American Exceptionalism at the Crossroads: Three Responses

Abstract

Unlike the immediate post-Cold War era of triumphalism and neoliberal prosperity, the last decade has witnessed the erosion of the ‘unipolar moment’ after the major setbacks of the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and the financial crisis of 2008. In this context, reconsidering the idea of American exceptional identity is not simply a scholastic exercise, but an urgent practical problem concerning the direction of US leadership in the world. This article presents a review of three representative discourses on American exceptionalism at a critical juncture. First, the neoconservatives Charles W. Dunn et al. and Robert Kagan attempt to reconfirm the virtue of the ‘American Creed’ and reassure the American people that the US will lead the world as it has done. Second, Tony Smith represents a dominant liberal consensus in US academia. Following Louis Hartz, Smith emphasizes not triumphalism, but an historical irony of American liberal identity. Finally, Anatol Lieven, resonating with the ‘multiple traditions’ approach against the liberal consensus school, suggests a more complex understanding of American exceptionalism by analyzing the existence of the ‘antithesis’ or the Jacksonian tradition.