Of Highways, Turntables, and Mirror Mazes: Metaphors of Americanisation in the History of American Philanthropy

Abstract

This exploratory essay reflects on recent scholarship on twentieth-century European–American relations that has used the concept of “Americanisation,” particularly with regard to cultural transfers. The essay analyses how concepts of Americanisation have changed over time and uses the historiography of American philanthropy abroad to illustrate these changes. Whilst most scholars who apply the concept now view Americanisation as a two-way process which entails selective adaptation and transformation, there are subtle differences in emphasis. The essay traces these in the use of metaphors. Two metaphors have achieved prominence recently, the highway and the turntable. Testing both against empirical material taken from the transnational history of American foundations, the article then introduces a third metaphor, the mirror maze, which brings out a neglected dimension, the question of reflexivity.

Acknowledgments

I would like to express my thanks to Daniel Laqua and John A. Thompson for their helpful advice and to Sarah Snyder for commenting on an earlier draft. Research funding from the Oslo Contemporary International History Network is gratefully acknowledged.

Notes

1. Thomas W. Zeiler, “The Diplomatic History Bandwagon: A State of the Field,” Journal of American History, 95/4 (2009), pp. 1053–73; for a similar but more reserved British perspective see David Reynolds, “International History, the Cultural Turn and the Diplomatic Twitch,” Cultural and Social History, 3/1(2006), pp. 75–91.

2. Letter to the Editor by Cody J. Foster, Passport, 43/1 (2012), pp. 48–49; Karl W. Schweizer and Matt J. Schumann, “The Revitalization of Diplomatic History: Renewed Reflections,” Diplomacy & Statecraft, 19/2(2008), pp. 149–186, especially 170.

3. On the use of the term in different historical subfields see Philipp Gassert, “Amerikanismus, Antiamerikanismus, Amerikanisierung: Neue Literatur zur Sozial- und Kulturgeschichte des amerikanischen Einflusses in Deutschland und Europa,” Archiv für Sozialgeschichte, 39(1999), pp. 531–61; for recent research see e.g. David W. Ellwood, The Shock of America: Europe and the Challenge of the Century (Oxford, 2012).

4. Note that this amalgamation had a distinctly Anglo–American flavour. William T. Stead, The Americanization of the World (New York, London, 1901).

5. Ibid., p. 332.

6. Ellwood, Shock of America, pp. 33–60; Harm G. Schröter, “Economic Culture and its Transfer: An Overview of the Americanisation of the European Economy, 1900–2005,” European Review of History: Revue européenne d'histoire, 15/4(2008), pp. 331–44.

7. Kathleen Burk, “The Marshall Plan: Filling in Some of the Blanks,” Contemporary European History, 10/2(2001), pp. 267–94.

8. Hans Krabbendam and Giles Scott-Smith, eds., The Cultural Cold War in Western Europe, 1945–1960, special issue of Intelligence and National Security, 18/2(2003).

9. Petra Goedde, “The Globalization of American Culture,” in Karen Halttunen, ed., A Companion to American Cultural History (Oxford, 2008), pp. 246–62; on cultural imperialism as a paradigm for Americanisation see Uta G. Poiger, “Beyond ‘Modernization' and ‘Colonization',” Diplomatic History, 23/1(1999), pp. 45–56.

10. Robert F. Arnove, “Introduction,” in Philanthropy and Cultural Imperialism: The Foundations at Home and Abroad, ed. Robert F. Arnove (Boston, 1980), p. 1.

11. Merle Curti, American Philanthropy Abroad: A History (New Brunswick, NJ, 1963).

12. Frank Costigliola, Awkward Dominion: American Political, Economic, and Cultural Relations with Europe, 1919–1933 (Ithaca, NY, London, 1984), p. 168, emphasis added.

13. Goedde, “Globalization of American Culture,” p. 254; see also Rob Kroes, “American Empire and Cultural Imperialism: A View from the Receiving End,” Diplomatic History, 23/3 (1999), pp. 463–77

14. Rob Kroes, If You've Seen one You've Seen the Mall: Europeans and American Mass Culture (Urbana, IL, Chicago, IL, 1996), p. xi.

