This study focuses on the construction of American identity over time as it relates to U.S. foreign policy. It is based on the insights of poststructuralism and variants of discourse theory. In particular, the study depicts the historical development of identity representations within U.S. foreign policy discourse from 2008 to 2020, in order to demonstrate how the ongoing construction of identity enabled Donald Trump's disruptive foreign policy. Much of identity research in IR focuses on Self/Other relationships and understudies affirmative representations of identity. The current study fills this research gap by examining processes of affirmative linking in the construction of identity. The main results of the study found that the Trump administration's identity representations radically diverged from those of the Obama administration. The latter articulated America predominantly as a leader in the world, while the former reconstructed American identity as one of being a victim. However, two representations of American identity stayed constant: America as an inspiration to others and America as a force for good in the world.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:nusl.cz/oai:invenio.nusl.cz:438012 |
| Date | January 2021 |
| Creators | Delmastro, Matthew |
| Contributors | Ditrych, Ondřej, Tesař, Jakub |
| Source Sets | Czech ETDs |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | info:eu-repo/semantics/masterThesis |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/restrictedAccess |
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