Good Intentions: The Failure of the Clinton Approach to Foreign Policy

by Jeane J. Kirkpatrick

This volume describes the Clinton administration's approach to foreign affairs. It considers issues such as its commitment to unilateral decision-making and its enthusiasm for the use of forces but not force - policies which have not worked. This text explains the reasons for this failure.

200 pages, Hardcover

First published July 1, 1997

About the author

Jeane Duane Kirkpatrick, née Jordan and writing as Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, was an American ambassador and an ardent anticommunist. After serving as Ronald Reagan's foreign policy adviser in his 1980 campaign and later in his Cabinet, the longtime Democrat-turned-Republican was nominated as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and became the first woman to hold this position.

She is famous for her "Kirkpatrick Doctrine," which advocated U.S. support of anticommunist governments around the world, including authoritarian dictatorships, if they went along with Washington's aims—believing they could be led into democracy by example. She wrote, "Traditional authoritarian governments are less repressive than revolutionary autocracies."

Kirkpatrick served on Reagan's Cabinet on the National Security Council, Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, Defense Policy Review Board, and chaired the Secretary of Defense Commission on Fail Safe and Risk reduction of the Nuclear Command and Control System.