The American Civilizing Process

Prologue:.

1 ‘American Civilization’.

The Founding Fathers as Philosophes.

‘Progress’ and ‘American Civilization’.

Fugitive government and ‘American Civilization’.

‘Human nature’ and ‘American Civilization’.

European absolutism and ‘American Civilization’.

Conclusion.

2 ‘Fellow Americans’ and Outsiders.

Others: the Native Americans.

Others: the Blacks.

Others: the Europeans.

Anti-Americanism: How the outsiders view the established.

Conclusion.

3 American Manners under Scrutiny.

American manners books.

Americans observed.

Technology, hygiene and deference.

Victorianism.

Informalization.

Conclusion.

4 American Aristocracies.

The colonial gentry.

The South: American Junkers?.

The North: Working upper classes.

From cumulative to dispersed inequalities?.

A significant absence: an aristocracy of office.

Conclusion.

5 The Market Society.

The constraints of the market.

The constraints of organization.

Conclusion.

6 Violence and Aggressiveness.

Long-term trends in violence.

Is America peculiarly violent?.

Capital punishment.

Conclusion.

7 And wilderness is paradise enow: From Settlements to Independence.

Autarky, but not terra nullius.

Population.

Early phases of the American state formation process.

Conclusion.

8 Westward Look the Land is Bright: From Frontier to Empire.

Manifest destiny and latent dynamics: a necessary theoretical digression.

The balance between the planned and the unplanned in US territorial expansion.

‘Sovereignty’ as a function of power ratios.

The Frontier.

Beyond manifest destiny: the beginnings of an American empire.

Conclusion.

9 Integration Struggles.

Urbanization and resentment of the city.

Immigration.

Growth of the means of ruling.

The breakdown: the Civil War and its aftermath.

A central ambivalence: the armed forces.

Conclusion.

10 The Curse of the American Dream.

Equality and inequality in America.

The American welfare state.

Social mobility in America.

Conclusion: Upwards identification, not mutual identification?.

11 Involvement, Detachment and American Religiosity.

Fantasy and the growth of knowledge.

American religion in long-term perspective.

Some explanations.

Odd one out - Europe or the USA?.

Conclusion.

12 America and Humanity as a Whole.

‘American Social Character’: Diminishing contrasts, increasing varieties.

The problem of the American homo clausus: the We-I balance.

Market fundamentalism and diminishing foresight.

Functional de-democratization.

The American Empire.

Conclusion: path dependency in America and the world.

Notes.

Bibliography.

Index