Peace through Institutions: Woodrow Wilson and the Paris Peace Conference

• Main Author: Burak Küntay
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Hale Şıvgın 2014-12-01
• Series: Gazi Akademik Bakış
• Subjects: World War I; League of Nations; American Foreign Policy; Woodrow Wilson.
• Online Access: http://www.gaziakademikbakis.com/index.php/gab/article/view/236/210

As we approach the centennial of World War I, it is fitting to undertake a retrospective, academic review of the institutions devised in the war’s aftermath. The efforts to build and sustain a global order ensuring peace and cooperation in the international community - which ultimately failed with the beginning of a Second World War—constitute telling and timely lessons for world politics today. This paper looks critically at America’s role in World War I, diplomatic talks preceding the signature of the treaty of Versailles, and domestic and international reactions to President Woodrow Wilson’s signature idealism.The paper begins with a historical overview of how World War I began in Europe in an effort to contextualize the entrance of the United States in 1917, two and a half years after the war began. Since Woodrow Wilson originally promoted American neutrality, and U.S. public opinion had mostly favored isolationism until World War I, Wilson’s presidency represents a historic shift in American foreign policy to interventionism and eventually, its post-Cold War “global policeman” status. Assessing the main actors of WWI and America’s role in it serves to frame Woodrow Wilson’s asymmetrical reception within his own country. In the U.S., Wilson’s foreign affairs record is characterized by his intervention in Mexico, his original attempt to remain uninvolved in Europe’s war, and his failed attempt to keep peace after the war. Wilson garnered domestic support for U.S. entrance with his call to “make the world safe for democracy.” Using such overt idealistic rhetoric in the foreign policymaking decision process was novel at the time, but sounds all too familiar today. Post-WWI, Wilson’s fight with Congress and the U.S. not entering into the League of Nations resembles rifts between U.S. administrations and their Congresses in recent times, and it arguably indirectly contributed to the occurrence of the World War II. As U.S. public opinion once again begins favoring non-interventionism amidst volatility overseas, a critical approach to WWI history and its discourse invites salient questions about today’s international order