15. Reinhold Wagnleitner (trans. Diana M. Wolf, Coca-Colonization and the Cold War: The Cultural Mission of the United States in Austria After the Second World War (Chapel Hill, NC, 1994); see also Richard H. Pells, Not Like Us: How Europeans Loved, Hated, and Transformed American Culture Since World War II (New York, 1997); on American cultural imports in the Soviet bloc see Uta G. Poiger, Jazz, Rock, and Rebels: Cold War Politics and American Culture in a Divided Germany (Berkeley, CA, 2000).

16. Daniel Rodgers, Atlantic Crossings: Social Policies in a Progressive Age (Cambridge, MA, 1998).

17. Emily Rosenberg, “Missions to the World: Philanthropy Abroad,” in Lawrence J. Friedman and Mark D. McGarvie, eds., Charity, Philanthropy and Civility in American History (Cambridge, 2003), pp. 241–57, here 242.

18. Steven Palmer, “Central American Encounters with Rockefeller Public Health, 1914–1921,” in Gilbert M. Joseph, Catherine C. LeGrand, and Ricardo D. Salvatore, eds., Close Encounters of Empire: Writing the Cultural History of U.S.–Latin American Relations (Durham, NC, 1998), pp. 311–32.

19. Brigitte Mazon, Aux origines de l'École des hautes études en sciences sociales: le rôle du mécénat américain, 1920–1960 (Paris, 1988). For other studies on American philanthropy in Europe, see Giuliana Gemelli (trans. Brigitte Pasquet and Béatrice Propetto Marzi), Fernand Braudel (Paris, 1995); Giuliana Gemelli, ed., The Ford Foundation and Europe (1950's–1970's): Cross-Fertilization of Learning in Social Science and Management (Brussels, 1998); Giuliana Gemelli, Jean-François Picard, and William H. Schneider, eds., Managing Medical Research in Europe: The Role of the Rockefeller Foundation (1920–1950's) (Bologna, 1999); Giuliana Gemelli, ed., American Foundations and Large-Scale Research: Construction and Transfer of Knowledge (Bologna, 2001).

20. Giuliana Gemelli, ed., The “Unacceptables”: American Foundations and Refugee Scholars between the Two Wars and After (Brussels, 2000); Christian Fleck, Transatlantische Bereicherungen: Zur Erfindung der empirischen Sozialforschung (Frankfurt a. M., 2007).

21. Alfred E. Eckes, Jr. and Thomas W. Zeiler, Globalization and the American Century (Cambridge, 2003).

22. Thomas Bender, A Nation Among Nations: America's Place in World History (New York, 2006).

23. Thomas Bender, ed., Rethinking American History in a Global Age (Berkeley, CA, 2002); Jessica Gienow-Hecht, ed., Decentering America (New York, 2007); Ian Tyrrell, Transnational Nation: United States History in Global Perspective since 1789 (Basingstoke, 2007).

24. Goedde, “Globalization of American Culture,” p. 256.

25. Bernhard Rieger, “From People's Car to New Beetle: The Transatlantic Journeys of the Volkswagen Beetle,” Journal of American History, 97/1(2010), pp. 91–115.

26. Soma Hewa and Darwin Stapleton, eds., Globalization, Philanthropy and Civil Society: Toward a New Political Culture in the Twenty-First Century (New York, 2005).

27. Inderjeet Parmar, Foundations of the American Century: The Ford, Carnegie and Rockefeller Foundations in the Rise of American Power (New York, 2012); John Krige and Helke Rausch, eds., American Foundations and the Coproduction of World Order in the Twentieth Century (Göttingen, 2012).

28. For a critical view on metaphors in historical writing see Robert A. Nisbet, Social Change and History (New Brunswick, NJ, London, 1969).

29. Volker R. Berghahn, “The Debate on ‘Americanization' Among Economic and Cultural Historians,” Cold War History, 10/1(2010), pp. 107–30.

30. Ludovic Tournès, Sciences de l'homme et politique. Les fondations philanthropiques américaines en France au Xxe siècle (Paris, 2011).

