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The Pros And Cons Of American Exceptionalism

1650 Words7 Pages

“I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism (President Barack Obama Democrat).” The word exceptional means one of a kind, unique and being exceptional, but how exceptional is the United States to this day? The way the United States was created and the way they distributed freedom, such as freedom of religion and speech, once made them exceptional. Yet, over the last 241 years of exceptionalism, our uniqueness and our prosperity that we once had, has decreased. This is due to social issues, economic difficulties and unjust political power. So, although the system in which America was created on is very unique, this does not imply that America …show more content…

America may not be the greatest country in the world, but it has some aspects that make it exceptional. One of the aspects being America's economy, which is the largest, in nominal terms, in the world. America’s economy represents 22% of global GDP and 17% of gross world product. The U.S. dollar makes up the most frequently used currency in international transactions, due to the Bretton Woods System and the 1944 Agreement, which used the U.S. dollar as the global currency and taking the world off of the gold standard.The United States is also the world's most prominent reserve currency. Furthermore, the U.S. has a plethora of natural resources, including copper, lead, phosphate, iron, nickel, petroleum, nature gas, timber, arable land and coal, holding the largest coal reserves which accounts for 27% of the world’s total. These natural resources have helped positively impact the growth of the American economy during the Industrial Revolution. Together with China, it is the largest trading nation in the world, as well as the world’s largest manufacturer, representing a fifth of the global manufacturing output. Moreover, The United States has the world’s largest and most influential financial market. The New York Stock Exchange is the world’s largest stock exchange by market capitalization. The United States has the largest consumer market in the world. So in conclusion, although not the greatest country in the world, America's economy is fairly

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Henry Ford, one of the most notorious successful Americans that invented the assembly line, once said “Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success”. The United States of America was founded on immigration which today, there is an extensive diversity of cultures inhabiting America which would leave people to believe that the idea of it being a self-governing country is an outrageous idea but it in fact worked. America is able to succeed despite being an “improbable idea” by how the country is able to unite and recover quickly after times of hardship and how the citizens are able to tolerate and coexist with other despite their differences. America is able to succeed despite being an “Improbable

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Alfred Bester says that there are two threads to his view of American Exceptionalism: one based on Seymour Martin Lipset and another on Frederick Jackson Turner.1 He says that Martin Lipset said that the United States is exceptional because it came out of a "revolutionary event" that set up America as "the first new nation" and built a vision for the future on the ideology that caused them to break with England in the first place.2 He says that Turner thought that because the U.S. had a lot of unclaimed land that regular people could own land and not have to depend on anyone else. This means that there wouldn’t be an aristocracy and that small land-owners stuck to the values of the Revolution.3 The combination of what Lipset and Turner said

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American Exceptionalism was coined by Alexis de Tocqueville in his book Democracy in America. To illustrate how the American way of thought is superior to the other ways of the world, Tocqueville expresses that the American way of thought is distinctively unique and special. This distinction is exemplified through liberty, egalitarianism, individualism, populism, and Laissez-Faire Economics. These qualities prove America’s exceptionality and difference from other countries. Although American Exceptionalism originated in the early 1800s, the idyllic values Tocqueville paints in his book can be seen throughout American history.

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