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The Great American Mission: Modernization and the Construction of an American World Order
The Great American Mission traces how America's global modernization efforts during the twentieth century were a means to remake the world in its own image. David Ekbladh shows that the emerging concept of modernization combined existing development ideas from the Depression. He describes how ambitious New Deal programs like the Tennessee Valley Authority became symbols of American liberalism's ability to marshal the social sciences, state planning, civil society, and technology to produce extensive social and economic change. For proponents, it became a valuable weapon to check the influence of menacing ideologies such as Fascism and Communism.
Modernization took on profound geopolitical importance as the United States grappled with these threats. After World War II, modernization remained a means to contain the growing influence of the Soviet Union. Ekbladh demonstrates how U.S.-led nation-building efforts in global hot spots, enlisting an array of nongovernmental groups and international organizations, were a basic part of American strategy in the Cold War.
However, a close connection to the Vietnam War and the upheavals of the 1960s would discredit modernization. The end of the Cold War further obscured modernization's mission, but many of its assumptions regained prominence after September 11 as the United States moved to contain new threats. Using new sources and perspectives, The Great American Mission offers new and challenging interpretations of America's ideological motivations and humanitarian responsibilities abroad.
Modernization took on profound geopolitical importance as the United States grappled with these threats. After World War II, modernization remained a means to contain the growing influence of the Soviet Union. Ekbladh demonstrates how U.S.-led nation-building efforts in global hot spots, enlisting an array of nongovernmental groups and international organizations, were a basic part of American strategy in the Cold War.
However, a close connection to the Vietnam War and the upheavals of the 1960s would discredit modernization. The end of the Cold War further obscured modernization's mission, but many of its assumptions regained prominence after September 11 as the United States moved to contain new threats. Using new sources and perspectives, The Great American Mission offers new and challenging interpretations of America's ideological motivations and humanitarian responsibilities abroad.
384 pages, Hardcover
First published October 12, 2009
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
February 22, 2018
I‘m not sure what this book was trying to do, but whatever it was, it didn‘t succeed.
The book was (re-?) published in 2010, so it‘s relatively current & it‘s a good starting point if you want to snowball your bibliography. It also has a few interesting sources, which is the only reason I didn‘t give it one star.
However. Like I said, I don‘t really know what Ekbladh was trying to accomplish. At first I thought it was going to be a critical examination of US development aid and the concept of liberal modernization, but if you look at the acknowledgements it feels like Ekbladh was funded by every US American organization out there & it shows. Like, he sometimes puts words in quotation marks, but that‘s it. Also he conveniently leaves out context when it‘s uncomfortable for the US.
Then I thought it was supposed to be a discourse analysis on modernization, but he doesn‘t do any actual analysis except for maybe a few sentences here and there.
So. Yup. Don‘t read this.
The book was (re-?) published in 2010, so it‘s relatively current & it‘s a good starting point if you want to snowball your bibliography. It also has a few interesting sources, which is the only reason I didn‘t give it one star.
However. Like I said, I don‘t really know what Ekbladh was trying to accomplish. At first I thought it was going to be a critical examination of US development aid and the concept of liberal modernization, but if you look at the acknowledgements it feels like Ekbladh was funded by every US American organization out there & it shows. Like, he sometimes puts words in quotation marks, but that‘s it. Also he conveniently leaves out context when it‘s uncomfortable for the US.
Then I thought it was supposed to be a discourse analysis on modernization, but he doesn‘t do any actual analysis except for maybe a few sentences here and there.
So. Yup. Don‘t read this.
October 6, 2020
What's brilliant about Ekbladh's historical scholarship is that he demonstrates the linkage between international economic development abroad and domestic political-ideological legitimacy at home. He explores how America's triumphal rise from the Great Depression, its defeat of fascism in World War II, and the economic collapse of the Soviet Union created a superiority complex around liberal internationalism.
For America and many Western countries, "Proving the efficacy of their respective ideologies was a necessity and drove [them] to intervene across the globe." From Ekbladh's vantage point, and I think history backs up his assessment, America's interventions in Korea, Vietnam, Iran, Kuwait, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc. were all motivated by not just a logic of international security, but by a drive to prove the ideological superiority of liberalism. Unconsciously, America had an innate, unconscious desire to "demonstrate its ability to promote social and economic progress."
