UDTR — Radar mondial des droits de la Nature

The Liberal Traditions in the Americas: Rights, Sovereignty, and the Origins of Liberal Multilateralism

Identification

Clé publique

doi:10.1086/ahr.117.1.68

Auteurs

Greg Grandin

Année déclarée

2012

Langue déclarée

en

Type source

article

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2026-11-09T19:17:30.999572+00:00

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2026-11-09T19:17:30.999572+00:00

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Institutions déclarées par la source

Yale University

Résumé documentaire — langue originale

America is therefore the land of the future, where, in the ages that lie before us, the burden of the World's History shall reveal itself—perhaps in a contest between North and South America. Somos más Americanos/We are more American. “Who has written on a Western Hemisphere scale,” Herbert Bolton asked in 1932, “the history of shipbuilding and commerce, mining, Christian missions, Indian policies, slavery and emancipation, constitutional development, arbitration, the effects of the Indian on European cultures, the rise of the common man … Who has tried to state the significance of the frontier in terms of the Americas?” Bolton, a student of Frederick Jackson Turner, raised the question in his presidential address to the American Historical Association, hoping to prompt an innovative approach to American studies, one that would take the so-called New History movement associated with Turner—organized around the sociology of migration, institutions, ideas, and property relations—and stretch it over a transnational frame. Bolton started his address by making what seems a commonsense comparison, noting that if European history could not be understood by studying England, France, or Germany alone, then “Greater America” could not be “adequately presented if confined to Brazil, or Chile, or Mexico, or Canada, or the United States.”1 This effort to dilute nationalist historiography by depicting “American History as Western Hemisphere History” holds up well against the scholarly provincialism of Bolton's day. Yet his belief that the Western Hemisphere shared a unity of republican and anticolonial experiences and, by implication, interests led him to posit a homologous relationship between the nations of Greater America and those of Greater Europe that did not exist. America was different from half-monarchical, largely illiberal, balance-of-power Europe. More importantly, the United States' emergence as a new kind of hegemon, able to project its power and influence free from the burdens of direct territorial or administrative rule, prevented Bolton, and many who followed, from seeing a more useful comparison: between the United States' relationship with Latin America and Europe's with its colonial possessions. As a result, more recently, as intellectual historians (including Jennifer Pitts and Andrew Fitzmaurice in this AHR Forum) have considered the links between liberalism and empire, the United States and its dealings with Latin America have largely been ignored. In all the debates over what is and is not distinct about the United States—in terms of national identity, political institutions, domestic history, and foreign policy—little attention has been paid to one variable that can, at least in relation to its global ascendance, unambiguously be called unique: its relationship with Latin America.2 “South America will be to North America,” the North American Review wrote in 1821, “what Asia and Africa are to Europe.”3 Not quite. Other liberal capitalist world powers—France, Holland, and Great Britain—tended, at their apex, to rule over culturally and religiously distinct peoples in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. The settlers who colonized North America, by contrast, looked to Iberian America not as an epistemic “other” but as a competitor in a fight to define a set of nominally shared but actually contested ideas and political forms: Christianity, republicanism, liberalism, democracy, sovereignty, rights, and above all the very idea of America. After the republican revolutions of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the relationship between the United States and the new nations of Spanish America developed a contentious ideological and legal intimacy—an ongoing “immanent critique”—unmatched by other comparable hegemon-periphery relations, especially one that would jump scale from the regional to the global level. England's relation to its “Celtic fringe,” especially to Ireland and Scotland, produced a somewhat similar dynamic that gave form and content, in terms of law, justifying ideologies, and administration, to the British Empire.4 But in the Americas, extended space (“a hemisphere to itself,” as Thomas Jefferson once put it) and time (running from Elizabethan anti-Hispanism of the seventeenth century to the neoliberal Washington Consensus of the twentieth) allowed the rivalry to play out on an unprecedented scale. Out of this antagonism emerged a normative ideal of republican America. The origins and endurance of the United States' sense of moral purpose, distinct from the utilitarian, positive-law expositions of international diplomacy that took shape in nineteenth-century Europe, have long been the subject of scholarly inquiry. In 1820, Jefferson imagined a future when “our strength will permit us to give the law of our hemisphere,” marked by “the meridian of the mid-Atlantic,” would as “the of between and on this of of be and the and the lie in have considered that it was South and America that would give to the of what the legal and would by the early century to American international of more by the it is by intellectual historians with out the transnational origins of liberal and in the new nations to the of the to and therefore did not a that the a But over emerged a over to define the of this moral and political and Spanish and to to the of the common and territorial as In the United the terms as and and state on that could those The between but is The of the political of the United States of by a of and intellectual of Bolton, be the Americas, and and and republican migration, Christian and and relations, and of and national of national that is at least in its of to the United and land the between and the of America,” as Andrew Jackson the American ideal in his their to a and many of the Latin American who in the late nineteenth century would legal an of to contest what was as an United of the The liberal legal from Brazil, and over their in to or American nations their a by a with Indian attention from their against as the and in or the in out that the United States' to of the was not But over this produced very distinct of what and other have as the liberalism between and The that the United States was able to the that slavery and presented to republican and is not But it in the of Greater considered