Exporting Democracy
Since its inception, America has been steeped into the view that it is an extraordinary nation, a city on a hill, a beacon of hope and continues to this day to bask in the glory. What began as Puritan declaration and Jeffersonian thought aimed at promoting a societal reconstruction has now been coupled with economic and militaristic superiority to represent a much more complicated ideology. At the forefront of this consciousness stands the American democracy, and after Alexis DeTocqueville published Democracy in America in the 1800's, America became the "envy" of the world, or at least that's what the high school history teachers said. The close of World War II marked the end of global imperialism and ushered in a policy that called for systemic decolonization of some of the heftiest land-grabs in history. America never prided itself as an empire, at least not publicly. Post-Cold War politics, however, left the United States as the world's only remaining superpower- an unchecked force that regularly exercises imperial privileges, all in the name of democracy. Between 1989 and 1999, we invaded Panama, smashed Iraq, intervened in Somalia, invaded Haiti, launched air strikes on Bosnia, fired missiles at Baghdad, Sudan, and Afghan
Despite universal suffrage, most eligible citizens still do not vote, and that seems to be the case in many impoverished nations where illiteracy and extreme poverty levels curb political participation. The key theme in Alexeyava's message is that democracy was achieved by the collectivization of Soviets, not by the aggression of outside agitators waving pistols. Another logical dilemma facing the exportation of democracy is the actual political ideology. Currently, the United States and the United Nations are hammering out plans to transfer sovereignty of Iraq to Iraqis. We also imposed embargoes on Libya, Iran, Iraq, and dozens of other states. From what our leaders are saying, Osama bin Laden must have stumbled unto a copy of the Bill of Rights and subsequently gone berserk. Her book, The Thaw Generation, works to unveil the secret lives of the network of kompanii that united the Moscow intelligentsia. The most important point to make repeatedly is this: a lot more harm has been done in the last quarter-century by leaders thinking these issues were too easy, rather than too hard to resolve. Instead, we were instructed to believe that we were dealt a blow because of our virtues. Buchanan sees a problem here, and insinuates that the American people have been set up in believing a two-dimensional analysis: that since our virtues have come under attack, we now have the obligation of defending them abroad (32). These nationalist movements which brought down the Soviet Union during the Gorbachev administration had very defined political goals of achieving democracy. Hard analyses into why our nation was attacked on Sep 11 were evaded. Americans continue to argue about when, how and if, America should export democracy.
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Acceptance Essays
