ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the nature and goals of US foreign policy. American foreign policy has always been a blend of realism and idealism and of internationalist and isolationist tendencies. Neo-isolationists also blend realism with idealism in their desire to return to the foreign policy principles and practices of the early republic. The foreign policy of the Washington administration is more akin to active neutrality than isolationism. Foreign policy is likely to be affected by factors both external and internal to the nation. The chapter also examines how foreign policy has been made in the United States, particularly since the end of the Second World War. The Cold War was a permanent crisis in American foreign policy because it constituted a continuing threat to national security. The character and interests of the individual president can go a long way in explaining the substance and management of American foreign policy in any given period.