in relation to other republican and liberal in the The that would as Latin America to and to In to the United its and a colonial of legal and that understood in and administrative and the United new nations at their to with the and interests of other nations at their As a result, the and with the of and their new In the their ideal of from their territorial by out the legal of on of international arbitration, and developed a as that would the Latin in to liberalism and diplomacy was it allowed Washington to to project its and influence in a new not by but by nominally free and This the United States its as it could be was in territorial and in the nineteenth it was a to the kind of global power it would in the that the between is the and, debates that took before and the over the of the is presented as a of over the to in Latin Europe, But a in the was a on the one the interests of an world power and, on the a of on New define wrote the that not not have to in to on the the to the of to the that … in to the of the but to will to in when tried to define it that it The has been about American and in what has been from a is Latin America. and to to a with the of political the of the state in as the of the kind of that the of the United States but did not that the it in Spanish After of that the between a and an it would take more the of to republican would take a over a moral state that would and The of to “the of the and the of political was a kind of republican on in many of the a of ideas from republicanism, the associated with Thomas and more the of and Thomas intellectual the between interests and the and the to the in the United that the of the would the the origins of this between and republicanism, it was in the history that British from Spanish in the as to the of and Spanish rule, the of was the of the a century in a of of of the of of a of as this was Spanish and and the with the developed over against and to the of the New to and the of that emerged out of this was on or law, but the the of the of rights, the of political the terms of what would international in raised the of as the law of nations as law between between but between all as one is in a sense a has the power to are and to all and up the law of But this in a colonial state that the of a that distinct and to understood not in was a in the administrative of the early and then from the very of Spanish and then and in the of and of to the of and in the of one of the the in the of a and it was on was more to with The was of But it was colonial could be many by a of legal and and This history by the of the eighteenth a that was more its in the United in the sense that its of a colonial that the that to its and more in that a state as to that a between the of and that their many of on and the of ongoing about to and or to and on After and ideologies, of and to of peoples of and from the and to In many an of republican gave in the late nineteenth century to liberalism or more to and to and a of and But the that to in the United in Latin America could and ideologies, in the that the has from the of by up of and free of to the of against on to the and its of the as a national In the nineteenth could in the of what historians of Mexico, and in Latin America or In the it took the form of and different of In Latin America, it was not the of and that the sense of and that is as The of and political power that the of the of led in many to a and of and In a of well the of of on and the that the of in the of Latin America in the century would its is the to global democracy, with its and in and in international a of The was the similar in Europe and the to the to a and and In similar in the of all Latin American and in by the United Chile, and the of American States the of the of The of who with on the was the in the the to to to and and to have to and The on and as and the to or the of the to to the of was the of a of property to its the more to it was what Latin American would by the the of could be to colonial of a and more of nineteenth-century As the ideal the political The of the state to property was by of all as to a to in to a in the form of and or to more in the and as to and As with more the idea was and in in that land and national is by the has the to this to the of Brazil, and other property to their as did of did not the the new by the of and on the set in property as a and to the state over the and In North America, an history to the colonial at least as with the in Spanish the of moral debates that took the Spanish against was and legal of the and of did and as against the of the Yet the of British rule did not prompt the kind of legal and that it did in In as Andrew Fitzmaurice has the but their colonial project against that In the of the to a to their in the New reveal a of the that and as with to and Spanish was and and the Spanish could political but not the of American The therefore to the question that would be to be as as … but to be of the that it would be to from this of and to is a of a form of one in to Spanish at but then its the of wrote the that question the of the and then and in Spanish with their republican the a that the of in the century Latin put in Fitzmaurice has the of the of the of the in an of the of with and it not to but to that in Fitzmaurice the to as of in this to to The liberal that emerged from was and many different political but at least one of it by the century to to to to and to and In the that the of the and then the of their political ideas in relation to Spanish America. the the of an of a to on the of their in making the In wrote that the United States could from of as the of a Spanish in it the United States could with its “the our and “the on our as a of at and a In an took the by a against to the United States from the of the Americas, the against the and of and Spanish America, what was about the United institutions, and a and a more in common with Europe with the United and its and revolutions a of the of a a of the ideas of the to New is from the of our before the idea of American was and over a century before the was it be that … is distinct from one did not have the a of British America before its from the “the question of of a foreign is one of up with the of and was the question of The United States was a that its early and of and of the the and of the and of property rights, ideas of as a to dilute the that from a on those property of the of this but the of law their legal and to be was and Spanish America, their as political that the United States to in the Spanish and the as the has a set of legal and that to define foreign to this In Latin in the ideas, and of the United States' the New and the New The could be extended the nineteenth that all of the to European was the of many when debates about Spanish America, and the from those allowed a of interests and ideas domestic and foreign As the of “American of the Western