President Clinton and the Anglo-American ‘Special Relationship

The election of a new American president inevitably raises questions in foreign capitals concerning the approach that the new administration is likely to take towards foreign policy. This has certainly been the case in London with the return to the White House of a Democrat for the first time in sixteen years and at a time of great instability hi international politics. For the UK, ties with Washington have for the last seventy-five years been viewed as a central component of its foreign policy (Dimbleby and Reynolds, 1988). With the election of Bill Clinton several concerns have been raised as to whether the end of the Republican presidency, together with the change of generation which the new administration also represents, heralds a major reassessment of the ‘special relationship’ between the two countries. Several specific policy statements made by Candidate Clinton led to expressions of concern in the British press as to the prospects for Anglo-American relations under the new administration1. This article sets out these possible areas of disagreement in an attempt to ascertain whether these differences were merely the rhetoric necessary for the campaign trail or whether they reflect and herald a more profound change in the Anglo-American relationship

Administration (probate law · Foreign policy · International relations · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Presidency · Rhetoric · Sociology · Special Relationship · Theology · White (mutation · Law · Political Systems and Governance · Public Administration · Scottish History and National Identity

• Britain and the New World Order

  Christopher Coker•International Affairs•1992

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