Much of America's international development assistance centered around large-scale planning that utilized technology. Industrialization was seen as "both the means and the ends of the process." It was widely assumed that technology could promote economic prosperity and human progress. Scientific improvements were believed to be sufficient to reconcile the destabilizing forces of nationalism, communism, and ethnic conflict. American leaders believed that technology would lead to economic liberalism and eventually to political liberalism. Assistance would be given to nation-states willing to "confront and overcome" their underdevelopment.
America's first real failure in promoting the "gospel of liberalism" occurred in Vietnam. A lack of understanding and awareness about Vietnamese, and to a large extent, Pan-Asian nationalism, doomed the project from the start. Instead of supporting the Vietnamese nationalists, America devoted its attention to the ideological battle being waged against the Soviets. Washington could not perceive a Vietnam beyond its potential as a conflict zone in the Cold War. An awareness of Vietnamese nationalism might have prevented war.
Instead, it began creating disillusionment back home among the American people and among the fringes of the foreign policy establishment. Failures in the Mekong caused liberals to see that around the world, American experiments were not living up to their full potential. Growing economies and state-planning were empowering dictators and not leading to the establishment of democracies. These unintended consequences alarmed American grand strategists and policy analysts. As domestic unrest increased, there was a realization that perhaps America should not be "tutoring" the world, when its own people were politically frustrated with social inequality and racial tensions.
He ends the book exploring how the collapse of the Soviet Union removed the unifying reason for liberals to unite and to promote the liberal world order. Without an existential threat, the American people have been questioning why and to what end America should be promoting its values and agendas throughout the world.
For America and many Western countries, "Proving the efficacy of their respective ideologies was a necessity and drove [them] to intervene across the globe." From Ekbladh's vantage point, and I think history backs up his assessment, America's interventions in Korea, Vietnam, Iran, Kuwait, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc. were all motivated by not just a logic of international security, but by a drive to prove the ideological superiority of liberalism. Unconsciously, America had an innate, unconscious desire to "demonstrate its ability to promote social and economic progress."
Much of America's international development assistance centered around large-scale planning that utilized technology. Industrialization was seen as "both the means and the ends of the process." It was widely assumed that technology could promote economic prosperity and human progress. Scientific improvements were believed to be sufficient to reconcile the destabilizing forces of nationalism, communism, and ethnic conflict. American leaders believed that technology would lead to economic liberalism and eventually to political liberalism. Assistance would be given to nation-states willing to "confront and overcome" their underdevelopment.
America's first real failure in promoting the "gospel of liberalism" occurred in Vietnam. A lack of understanding and awareness about Vietnamese, and to a large extent, Pan-Asian nationalism, doomed the project from the start. Instead of supporting the Vietnamese nationalists, America devoted its attention to the ideological battle being waged against the Soviets. Washington could not perceive a Vietnam beyond its potential as a conflict zone in the Cold War. An awareness of Vietnamese nationalism might have prevented war.
Instead, it began creating disillusionment back home among the American people and among the fringes of the foreign policy establishment. Failures in the Mekong caused liberals to see that around the world, American experiments were not living up to their full potential. Growing economies and state-planning were empowering dictators and not leading to the establishment of democracies. These unintended consequences alarmed American grand strategists and policy analysts. As domestic unrest increased, there was a realization that perhaps America should not be "tutoring" the world, when its own people were politically frustrated with social inequality and racial tensions.
He ends the book exploring how the collapse of the Soviet Union removed the unifying reason for liberals to unite and to promote the liberal world order. Without an existential threat, the American people have been questioning why and to what end America should be promoting its values and agendas throughout the world.
September 3, 2025
Good. Ekbladh traces the history of "development" in the TVA, and how this lay the groundwork for the U.S.'s Cold War approach to aid in Korea, Vietnam, Egypt, and various other "third-world" countries. This book does a good job of showing how the success of the New Deal and America's unrivaled power in the post-WWII moment led to efforts of "nation-building," and why this matters for understanding America's role in the world.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews