American Foreign Policy: Progressive Imperialism

The Hillsdale College Online Courses Podcast

Hillsdale College

Government, Society & Culture, Education, History, Courses

4.6 • 621 Ratings

🗓️ 10 September 2025

⏱️ 32 minutes

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Summary

On this episode of The Hillsdale College Online Courses Podcast, Jeremiah and Juan discuss the birth of American empire before introducing Michael Anton.

We often treat foreign policy as a mystery that can only be understood by an enlightened few who have committed their lives to understanding the complexities of international life. This view is dangerous because it encourages citizens to ignore a critical aspect of American political life that it’s our duty to understand. And it’s false because the basics of foreign policy are commonsense and a joy to learn. For the Founders, the basic premise of foreign policy is simple—we must make every decision with a view towards securing the equal, natural rights of American citizens. This understanding requires that America’s leaders remain accountable to the people, and it places essential limits on our interventions abroad. Yet, for over a century, this traditional understanding of American foreign policy has been challenged by new and more ambitious doctrines that argue for increased American involvement and leadership abroad.

In the Spanish-American War, America intervened in the internal affairs of a European colony in the Western Hemisphere. As a result of the war, America acquired territories that it ruled with no intention of admitting to statehood, fundamentally changing the nature of American foreign policy.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Hillsdale College Online Courses podcast. I am Jeremiah Regan.
0:13.4	And I'm Juan Davalos. We're back with American Foreign Policy. Lecture number three, progressive imperialism.
0:19.6	With the advent of the progressive era, we see a shift in
0:22.6	American domestic policy that also flows into American foreign policy. And the idea that
0:28.2	government's primary purpose is to protect the lives, liberty, and property of American
0:32.3	citizens, and that it ought not to interfere in the policies of other nations is replaced by an idea
0:38.4	that humanity is improving, civilization is developing, and we need to do everything we can,
0:43.9	national boundaries, not regarded, to further the progress of humanity.
0:50.0	That's right. In this course, we cover all these topics more briefly, but if you'd like to go
0:55.3	into a much deeper dive onto the ideas of the progressives, what motivated their ideas, and how
1:03.1	those ideas play out in American history starting in the progressive era, we have a whole course
1:08.3	dedicated to the ideas of progressivism, the American Left,
1:11.7	from liberalism to despotism, taught by Professor Slack. That's available in podcast form,
1:17.8	or you can watch the course at Hillsdale.edu slash course. That gives you access to quizzes
1:23.5	and all the supporting documentation as well. So enroll in American Left from liberalism to despotism at Hillsdale.edu slash course.
1:33.7	And let's turn to lecture number three of American foreign policy, progressive imperialism. In this lecture, we're going to cover a much shorter time period, roughly the period between
1:49.9	1898 and the outbreak, or at least through the end of World War I, but not the aftermath
1:58.4	of World War I. We'll explain why shortly in what is to come.
2:02.6	This is a short but eventful period in American foreign policy. It's a period of great change.
2:09.3	And in order to understand the change, you first have to understand the principles or the
2:14.4	thought or the theorizing behind that change.
2:23.6	And to understand that, you have to understand the progressive era, and I mean progressive with a capital P.
	...

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