
Conservative Internationalism
Armed Diplomacy Under Jefferson, Polk, Truman, and Reagan
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
$0.99/mo for the first 3 months

Buy for $29.95
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Jones Allen
-
By:
-
Henry R. Nau
About this listen
Debates about U.S. foreign policy have revolved around three main traditions - liberal internationalism, realism, and nationalism. In this audiobook, distinguished political scientist, Henry Nau, delves deeply into a fourth, overlooked foreign policy tradition that he calls "conservative internationalism." This approach spreads freedom, like liberal internationalism; arms diplomacy, like realism; and preserves national sovereignty, like nationalism. It targets a world of limited government or independent "sister republics," not a world of great power concerts or centralized international institutions.
Nau explores conservative internationalism in the foreign policies of Thomas Jefferson, James Polk, Harry Truman, and Ronald Reagan. These presidents did more than any others to expand the arc of freedom using a deft combination of force, diplomacy, and compromise. Since Reagan, presidents have swung back and forth among the main traditions, overreaching under Bush and now retrenching under Obama. Nau demonstrates that conservative internationalism offers an alternative way. It pursues freedom but not everywhere, prioritizing situations that border on existing free countries - Turkey, for example, rather than Iraq. It uses lesser force early to influence negotiations rather than greater force later, after negotiations fail. And it reaches timely compromises to cash in military leverage and sustain public support.A groundbreaking revival of a neglected foreign policy tradition, Conservative Internationalism shows how the United States can effectively sustain global leadership while respecting the constraints of public will and material resources.
©2013 Princeton University Press (P)2013 Audible, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Romney
- A Reckoning
- By: McKay Coppins
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis, McKay Coppins
- Length: 12 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Few figures in American politics have seen more and said less than Mitt Romney. An outspoken dissident in Donald Trump’s GOP, he has made headlines in recent years for standing alone against the forces he believes are poisoning the party he once led. Romney was the first senator in history to vote to remove from office a president of his own party. When that president’s supporters went on to storm the US Capitol, Romney delivered a thundering speech from the Senate floor accusing his fellow Republicans of stoking insurrection.
-
-
Political and intellectual biography at its best!
- By Amazon Customer on 10-25-23
By: McKay Coppins
-
The Avoidable War
- The Dangers of a Catastrophic Conflict between the US and Xi Jinping's China
- By: Kevin Rudd
- Narrated by: Kevin Rudd, Rafe Beckley
- Length: 16 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The relationship between the US and China, the world’s two superpowers, is peculiarly volatile. Their militaries play a dangerous game of chicken, corporations steal intellectual property, intelligence satellites peer, and AI technicians plot. The capacity for either country to cross a fatal line grows daily. Kevin Rudd, a former Australian prime minister who has studied, lived in, and worked with China for more than forty years, is one of the very few people who can offer real insight into the mindsets of the leadership whose judgment will determine if a war will be fought.
-
-
Xi and the CCP Approve this Message
- By Andrizomai on 12-04-22
By: Kevin Rudd
-
The Fourth Turning Is Here
- What the Seasons of History Tell Us About How and When This Crisis Will End
- By: Neil Howe
- Narrated by: Neil Howe
- Length: 20 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Twenty-five years ago, Neil Howe and the late William Strauss dazzled the world with a provocative new theory of American history. Looking back at the last 500 years, they’d uncovered a distinct pattern: modern history moves in cycles, each one lasting roughly 80 to 100 years, the length of a long human life, with each cycle composed of four eras—or “turnings”—that always arrive in the same order and each last about 25 years. The last of these eras—the fourth turning—was always the most perilous, a period of civic upheaval and national mobilization.
-
-
A little baffled
- By John Coleman on 07-18-23
By: Neil Howe
-
The Return of Great Power Rivalry
- Democracy Versus Autocracy from the Ancient World to the U.S. and China
- By: Matthew Kroenig
- Narrated by: Joel Richards
- Length: 10 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The United States of America has been the most powerful country in the world for more than 70 years, but recently the US National Security Strategy declared that the return of great power competition with Russia and China is the greatest threat to US national security. Further, many analysts predict that America's autocratic rivals will have at least some success in disrupting - and, in the longer term, possibly even displacing - US global leadership. Brilliant and engagingly written, The Return of Great Power Rivalry argues that this conventional wisdom is wrong.
