Time to Turn Off the Lava Lamp

The New Left is growing hair on its ears. The special issue on American Foreign Policy and Its Thinkers arrives like a ponytailed colleague from the sixties at the Dean’s annual wine and cheese reception, still ranting at The Man, bragging about The Movement, and hankering for a free Merlot. Its self-righteous certainty prompts a nostalgic smile, but quickly becomes tiresome. Perry Anderson bases his book on three unexamined axioms. First, that the United States is a rapacious “global empire.” Second, America’s foreign policy is the plaything of elites who exploit the proletariat. Third, Latin and German—with a soupçon of French and Italian for taste—are superior to English for expressing such eternal truths. Anderson’s book has two parts: Imperium and Consilium. Imperium is a history of American foreign policy from World War II to the present. Consilium is an overview of foreign policy “apologists” whom Anderson disdains (Walter Russell Meade, Robert Kagan, Michael Mandelbaum, Zbigniew Brzezinski, and so on), contrasted implicitly with brave “non-conformists” he encourages readers “to honour” (Noam Chomsky, Gabriel Kolko, Andrew Bacevich, and Chalmers Johnson). Taken together, Anderson’s two essays recycle classic arguments and dish no new facts. They flout every principle of good writing. Other than that, the book is fine. Historians will find it useful as a historiographical example of unrevised Marxist–Leninism, or to prop up a window in a stuffy classroom. The latter usage promises the most light and fresh air.

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