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HARVARD UNIVERSITY

JOHN F. KENNEDY SCHOOL OF GOVERNMENT

IGA 301

LEADERSHIP AND ETHICS IN AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY

PROFESSOR JOSEPH NYE

SYLLABUS - FALL 2010

Course Assistant: Faculty Assistant Manuel Hartung Jeanne Marasca

Phone number: [TK] (617) 495-4537

Overview: The first part of the course will examine theories of good and bad leadership

and the ethical frameworks for making such judgments. Specific emphasis is on the

particular context of world politics and foreign policy as a setting for ethics and

leadership. The main part of the course will then analyze a series of case studies

regarding selected American presidents in the 20th

century and the foreign policy

decisions they made. There are no pre-requisites.

Time: Wednesday 4:10 PM – 6 PM, L280

Office Hours: Tuesday 2:00 PM -4:00 PM (phone or e mail Jeanne Marasca to schedule

appointment)

E mail address: joseph_nye@harvard.edu

Reading: Students are required to complete an average of 100-120 pages of readings a

week; study questions will be provided to help guide your reading. Course packets are

available for purchase at the Kennedy School’s Course Materials Office (CMO).

Additionally, the following books are required and available for purchase at the Harvard

COOP:

J. S. Nye, The Powers to Lead. Oxford 2008

Cathal Nolan, ed., Ethics and Statecraft, Praeger, 2004

Fred Greenstein, The Presidential Difference, 2nd

ed., Princeton, 2004

A limited number of all readings are also available on reserve in the KSG Library.

Specific Requirements and Grading: Each student will be required to write a five page

midterm exam and a five page final exam. More details will be provided in class.

Course grades will be determined based on these papers, as well as class participation,

including a group exercise. Students are expected to have done the reading before class,

and there will be occasional cold calling. Optional informal and review classes will also

be scheduled from time to time.

Course Outline:

Sept 1 – Charismatic, Transformational and Transactional Leadership (116 pages)

Required:

James M. Burns, Transforming Leadership, pp. 22-9).

Keeley, “The Trouble with Transformational Leadership,” in J. Ciulla, ed.

Ethics, the Heart of Leadership, pp. 149-172.

George Edwards, “Charisma and Personality: Does the Messenger Matter?,”

On Deaf Ears, pp 79-106.

J. S. Nye, The Powers to Lead, Ch 3, 4 pp 53-108

Sept 8 Leadership and Ethics (91 pages)

Required:

Gerald Gaus, “Dirty Hands,” in Frey and Wellman, eds., A Companion to

Applied Ethics, pp. 167-179

Joseph Badaracco, “The Disciplines of Building Characters” Harvard Business

Review, March-April, 1998 (10 pages)

Stephan Garrett, “Political Leadership and Dirty Hands,” in Ethics and Statecraft,

pp. 59-74

J.S. Nye, The Powers to Lead, Ch 5 pp 109-145

James Hoopes, Hail to the CEO, pp 55-68

Sept 15 Ethics and International Relations (89 pp)

Required:

Joseph S. Nye. “The Ethics of Foreign Policy,” in Power in the Global

Information Age, pp. 115-144.

Owen Harries, “Power and Morals” Prospect April 2005, pp 26-31

John Rawls, The Law of Peoples, pp. 23-43.

Robert Jackson, “The Situational Ethics of Statecraft,” in Cathal J. Nolan, ed.,

Ethics and Statecraft, pp. 17-31

Daniel Deudney and Jeffrey Meiser, “American Exceptionalism,” in Michael Cox

and Doug Stokes,eds.US Foreign Policy,pp 25-40

Sept 22 Robert McNamara: Cuba and Vietnam (Video plus 58 pages)

Required

View movie: “The Fog of War” – Location/Time TBA

James Blight and Janet Lang, The Fog of War: Lessons from the Life of Robert

McNamara pp. 15-57.

Fred Greenstein, The Presidential Difference, pp. 75-89

Sept 29 - Theodore Roosevelt and American Expansion (101 pages)

Required:

Henry Kissinger, “Chapter 2: TR and Wilson.” Diplomacy, pp. 29-55.