-
-
Pass
- By Jimmy Chien on 06-11-22
By: Matthew Kroenig
-
Listen, Liberal
- Or, What Ever Happened to the Party of the People?
- By: Thomas Frank
- Narrated by: Thomas Frank
- Length: 8 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is a widespread belief among liberals that if only Democrats can continue to dominate national elections, if only those awful Republicans are beaten into submission, the country will be on the right course. But this is to fundamentally misunderstand the modern Democratic Party. Drawing on years of research and first-hand reporting, Frank points out that the Democrats have done little to advance traditional liberal goals: expanding opportunity, fighting for social justice, and ensuring that workers get a fair deal.
-
-
Wow! Such an eye opener!
- By William R. Brown on 03-24-16
By: Thomas Frank
-
The Four Ages of American Foreign Policy
- Weak Power, Great Power, Superpower, Hyperpower
- By: Michael Mandelbaum
- Narrated by: Lyle Blaker
- Length: 18 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Four Ages of American Foreign Policy, Michael Mandelbaum offers a new framework for understanding the evolution of the foreign policy of the United States. He divides that evolution into four distinct periods, with each defined by the consistent increase in American power relative to other countries. His history of the four periods features engaging accounts of the major events and important personalities in the foreign policy of each era.
-
-
Expectations are everything
- By Patristics Guy on 08-07-23
-
Romney
- A Reckoning
- By: McKay Coppins
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis, McKay Coppins
- Length: 12 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Few figures in American politics have seen more and said less than Mitt Romney. An outspoken dissident in Donald Trump’s GOP, he has made headlines in recent years for standing alone against the forces he believes are poisoning the party he once led. Romney was the first senator in history to vote to remove from office a president of his own party. When that president’s supporters went on to storm the US Capitol, Romney delivered a thundering speech from the Senate floor accusing his fellow Republicans of stoking insurrection.
-
-
Political and intellectual biography at its best!
- By Amazon Customer on 10-25-23
By: McKay Coppins
-
The Avoidable War
- The Dangers of a Catastrophic Conflict between the US and Xi Jinping's China
- By: Kevin Rudd
- Narrated by: Kevin Rudd, Rafe Beckley
- Length: 16 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The relationship between the US and China, the world’s two superpowers, is peculiarly volatile. Their militaries play a dangerous game of chicken, corporations steal intellectual property, intelligence satellites peer, and AI technicians plot. The capacity for either country to cross a fatal line grows daily. Kevin Rudd, a former Australian prime minister who has studied, lived in, and worked with China for more than forty years, is one of the very few people who can offer real insight into the mindsets of the leadership whose judgment will determine if a war will be fought.
-
-
Xi and the CCP Approve this Message
- By Andrizomai on 12-04-22
By: Kevin Rudd
-
The Fourth Turning Is Here
- What the Seasons of History Tell Us About How and When This Crisis Will End
- By: Neil Howe
- Narrated by: Neil Howe
- Length: 20 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Twenty-five years ago, Neil Howe and the late William Strauss dazzled the world with a provocative new theory of American history. Looking back at the last 500 years, they’d uncovered a distinct pattern: modern history moves in cycles, each one lasting roughly 80 to 100 years, the length of a long human life, with each cycle composed of four eras—or “turnings”—that always arrive in the same order and each last about 25 years. The last of these eras—the fourth turning—was always the most perilous, a period of civic upheaval and national mobilization.
-
-
A little baffled
- By John Coleman on 07-18-23
By: Neil Howe
-
The Return of Great Power Rivalry
- Democracy Versus Autocracy from the Ancient World to the U.S. and China
- By: Matthew Kroenig
- Narrated by: Joel Richards
- Length: 10 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The United States of America has been the most powerful country in the world for more than 70 years, but recently the US National Security Strategy declared that the return of great power competition with Russia and China is the greatest threat to US national security. Further, many analysts predict that America's autocratic rivals will have at least some success in disrupting - and, in the longer term, possibly even displacing - US global leadership. Brilliant and engagingly written, The Return of Great Power Rivalry argues that this conventional wisdom is wrong.
