Robert G. Kaufman is professor of public policy at Pepperdine University. He is the author of Henry M. Jackson: A Life in Politics (Washington) and In Defense of the Bush Doctrine (UPK).
In Dangerous Doctrine, political scientist Robert G. Kaufman argues that the forty-fourth president has indeed articulated a clear, consistent national security policy. Drawing on international relations theory and American diplomatic history, Kaufman presents a robust critique of the Obama Doctrine. He situates Obama's exercise of power within American strategic traditions such as neorealism, classical realism, declinism, liberal internationalism, and moral democratic realism. Kaufman contends that President Obama has imprudently abandoned the venerable tradition of muscular internationalism employed by most of his predecessors since the end of World War II. Focusing on the pivotal regions of Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, Kaufman demonstrates how current executive branch leadership threatens the United States' role as superpower, weakening its ability to spread democracy and defeat threats to geopolitical order.