James Burns and Susan Dunn, The Three Roosevelts, pp.8-13, 45-77

William Tilchin, “Power and Principle: The Statecraft of Theodore Roosevelt”,

in Cathal Nolan, ed. Ethics and Statecraft, pp. 97-115

Warren Zimmerman, First Great Triumph, pp. 403-417, 428-37

Oct 6 -Woodrow Wilson: WW I and the League of Nations ( 97 pages)

Required:

Louis Auchinchloss, Woodrow Wilson, pp. 1-3, 83-97

Alvin Felzenberg, The Leaders We Deserved, pp 57-67

Alexander and Juliette George, Woodrow Wilson and Colonel House, pp. 113-

132, 157-176, 290-315

Arthur Link, “The Higher Realism of Woodrow Wilson,” in Cathal Nolan, ed.

Ethics and Statecraft, pp. 121-132

Ernest May, The World War and American Isolation, pp. 416-37

John Milton Cooper, Woodrow Wilson: A Biography, pp 3-11

Oct 13 - Franklin Roosevelt and entry into WWII (127 pages)

Required:

Fred Greenstein, The Presidential Difference, pp. 11-26.

Cathal Nolan, “Bodyguard of Lies,” in Nolan, ed. Ethics and Statecraft, pp. 35-53

Garry Willis, Certain Trumpets, pp. 23-34

Burns and Dunn, The Three Roosevelts, pp. 347-359, 410-433.

Robert Dallek, Franklin D. Roosevelt and American Foreign Policy, pp. 269-313,

539-552

Oct 20 Mid Term Exam

Oct 27 - Harry Truman and the Cold War (102 pages)

Required:

David McCullough, Truman, pp.141-45, 989-92

Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas, The Wise Men, pp. 386-418.

Alonzo Hamby, “Harry Truman: Insecurity and Responsibility” in Fred

Greeenstein, ed., Leadership in the Modern Presidency, pp. 41-75.

Elizabeth Spalding, “The Ratification of NATO”, in David Abshire, ed. Triumphs

and Tragedies of the Modern Presidency, pp. 59-61.

Fred Greenstein, The Presidential Difference, pp. 27-41.

Nov 3— Dwight Eisenhower and the Cold War (84 pages)

Required:

Fred Greenstein, The Presidential Difference pp. 43-57

Robert Bowie, “President Eisenhower Establishes His National Security Process,”

in David Abshire, ed. Triumphs and Tragedies of the Modern Presidency, pp. 52-57

Fred Greenstein, The Hidden Hand Presidency, pp. 57-72

Stephen Ambrose, Eisenhower The President Vol. II, pp. 13-35, 618-627

Dwight Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 1953-56, pp. 503-511

Nov 10 - Ronald Reagan and the Cold War (89 pages)

Required

Fred Greenstein, The Presidential Difference, pp. 145-157

David Abshire, Saving the Reagan Presidency, pp. 38-70, 197-208.

David Gergen, Eyewitness to Power, pp. 151-60, 168-193.

Peter Bienart, “Think Again: Ronald Reagan,” Foreign Policy, July 2010, pp 28-

33

Nov 17 - George H. W. Bush: Cold War and Gulf War (103 pages)

Required:

Fred Greenstein, The Presidential Difference, pp. 159-171

Philip Zelikow and James Kitfield chapters in David Abshire, ed. Triumphs and

Tragedies of the Modern Presidency pp. 217-25

George Bush and Brent Scowcroft, A World Transformed, pp 302-333, 536-66.

Peter and Rochelle Schweizer, The Bushes, pp. 69-86

Nov 24 - William J. Clinton and the Post Cold War World (119 pages)

Required:

Fred Greenstein, The Presidential Difference, pp. 173-88

Robert Hunter, John Goshko, and James Kitfield in David Abshire, ed. Triumphs

and Tragedies of the Modern Presidency, pp. 173-77, 226-31, 235-42.

John Harris, The Survivor, pp. 120-41, 191-201, 400-24.

Bill Clinton, My Life, pp. 55-64, 148-161

Dec 1 - Final Exam