-
-
Pass
- By Jimmy Chien on 06-11-22
By: Matthew Kroenig
-
Listen, Liberal
- Or, What Ever Happened to the Party of the People?
- By: Thomas Frank
- Narrated by: Thomas Frank
- Length: 8 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is a widespread belief among liberals that if only Democrats can continue to dominate national elections, if only those awful Republicans are beaten into submission, the country will be on the right course. But this is to fundamentally misunderstand the modern Democratic Party. Drawing on years of research and first-hand reporting, Frank points out that the Democrats have done little to advance traditional liberal goals: expanding opportunity, fighting for social justice, and ensuring that workers get a fair deal.
-
-
Wow! Such an eye opener!
- By William R. Brown on 03-24-16
By: Thomas Frank
-
The Four Ages of American Foreign Policy
- Weak Power, Great Power, Superpower, Hyperpower
- By: Michael Mandelbaum
- Narrated by: Lyle Blaker
- Length: 18 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Four Ages of American Foreign Policy, Michael Mandelbaum offers a new framework for understanding the evolution of the foreign policy of the United States. He divides that evolution into four distinct periods, with each defined by the consistent increase in American power relative to other countries. His history of the four periods features engaging accounts of the major events and important personalities in the foreign policy of each era.
-
-
Expectations are everything
- By Patristics Guy on 08-07-23
-
Of Paradise and Power
- America and Europe in the New World Order
- By: Robert Kagan
- Narrated by: Robertson Dean
- Length: 2 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When historians want to find out about the ideas that motivated American foreign policy in the early years of the twenty-first century, they would do well to read this book. Robert Kagan has formally set out a case for unilateralism on the part of the United States, as opposed to the multilateralism now characteristic of Europe. Kagan believes that the United States can disregard a weak Europe, and have a free hand in pursuing its global interests.
-
-
Quick and pithy listen
- By Erik Fosshage on 01-14-04
By: Robert Kagan
-
On China
- By: Henry Kissinger
- Narrated by: Nicholas Hormann
- Length: 20 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this sweeping and insightful history, Henry Kissinger turns for the first time at book length to a country he has known intimately for decades and whose modern relations with the West he helped shape. On China illuminates the inner workings of Chinese diplomacy during such pivotal events as the initial encounters between China and tight line modern European powers, the formation and breakdown of the Sino-Soviet alliance, the Korean War, and Richard Nixon’s historic trip to Beijing.
-
-
Another History of China
- By Elton on 09-23-11
By: Henry Kissinger
-
Destined for War
- Can America and China Escape Thucydides's Trap?
- By: Graham Allison
- Narrated by: Richard Ferrone
- Length: 12 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
War with China is much more likely than anyone thinks. When Athens went to war with Sparta some 2,500 years ago, the Greek historian Thucydides identified one simple cause: A rising power threatened to displace a ruling one. As the eminent Harvard scholar Graham Allison explains, in the past 500 years, great powers have found themselves in "Thucydides's Trap" 16 times. In 12 of the 16, the results have been catastrophic.
-
-
Balances, Counter-Balances and Traps
- By Joyce U. Olewe on 10-09-17
By: Graham Allison
-
World Order
- By: Henry Kissinger
- Narrated by: Nicholas Hormann
- Length: 14 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Henry Kissinger offers in World Order a deep meditation on the roots of international harmony and global disorder. Drawing on his experience as one of the foremost statesmen of the modern era Kissinger now reveals his analysis of the ultimate challenge for the 21st century: How to build a shared international order in a world of divergent historical perspectives, violent conflict, proliferating technology, and ideological extremism.
-
-
More retrospective than future oriented
- By Scott on 10-23-14
By: Henry Kissinger
-
Leadership
- Six Studies in World Strategy
- By: Henry Kissinger
- Narrated by: Sean Patrick Hopkins
- Length: 19 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Henry Kissinger analyses the lives of six extraordinary leaders—Konrad Adenauer, Charles de Gaulle, Richard Nixon, Anwar Sadat, Lee Kuan Yew, and Margaret Thatcher—through the distinctive strategies of statecraft that he believes they embodied. To each of these studies, Kissinger brings historical perception, public experience and, because he knew each of the subjects and participated in many of the events he describes, personal knowledge.
