From Bush to Trump: American Exceptionalism and its implications for Multilateralism

Associate Fellow, Manohar Parrikar IDSA, Dr. Rajeesh Kumar’s chapter on American exceptionalism, titled ‘From Bush to Trump: American Exceptionalism and its implications for Multilateralism’ has been published in Arzu Merali & Faisal Bodi, eds. The New Colonialism: The American Model of Human Rights, London: IHRC, 2019.

The chapter examines the implications of American exceptionalism, belief that the US differs qualitatively from other nations, on multilateralism by analysing the US foreign policy from President George W. Bush to Donald Trump. It argues that American exceptionalism always seeks to safeguard the sovereignty of the US in all aspects of global politics, and this approach often transformed into unilateral international actions and challenged the very existence of multilateral institutions.

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