Morality and American Foreign Policy

The Role of Ethics in International Affairs

Robert W. McElroy

• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9780691000787, 9780691637280
• eBook ISBN: 9781400862757
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: International Relations
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Most international relations specialists since World War II have assumed that morality plays only the most peripheral role in the making of substantive foreign policy decisions. To show that moral norms can, and do, significantly affect international affairs, Robert McElroy investigates four cases of American foreign policy-making: U.S. food aid to the Soviet Union during the Russian famine of 1921, Nixon's decision to alter U.S. policies on biochemical weapons production in 1969, the signing of the Panama Canal Treaties in 1978, and the bombing of Dresden during World War II.

Originally published in 1992.

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Table of contents

• Cover
• Contents
• Tables
• Acknowledgments
• 1. The Debate on Morality and International Relations
• 2. Toward a Theoretical Understanding of the Role of International Moral Norms
• 3. United States Famine Relief to Soviet Russia, 1921
• 4. America's Renunciation of Chemical and Biological Warfare
• 5. Colonialism and the Panama Canal
• 6. The Limits of Moral Norms: The Bombing of Dresden
• 7. Conclusions
• Selected Bibliography
• Index