THE IMAGINED WEST: EXPLORING OCCIDENTALISM

Imagining the West in the Era of America First

This chapter focuses on the debates revolving around President Donald Trump’s “America First”-policy from the perspectives of the main actors engaged in discussions on US foreign policy: the president and the administration, Congress, public and expert opinion, and media. We uncover three overlapping crisis narratives present in the debates: crisis of Western values, crisis of the liberal international order, and crisis of US leadership and analyze how the idea and concept of the West is utilized in these narratives. First, we argue that the concept of the West is eminently useful and effective in political rhetoric because of its familiarity, plasticity, and emotiveness. This is why both t…

Material, mental, and moral progress : American conceptions of civilization in late 19th century studies on "things Chinese and Japanese"