Hemisphere be with a at its against Great as as those by and In the on the kind of by to and his American the extended over the United States and as an to put the allowed many of the future of to their and their In the the of with and of the to be the of the the in the of between by up of a of of the and As has of this and would on to the the to of Latin as a of their in the North and and Thomas Jefferson before him to of a with shared interests different from those of Europe, early to of the to not the time but with South America as distinct from This of America in it American from at the in and took it be before Spanish to of one the other Spanish America did more ideological the new the of and the with the not the of slavery but allowed a of by the of law, republicanism, and an the the United States' idea that the could as a to be but would largely from that on other to what be called that direct to the and of other But the and the to the is the one in Latin America could not the United the looked to an of many of and took from Spanish America, as Chile, and slavery After the Spanish America to be by many as a to to the Latin America” with the Mexico, in the as the has and New effort to a and liberal capitalist an that would in the and In the as of the political that and After the frontier and the of that long been on peoples was by Latin American nations the new to the one of in the Latin American of the a that to have been by of his with Latin America, or and up with a of are to be allowed to their in a world to be by many are the in is the that a could be was moral to the at it the to of a and at other it or the to foreign property as the variable of Washington But in what was that the United States the its sense of to be the In marked contrast, nations at the time of by a of colonial administrative as the of the new In a of and regional and the of or law to the of at the of a not the to the to the of the United States its in an effort to a with Great Yet it was in South and America, foreign the nineteenth century what to of to that of the sovereignty, that the developed a legal of the was in of administrative (including of the the and and and as and on one or the to more a century of and from the between and over to the between and in the Yet effort to to the of the and led to its to Spanish America in Spanish the early the the of what Latin American called American international law, on the ideal of and on In the United an ideal of with and a of on the of those In Latin America, the between a of and a of territorial was at more of an not in but in as by and But over time developed a more to state in the domestic and foreign interests to or by the in in in and in are the of are many other between and to Washington to in Latin America a of at least In and to and as would take a with over the and the space of the to the of the of the of American international law, as the that was a between their positive-law ideal of territorial and their normative of what did an or have to As an up as a with an United and by their Latin American nations by the early century their to The history of United American in the late nineteenth and is as a of of and and in Mexico, the and America. But this of territorial and is a of the of international to this is in the of the in all the on the is the that and did not to that all of the to European understood its against as an and of their and to the their In the against what it on its by and and to the in their over with out that was to it therefore a European in the United States to the to the and to Washington and all by Spanish to define the as international law or to the in a that would the of American slavery or a in the nineteenth and the early of and would its in nationalist to territorial and by with his to the American when it to the to in the of other nations to its Washington the United States to to what Latin understood to be a Latin at the a of to their ideas, the of to regional as a of American the to the the more be an American international law be an a or a international was and was before of the American nations an did the to be the of international it was to their regional and to as of did in in the of a between and Great on the between the United States and Latin America as a of or of the as many Latin American the in developed an that the of are to be in nineteenth-century the to be in distinct but power allowed it to the to its and law, on would that and international that of interests as to the of their between the of America, did not more as an of the that then in all the the of been written or the in it would have been in the New In this it be and not a of that the is of But that its and it is that an of the of America have been early in the of emancipation, by a power would not permit the of the world to that as was this that America, from the very of to give to its foreign a of the ideas then on In this sense the is and is of The of its and was to reveal the ideal of by the early from the a global to the in that and out the Western arbitration, territorial sovereignty, and the belief that common interests to of form the of international the of what to at Latin in liberal is by the of the of the of of the of nations to and as against the territorial and political of all of the the on the American that the United States been in and Spanish been of a of in it a the not the of a when did not to a The did a to the Yet this to with the with to in the who of the of the did not over in the it in Latin America, who the as the with the Western similar to those to Great in the Middle the many of the Latin American of their that have been one have been Latin American an of and a of the world that one international to the of American international the in that Washington what the of that an of the of of all In this one in a of and in the have to the of it to the the of the at the the of to territorial as a when it to Latin of an from Mexico, its to the was by to the Mexico, the and to be not been to the between and the United States of the in the a of with the of The of property law is by the early it the idea that could Yet many legal who this the as that property is a by the many that the if would other to a similar to define but The in its and his of against the of the the of American in and the Association, interests that or property the on to the of the and to take that would to the of and the one to the of and its But on the to the to the of and “the ideas of the new as international did not But an of the the that as a between and land and but justifying the not as a of liberal of property but as thei

Identifiants

OPENALEX

W2142285942

DOI

10.1086/ahr.117.1.68

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OpenAlex · Document 1 · Document 2

• DOI · https://doi.org/10.1086/ahr.117.1.68
• OpenAlex · https://openalex.org/W2142285942

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