"In clean, well-paced prose, Dawley sets the successes--and failures--of early American progressives .
. . against the backdrop of a complicated postwar world....This is an especially timely book, given the tense state
of world affairs."
--Publishers Weekly
"Changing the World is an ambitious and accessible book....It will provide students, scholars, and the wider
public with an engaging, wide-ranging synthesis of a complex and pivotal period."
--Michael E. Latham, Reviews in American History
"One does not have to agree with all of the author's points to find this a stimulating, thoughtful examination
of 20th-century progressivism."
--Choice
"Bancroft Prize-winning historian, Alan Dawley has once again produced a tour de force....Vividly written,
this book is filled with fresh insights on the Progressive Era, from its politics and diplomacy to its architecture."
--John Whiteclay Chambers II, Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography
Publisher Web Site, July 2005
Summary
In May of 1919, women from around the world gathered in Zurich, Switzerland, and proclaimed, "We dedicate
ourselves to peace!" Just months after the end of World War I, the Womens International League for Peace and
Freedom--a group led by American progressive Jane Addams and comprising veteran campaigners for social reform--knew
that a peaceful world was essential to their ongoing quest for social and economic justice.
Alan Dawley tells the story of American progressives during the decade spanning World War I and its aftermath.
He shows how they laid the foundation for progressive internationalism in their efforts to improve the world both
at home and abroad. Unlike other accounts of the progressive movement--and of American politics in general--this
book fuses social and international history. Dawley shows how interventions in Latin America and Europe affected
domestic plans for social reform and civic engagement, and he depicts internal battles among progressives between
unabashed imperialists like Theodore Roosevelt and their implacable opponents like Robert La Follette. He draws
a contrast between Woodrow Wilson's use of force in exporting American ideals and Addams's more cosmopolitan pursuit
of economic justice and world peace. In discussing the debate over the League of Nations within the context of
turbulent domestic affairs, Dawley brings keen insight into that complicated moment in American history.
In striking and original ways, Dawley brings together domestic and world affairs to argue that American progressivism
cannot be understood apart from its international context. Focusing on world-historical events of empire, revolution,
war, and peace, he shows how American reformers invented a new politics built around progressive internationalism.
Changing the World retrieves the progressive tradition in American politics and makes it available to contemporary
debates. The book speaks to anyone seeking to be both a good citizen within the nation and a good citizen of today's
troubled world.