Wilsonianism

This article is part of a series about Woodrow Wilson
Early life Boyhood home South Carolina home President of Princeton University New Jersey gubernatorial election President of the United States Presidency First term 1912 presidential election Convention 1st inauguration Women's suffrage Woman Suffrage Procession The New Freedom Silent Sentinels Federal Reserve Act Clayton Antitrust Act Federal Trade Commission United States occupation of Veracruz Pancho Villa Expedition Coalfield War Daylight saving time Banana Wars Second term 1916 presidential election Convention 2nd inauguration 18th Amendment 19th Amendment World War I Zimmermann Telegram Thrasher incident Entry into war Against Austria-Hungary Against Germany American home front Espionage Act Fourteen Points Wilsonian Armenia Paris Peace Conference Big Four Treaty of Versailles League of Nations Judicial appointments Wilson House Princeton School of Public and International Affairs Wilson Center Presidential Library Wilsonianism

Wilsonianism or Wilsonian idealism describes a certain type of foreign policy advice. The term comes from the ideas and proposals of President Woodrow Wilson (1913–1921). He issued his famous Fourteen Points in January 1918 as a basis for ending World War I and promoting world peace. He was a leading advocate of the League of Nations to enable the international community to avoid wars and end hostile aggression. Wilsonianism is a form of liberal internationalism.

Principles

Common principles that are often associated with "Wilsonianism" include:

• Emphasis on self-determination of peoples;
• Advocacy of the spread of democracy;
• Advocacy of the spread of capitalism; and
• Support for collective security, and least partial opposition to American isolationism.

Historian Joan Hoff writes, "What is 'normal' Wilsonianism remains contested today. For some, it is 'inspiring liberal internationalism' based on adherence to self-determination; for others, Wilsonianism is the exemplar of humanitarian intervention around the world,' making U.S. foreign policy a paragon of carefully defined and restrict use of force." Amos Perlmutter defined Wilsonianism as simultaneously consisting of "liberal interventionism, self-determination, nonintervention, humanitarian intervention" oriented in support of collective security, open diplomacy, capitalism, American exceptionalism, and free and open borders, and opposed to revolution.

See also

• Imperialism
• Empire of Liberty
• Human rights
• Idealism in international relations
• International relations theory
• Nation-building
• New world order (politics)
• Open Door Policy
• Political realism
• Straussian Wilsonianism
• United Nations

Further reading

• Ambrosius, Lloyd E. Wilsonianism: Woodrow Wilson and His Legacy in American Foreign Relations (Palgrave Macmillan, 2002).
• Ikenberry, G. John, Thomas J. Knock, Anne-Marie Slaughter & Tony Smith. The Crisis of American Foreign Policy: Wilsonianism in the Twenty-first Century (Princeton University Press, 2009).
• Layne, Christopher. The Peace of Illusions: American Grand Strategy from 1940 to the Present (Cornell Studies in Security Affairs) (Cornell University Press, 2000).
• Smith, Tony. Why Wilson Matters: The Origin of American Liberal Internationalism and Its Crisis Today (2019) excerpt
• Throntveit, Trygve. Power without Victory: Woodrow Wilson and the American Internationalist Experiment (2017)