff, as principal speechwriter for Secretary of State George P. Shultz, and as deputy for policy in the Bureau of Inter-American Affairs.
Dr. Kagan is listed by Foreign Policy magazine as one of the world’s “Top 100 Public Global Thinkers.” He writes a monthly column on world affairs for The Washington Post, and is a contributing editor at both The Weekly Standard and The New Republic. His latest book, The Ghost at the Feast: America and Collapse of World Order, 1900-1941 (Knopf), was released January 2023. His previous books include The World America Made, The Return of History and the End of Dreams, Dangerous Nation: America’s Place in the World from its Earliest Days to the Dawn of the 20th Century, Of Paradise and Power, and A Twilight Struggle: American Power and Nicaragua, 1977-1990.
Dr. Kagan also serves as a member of the Secretary of State’s foreign affairs policy board and is co-chairman of the bipartisan Working Group on Egypt. He is a graduate of Yale University and Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government and holds a Ph.D. in American History from American University.
Download the Full Syllabus
Preview the Syllabus by Week/Session
Session 1: What Is World Order and Why Does It Matter?
Readings:
- Robert Gilpin, War and Change in World Politics, Chs. 1-3 and 5
- John Ikenberry, After Victory: Institutions, Strategic Restraint, and the Rebuilding of Order After Major Wars, Chs. 1-3
Discussion Questions:
- Is there such a thing as “world order”? If so, what is it? If not, how should we think about the relations among states and people?
- Is there a “world order” today? How should we characterize the present international situation?
Session 2: America and the World, Past and Present
Readings:
- Robert Kagan, Dangerous Nation, Chs. 2-4, and 12
- Stephen Sestanovich, “American Maximalism,” The National Interest, Spring 2005
- Melvyn P. Leffler, “The Emergence of an American Grand Strategy,” in Cambridge History of the Cold War, Volume 1
Discussion Questions:
- Has the United States shaped or reshaped the international order over the past two centuries? And if so, how?
- Is the United States a source of order or disorder?
- Are American goals and ambitions in the world different today than in the past?
Session 3: China and the World Order
Readings:
- Aaron Friedberg, A Contest For Supremacy: China, America, and the Struggle For Mastery in Asia, Chs. 1, 2, and 6
- John Ikenberry, “The Rise of China and the Future of the West,” Foreign Affairs, January/February 2008
Discussion Questions:
- Is China reshaping the world order? If so, how?
- Is a rising China a source of order or disorder in the world?
- Can an “American order” and a “Chinese order” coexist?
Session 4: Great Powers and Ideology
Readings:
- Azar Gat, “The Return of Authoritarian Great Powers,” Foreign Affairs, July/August 2007, and responses by Daniel Deudney and G. John Ikenberry, and Ronald Inglehart and Christian Welzel, Foreign Affairs, July/August 2009
- Robert Kagan, “The End of Dreams, Return of History,” Policy Review 144, August/September 2007
Discussion Questions:
- Does ideology still matter in international affairs? Why or why not?
- What is the relationship between ideology and world order?
Session 5: What Comes Next?
Readings:
- Robert Kagan, The World America Made
- John Ikenberry, “The Future of the Liberal World Order: Internationalism After America,” Foreign Affairs, May/June 2012
- Charles A. Kupchan, No One’s World: The West, the Rising Rest, and the Coming Global Turn, Ch. 7
- Fareed Zakaria, “The Future of American Power,” Foreign Affairs, May/June 2008
Discussion Questions:
- What will the world order look like in 2030?
- How should the United States attempt to shape the world order in the decades to come? Does it have the capacity to shape the world order?