31. Berghahn, “Debate on ‘Americanization',” pp. 110, 119–21; see also idem., “Commentary—Turntable or Transatlantic Two-Lane Turnpikes?” in John Krige and Helke Rausch, eds., American Foundations and the Coproduction of World Order in the Twentieth Century (Göttingen, 2012), pp. 261–70.

32. Volker R. Berghahn, America and the Intellectual Cold Wars in Europe: Shepard Stone between Philanthropy, Academy, and Diplomacy (Princeton, NJ, 2001).

33. Arthur H. Buffinton, The Institute of Politics at Williamstown, Massachusetts: Its First Decade (Williamstown, MA, 1931); Harry A. Garfield, Lost Visions (Boston, MA, 1944), pp. 5–7, 38–39.

34. Institutes similar to Williamstown were established, inter alia, in Pasadena, Denver and at the University of Virginia. Tracy B. Kittredge, adviser on the Rockefeller Foundation's European fellowship programme in the social sciences, “International Relations Program,” 7 March 1941, RF [Rockefeller Foundation Archives, Rockefeller Archive Center, Sleepy Hollow, NY], RG 3, series 910, box 7, folder 66.

35. Otto Hoetzsch, “Außenpolitische Bildungsarbeit an den Universitäten Nordamerikas und Deutschlands,” in Wilhelm Arntz, ed., Außenpolitische Studien: Festgabe für Otto Köbner (Stuttgart, 1930), pp. 7–29; see also Carlo Sforza, “Williamstown: impressions américaines,” L'Esprit International, No. 4(1927), pp. 519–25.

36. Katharina Rietzler, “Philanthropy, Peace Research and Revisionist Politics: Rockefeller and Carnegie Support for the Study of International Relations in Weimar Germany,” Bulletin of the German Historical Institute, Washington D.C., Supplement 5 (2008), pp. 61–79.

37. Borchard, (Professor of Law, Yale), to Clark (Undersecretary of State), 11 April 1929, RG 59 (National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD) 811.43 - Research Institute of International Law/1; Paolo J.B. Ramos, “The Role of the Yale Institute of International Studies in the Construction of the United States National Security Ideology, 1935–1951” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Manchester, 2003).

38. Inderjeet Parmar, “American Hegemony, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Rise of Academic International Relations in the United States,” in Nicolas Guilhot, ed., The Invention of International Relations Theory: The Rockefeller Foundation, and the 1954 Conference on Theory (New York, 2011), pp. 182–209.

39. Moore to Hutchins (Dean of Yale Law School) (copy), 13 April 1929, RG 59, 811.43 - Research Institute of International Law/1.

40. Ibid.

41. Rietzler, “Philanthropy, Peace Research and Revisionist Politics,” pp. 71–74.

42. Gunn to Day, 22 June 1932, RF, RG 1, series 100, box 105, folder 952.

43. This was much resented within the Council. See Walter Mallory-Sydnor Walker correspondence, Council on Foreign Relations Archives, Seeley G. Mudd Library, Princeton, N.J., box 36, folder 4.

44. T. B. Millar, “Commonwealth Institutes of International Affairs,” International Journal, 33/1(1977–1978), pp. 5–27; Paul Williams, “A Commonwealth of Knowledge: Empire, Intellectuals and the Chatham House Project, 1919–1939,” International Relations, 17/1(2003), pp. 35–58.

45. For an overview, see F. Chalmers-Wright, The International Studies Conference: Origins, Functions, Organisation (Paris, 1937), pp. 37–50; International Institute of Intellectual Cooperation, L'Institut International de Coopération Intellectuelle, 1925–1946 (Paris, 1946), pp. 249–316.

46. Van Sickle to Day, 8 June 1933, RF, RG 1, series 100, box 105, folder 952.

47. Resolution RF 37117, 1 December 1937, Ibid.; memorandum “JVS, EED conversations at Chatham House, London, May 22, 1934,” 22 May 1934, RF, RG 1.1, series 401, box 77, folder 1014. On Rockefeller support for the International Studies Conference, see Katharina Rietzler, “Experts for Peace: Structures and Motivations of Philanthropic Internationalism in the United States and Europe,” in Daniel Laqua, eds., Internationalism Reconfigured: Transnational Ideas and Movements between the World Wars (London, 2011), pp. 45–65, especially pp. 54–57.

