Book Review

Freie Universität Berlin

Fachbereich Politik- und Sozialwissenschaften

Otto-Suhr-Institut für Politikwissenschaft

SoSe 2013

U.S. Foreign Policy and the Developing World JFKI_G_32500_13S

Prof. Dr. Thomas Greven

Book review

U.S. Foreign Policy: Procedure and Substance

Lukasz Wordliczek

Smilen Teodorov Hadzhikostov

Goerzallee 131

12207 Berlin

E-Mail: smilenteodorov@gmail.com

Politikwissenschaft (B.A.)

4. Fachsemester

Matrikelnummer: 4587957

With the recent uncovering of the spy program scandal, certain questions

regarding U.S. foreign policy may have naturally been raised. For example, to what

extent does the United States actively participate in being a global player? When did the

United States become so involved in international activities, and have they always been

so involved? How are these policies legislated, and which branch of government has the

most influence when it comes to creating and implementing them? By approaching these

questions in a specific matter, Łukasz Wordliczek’s careful deconstruction and analysis

of U.S. foreign policy gives the reader an objective, outside perspective of the subject in

U.S. Foreign Policy: Procedure and Substance. All in all, U.S. Foreign Policy gives the

reader an understanding of how United States foreign policy developed into what it is

today, and while the book may come off as lacking in style and require extensive

background knowledge of U.S. political history to fully grasp the context of the cited

examples, it nonetheless is a very useful text in examining U.S. foreign policy.

The first chapter of the book deals with the beginning of U.S. foreign policy.

Wordliczek makes the careful observation that, indeed, when it comes to foreign policy,

the early government for the United States wanted to engage in as little international

affairs as possible. This could certainly be attributed to the fact that, at this time, the

United States was not recognized as a particularly important...