-
-
Architects of World Order
- By GrimLockz on 09-21-22
By: Henry Kissinger
-
The Cold War
- A New History
- By: John Lewis Gaddis
- Narrated by: Jay Gregory, Alan Sklar
- Length: 9 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Drawing on new and often startling information from newly opened Soviet, Eastern European, and Chinese archives, this thrilling account explores the strategic dynamics that drove the Cold War, provides illuminating portraits of its major personalities, and offers much fresh insight into its most crucial events. Riveting, revelatory, and wise, it tells a story whose lessons it is vitally necessary to understand as America once more faces an implacable ideological enemy.
-
-
WOW
- By Cordell eddings on 10-13-07
-
Losing an Enemy
- Obama, Iran, and the Triumph of Diplomacy
- By: Trita Parsi
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 17 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This timely book focuses on President Obama's deeply considered strategy toward Iran's nuclear program and reveals how the historic agreement of 2015 broke the persistent stalemate in negotiations that had blocked earlier efforts. Drawing from more than 75 in-depth interviews with key decision-makers, including Iran's Foreign Minister Javad Zarif and US Secretary of State John Kerry, this is the first authoritative account of President Obama's signature foreign policy achievement.
-
-
required reading
- By Seth K on 07-18-19
By: Trita Parsi
-
What Good Is Grand Strategy?
- Power and Purpose in American Statecraft from Harry S. Truman to George W. Bush
- By: Hal Brands
- Narrated by: Todd Belcher
- Length: 9 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
"Grand strategy" is one of the most widely used and abused concepts in the foreign policy lexicon. In this important book, Hal Brands explains why grand strategy is a concept that is so alluring - and so elusive - to those who make American statecraft. He explores what grand strategy is, why it is so essential, and why it is so hard to get right amid the turbulence of global affairs and the chaos of domestic politics.
By: Hal Brands
-
All Measures Short of War
- The Contest for the Twenty-First Century and the Future of American Power
- By: Thomas J. Wright
- Narrated by: Keith Sellon-Wright
- Length: 8 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Russia and China are increasingly revisionist in their regions. The Middle East appears to be unraveling. And many Americans question why the United States ought to lead. What will great power competition look like in the decades ahead? What impact will geopolitics have on globalization? And what strategy should the United States pursue to succeed in an increasingly competitive world? In this book, Thomas Wright explains how major powers will compete fiercely even as they try to avoid war with each other.
-
-
Globalist propaganda
- By Anthony Colosimo Jr on 07-10-21
By: Thomas J. Wright
-
The Jungle Grows Back
- America and Our Imperiled World
- By: Robert Kagan
- Narrated by: Jason Culp
- Length: 5 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Recent years have brought deeply disturbing developments around the globe. American sentiment seems to be leaning increasingly toward withdrawal in the face of such disarray. In this powerful, urgent essay, Robert Kagan elucidates the reasons why American withdrawal would be the worst possible response, based as it is on a fundamental and dangerous misreading of the world. Like a jungle that keeps growing back after being cut down, the world has always been full of dangerous actors who, left unchecked, possess the desire and ability to make things worse.
-
-
Out of date: covid, Trump nobel nominations etc
- By David on 11-13-18
By: Robert Kagan
-
The Hell of Good Intentions
- America's Foreign Policy Elite and the Decline of U.S. Primacy
- By: Stephen M. Walt
- Narrated by: Stephen M. Walt
- Length: 11 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the New York Times best-selling author Stephen M. Walt, The Hell of Good Intentions dissects the faults and foibles of recent American foreign policy - explaining why it has been plagued by disasters like the “forever wars” in Iraq and Afghanistan and outlining what can be done to fix it.
-
-
Shifted My Thinking
- By Sams95 on 11-07-18
By: Stephen M. Walt
-
The Twilight Struggle
- What the Cold War Teaches Us About Great-Power Rivalry Today
- By: Hal Brands
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 13 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The United States is entering an era of great-power competition with China and Russia. Such global struggles happen in a geopolitical twilight, between the sunshine of peace and the darkness of war. In this innovative and illuminating book, Hal Brands, a leading historian and former Pentagon adviser, argues that America should look to the history of the Cold War for lessons in how to succeed in great-power rivalry today.
-
-
one word
- By Stormchaser on 12-06-23
By: Hal Brands