48. Rockefeller Foundation resolutions 35136, 27 September 1935; 38046, 6 April 1938, RF, RG 1.1, series 500, box 20, folder 204; Memorandum “Comité d'Etudes des Problèmes du Pacifique,” May 1936; Kittredge to Walker, 24 August 1936; Kittredge to Walker, “Islamic Studies – Centre d'Etudes de Politique Entrangère, Paris,” 7 July 1938, all RF, RG 1.1, series 500, box 20, folder 205; for some basic information see A. Demangeon, “Centre d'études de politique étrangère,” Annales de géographie no. 258 (1936), pp. 664–668; on Sweden see Bjørn Arne Steine, “Scandinavian Foreign Policy Elites and their Networks, 1900–1939” (paper presented at the Nordic Summer School in Contemporary History, St. Petersburg, 12–17 August 2007).

49. Michael Werner and Bénédicte Zimmermann, “Beyond Comparison: Histoire Croisée and the Challenge of Reflexivity,” History and Theory, 45/1(2006), pp. 30–50.

50. Tocqueville first described the American propensity to form voluntary associations in the 1830s. Historians still interpret philanthropy as a vital component of the American national character, most recently Olivier Zunz, Philanthropy in America: A History (Princeton, NJ, 2011). Parmar assigns philanthropic foundations a pivotal position in the United States' rise to global hegemony in the twentieth century in his Foundations of the American Century.

51. Charities Aid Foundation, “International Comparisons of Charitable Giving,” Briefing Paper (November 2006): www.cafonline.org/pdf/International%20Comparisons %20of%20Charitable%20Giving.pdf; for a comparison between European and American attitudes to charity and philanthropy, see William B. Cohen, “Epilogue: The European Comparison,” in Frieman and McGarvie, Charity, pp. 385–412; on Germany and the United States, see Thomas Adam, Simone Lässig, and Gabriele Lingelbach, eds., Stifter, Spender und Mäzene: USA und Deutschland im historischen Vergleich (Stuttgart, 2009).

52. Zunz, Philanthropy in America, p. 56.

53. Daniel R. Maul, “Appell an das Gewissen – Fridtjof Nansen und die Russische Hungerhilfe 1921–23,” Themenportal Europäische Geschichte (2011): http://www.europa.clio-online.de/2011/Article=519.

54. Emily Rosenberg, Spreading the American Dream: American Economic and Cultural Expansion, 1890–1945 (New York, 1982), p. 76. In this context, governmental intervention in humanitarian relief in the Second World War is also relevant. The President's War Relief Control Board took control of the image of the United States which was projected by relief agencies abroad, and pressured refugee relief organisations to change their names, e.g., from French Relief Fund to American Relief for France, and from Queen Wilhelmina Fund to American Relief for Holland. Zunz, Philanthropy in America, pp. 138–39.

55. A. Korsoonskaya to ARA, 30 March 1923, Spelman (Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial Archives, Rockefeller Archive Center, Sleepy Hollow, NY) series III, subseries 3, box 9, folder 106 (letters of appreciation from Russia).

56. Bertrand M. Patenaude, The Big Show in Bololand: The American Relief Expedition to Soviet Russia in the Famine of 1921 (Stanford, CA, 2002).

57. For similar dynamics in the field of urban development, see Thomas Adam, Buying Respectability: Philanthropy and Urban Society in Transnational Perspective, 1840s to 1930s (Bloomington, IN, 2009).

58. Memorandum “Conversations with Mr. R. Buell and Mr. Malcolm Davis, Paris, October 9 and 10, 1935,” 12 October 1935, RF, RG 1.1, series 100, box 5, folder 46.

59. Volker R. Berghahn, “Philanthropy and Diplomacy in the ‘American Century',” Diplomatic History, 23/3(1999), pp. 393–419, here 417.

60. Parmar, Foundations of the American Century, pp. 106–109; see also works reviewed in Berghahn, “Debate on ‘Americanization',” pp. 111–13.

61. Katharina Rietzler, “Before the Cultural Cold Wars: American Philanthropy and Cultural Diplomacy in the Interwar Years,” Historical Research, 84/223(2011), pp. 148–64.