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June 2012 (Volume 5, issue 9)
Many of us think of humanitarian intervention as a recent phenomenon of United States foreign policy. Certainly, critics of Barack Obama's intervention in Libya saw America's humanitarian involvement there as some new-fangled excuse to go mucking around in other countries. This month historian Jeff Bloodworth traces a much longer history of humanitarian intervention that goes back to the administration of William McKinley and is connected with the Protestant ideals of some of the nation's founders. Far from being new, Bloodworth demonstrates that humanitarism has been a central concern of American foreign policy for a very long time.
• This article includes a podcast,
images,
and maps
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In the late 19th century, humanitarian intervention was a popular idea among U.S. citizens. In this detail from a political cartoon, a caring woman whose garment reads "liberty" symbolizes this impulse.
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Welcome to Origins
A project of the Public History Initiative
and eHistory in the History Department at The Ohio State University.
Origins is a free and ad-free monthly publication
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In each issue of Origins, an academic expert will analyze
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help fill that gap, and we hope you enjoy what you find.
Nicholas
Breyfogle & Steven Conn, editors
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NEXT MONTH: Syria's Islamist Movement and the 2011-12 Uprising
by Fred Lawson
The events of the "Arab Spring" took the world by surprise. Yet, the roots of those rebellions run deep and nowhere more so than in Syria, where the fighting continues to be fierce and deadly. This month, Fred H. Lawson traces the history of one leading force in the ongoing Syrian uprising: the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood. The Brothers led a violent campaign to overthrow the Syrian regime in the 1970s, but more recently have advanced a platform that calls for liberal reform and constitutional government. Whatever the outcome of the current struggle, the Muslim Brotherhood is certain to play a central role in Syria's future.
Recent Issues
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Jeff Bloodworth
Many of us think of humanitarian intervention as a recent phenomenon of United States foreign policy. Certainly, critics of Barack Obama's intervention in Libya saw America's humanitarian involvement there as some new-fangled excuse to go mucking around in other countries. This month historian Jeff Bloodworth traces a much longer history of humanitarian intervention that goes back to the administration of William McKinley and is connected with the Protestant ideals of some of the nation's founders. Far from being new, Bloodworth demonstrates that humanitarism has been a central concern of American foreign policy for a very long time.
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John Brooke
The controversies generated by climate science in recent years center around the human relationship with the natural world and with natural resources. This month, historian John Brooke puts that critical question in historical perspective—deep historical perspective. For most of human history, our species had to struggle to survive powerful natural forces, like climate and disease. In the past three centuries, however, things have changed dramatically: that struggle has been reshaped by the unprecedented growth of the human population—from under one billion to now over seven. John Brooke's essay forces us to ask whether our population can continue to grow given the current Malthusian pressure on resources and on the earth system itself.
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Alongside the Presidential nomination process, the most prominent American political news stories these days are about the heated, high-stakes struggles over redistricting. The modern era of reapportioning state and federal legislative districts began almost exactly a half century ago when the U.S. Supreme Court decided Baker v. Carr (1962). With the Supreme Court recently agreeing to hear a Congressional redistricting case from Texas, this month historian and legal scholar David Stebenne puts today's redistricting battles in historical perspective to understand better this decisive component of American politics.
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Nurcan Atalan-Helicke
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1857, the 1870s, the 1890s, 1907, 1914, 1919, 1921: The United States faced widespread joblessness in all of these years, well before the Great Depression, not to mention today's Great Recession. As legislators in Washington prepare to debate another round of stimulus spending, and as unemployment reaches record highs, historian Daniel Amsterdam looks back at how the United States has tackled major spikes in unemployment throughout its history and how American efforts have compared with those of other countries.
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Energy has been in the news lately: The natural gas industry appears to be developing a world market; the U.S. Army is experimenting with “alternative” and “renewable” energy sources; “green” and “conservation” are being marketed as sound corporate management strategies. A half century ago the emphasis on natural gas, alternative and renewable fuels, and conservation were not in the energy policy mix in the United States. The convergence of historical trends in the 1970s, however, ushered in a “long transition” in American energy policy-making that is on-going. This month historian William R. Childs untangles a few of the many complex strands that make up the history of energy policy in America.
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Donald Hempson
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Steven Hyland
Forty years after President Richard Nixon declared a 'war on drugs,' the countries of Central and South America remain a central battleground. Though the horrific drug violence in Mexico has captured our attention recently, the history of the trade in the region stretches back much farther. This month, historian Steven Hyland explores how illicit drugs have been one of Latin America's principal contributions to our globalized world, and how narco-trafficking has adapted to market shifts in taste and demand and global and local politics over the last century.
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James Helicke
Turkey’s Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, recently unveiled a plan so ambitious that even he calls it the 'Crazy Project.' The project aims to build a massive canal that will bypass the Bosporus waterway that bisects Istanbul—a rival to the Panama and Suez Canals in time for the Turkish Republic’s centennial celebrations in 2023. The new canal, Erdogan hopes, will overcome centuries of international intrigue over the Bosporus, facilitate trade, and reduce the possibility of shipping accidents through the heart of Istanbul. This month Origins Managing Editor James Helicke examines the international history surrounding the strategic waterway that has confounded sultans and statesmen. He asks if the 'Crazy Project' will solve the Bosporus dilemma once and for all, or if it is just plain folly.
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Ryan Irwin
On a fundraising trip to California in April, President Obama was confronted by protesters demanding better treatment for Pfc Bradley Manning, who has been at the center of the WikiLeaks controversy. Private Manning has been imprisoned for passing on tens of thousands of military and diplomatic documents to Wikileaks, in one of the greatest breaches of state secrecy in the history of the United States. This month, historian Ryan Irwin looks at the WikiLeaks tempest and what it tells us about America's role in the world.
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Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective
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