The Puritan Culture of America's Military

The Puritan Culture of America's Military
Author: Ronald Lorenzo
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 252
Release: 2016-02-24
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1317018486

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This book explores Puritanism and its continuing influence on U.S. and military law in the Global War on Terror, exploring connections between Puritanism and notions of responsibility in relation to military crimes, superstitious practices within the military, and urges for revenge. Engaging with the work of figures such as Durkheim, Fauconnet and Weber, it draws on primary data gathered through participation and observation at the U.S. Army courts-martial following events at Abu Ghraib, Operation Iron Triangle, the Baghdad canal killings and a war crimes case in Afghanistan, to show how Puritan cultural habits color and shape both American military actions and the ways in which these actions are perceived by the American public. A theoretically sophisticated examination of the cultural tendencies that shape military conduct and justice in the context of a contemporary global conflict, The Puritan Culture of America’s Military will appeal to scholars across the social sciences with interests in social theory and sociology, cultural studies, politics and international relations and military studies.

Miles Standish, the Puritan Captain

Miles Standish, the Puritan Captain
Author: John S. C. Abbott
Publisher: Good Press
Total Pages: 232
Release: 2019-11-27
Genre: Fiction
ISBN:

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Miles Standish, the Puritan Captain is a historical biography written by John S.C. Abbott. Standish was an English military officer who accompanied the Pilgrims on the Mayflower and played a substantial role in the early colonization of modern-day Massachusetts.

Puritan Military Justice

Puritan Military Justice
Author: Ronald Lorenzo
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2012
Genre:
ISBN:

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Exploring Puritanical cultural habits in the 21st century American military, the following study focuses on U.S. Army courts-martial in the Global War on Terrorism. The study uses Emile Durkheim's original sociological interpretation of crime and deviance. That interpretation is linked with responsibility as described by Durkheim's follower Paul Fauconnet in Responsibility: A Study in Sociology ([1928] 1978) and with a new cultural reading of Max Weber's The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism ([1905] 1976). The study is an inductive, descriptive examination of the Puritanical aspects of American military culture based on its treatment of acts labeled as deviant and criminal in the Global War on Terrorism. Four sets of war crimes are included in the study: Abu Ghraib (which occurred in Iraq in 2004), Operation Iron Triangle (which occurred in Iraq in 2006), the Baghdad canal killings (which occurred in Iraq in 2007), and the Maywand District killings (which occurred in Afghanistan in 2010). My data include primary data collected through participation and observation as a consultant for courts-martial related to all the cases except Abu Ghraib. Records of trial, investigation reports, charge sheets, sworn statements, and other documentation are also included in the study as secondary data sources. The study illuminates how unconscious, Puritan cultural habits color and shape both military actions and their perceptions. I explore Puritanism and its influence on military law, responsibility, revenge, "magic" (in its sociological sense), and narcissism. The study concludes with observations and recommendations for changes in U.S. military law.

The Puritan Gift

The Puritan Gift
Author: Kenneth Hopper
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 360
Release: 2007-02-23
Genre: History
ISBN: 0857715976

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Where does the Protestant work ethic come from? And how did America achieve such dominance in management for so long? "The Puritan Gift" traces the origins and the characteristics of American managerial culture which, in the course of three centuries, turned a group of small colonies into the greatest economic and political power on earth. It argues that the drive, energy and acceptance of innovation, competition, growth and social mobility, all of which lie at the root of America's management culture, have their origins in the discipline and ethos of America's first wave of European immigrants: the Puritans.And, the authors warn, as Americans distance themselves from the core values which produced their business and economic successes during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, they put their future prosperity and security at risk. This is an original exploration of the dramatic and far-reaching consequences of the Puritans' 'gift' to America - the ethos which produced the early success of America and what came to be known as the American dream.

U.S. Strategic Culture and the Puritan Tradition

U.S. Strategic Culture and the Puritan Tradition
Author: Emily K. Beckett
Publisher:
Total Pages: 198
Release: 2009
Genre: Puritans
ISBN:

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Strategic culture is a vitally important, yet overlooked research program within strategic studies. Too often policymakers fail to consider the strategic culture of other nations as well as that of their own nation before making decisions. This failure often leads to conflict within international relations. This study shows that religion, specifically the Puritan tradition of seventeenth century American, is the main source of U.S. strategic culture. The Puritan tradition has influenced four major elements of modern U.S. strategic culture -- American exceptionalism, the "can do" mentality, unlimited aims in military operations, and the belief that war is both abnormal and evil behavior. These elements in turn have manifested themselves in U.S. applications of force around the world. This study argues that because of the influence of the Puritan religious tradition in U.S. strategic culture, the United States is not solely prone to uses of military force which conform to secular considerations of realpolitik. Rather, the United States demonstrates its religious influence by engaging in uses of military force that are either humanitarian or crusade-like in nature. Understanding strategic culture provides valuable insight into the mindset, reasoning, and decision-making of oneself, allies, and adversaries alike.

Puritanism: A Very Short Introduction

Puritanism: A Very Short Introduction
Author: Francis J. Bremer
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 138
Release: 2009-07-24
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0199740879

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Written by a leading expert on the Puritans, this brief, informative volume offers a wealth of background on this key religious movement. This book traces the shaping, triumph, and decline of the Puritan world, while also examining the role of religion in the shaping of American society and the role of the Puritan legacy in American history. Francis J. Bremer discusses the rise of Puritanism in the English Reformation, the struggle of the reformers to purge what they viewed as the corruptions of Roman Catholicism from the Elizabethan church, and the struggle with the Stuart monarchs that led to a brief Puritan triumph under Oliver Cromwell. It also examines the effort of Puritans who left England to establish a godly kingdom in America. Bremer examines puritan theology, views on family and community, their beliefs about the proper relationship between religion and public life, the limits of toleration, the balance between individual rights and one's obligation to others, and the extent to which public character should be shaped by private religious belief. About the Series: Combining authority with wit, accessibility, and style, Very Short Introductions offer an introduction to some of life's most interesting topics. Written by experts for the newcomer, they demonstrate the finest contemporary thinking about the central problems and issues in hundreds of key topics, from philosophy to Freud, quantum theory to Islam.

Heavenly Merchandize

Heavenly Merchandize
Author: Mark Valeri
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 357
Release: 2014-01-05
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0691162174

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Focusing on the economic culture of colonial New England, Heavenly Merchandize views commerce through the eyes of four generations of Boston merchants, drawing upon their personal letters, diaries, business records, and sermon notes to reveal how merchants built a modern form of exchange out of profound transitions in the puritan understanding of discipline, providence, and the meaning of New England. --From publisher's description.

Albion's Seed

Albion's Seed
Author: David Hackett Fischer
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 981
Release: 1991-03-14
Genre: History
ISBN: 019974369X

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This fascinating book is the first volume in a projected cultural history of the United States, from the earliest English settlements to our own time. It is a history of American folkways as they have changed through time, and it argues a thesis about the importance for the United States of having been British in its cultural origins. While most people in the United States today have no British ancestors, they have assimilated regional cultures which were created by British colonists, even while preserving ethnic identities at the same time. In this sense, nearly all Americans are "Albion's Seed," no matter what their ethnicity may be. The concluding section of this remarkable book explores the ways that regional cultures have continued to dominate national politics from 1789 to 1988, and still help to shape attitudes toward education, government, gender, and violence, on which differences between American regions are greater than between European nations.

The role of federal military forces in domestic disorders, 1877-1945

The role of federal military forces in domestic disorders, 1877-1945
Author: Clayton D. Laurie
Publisher: Government Printing Office
Total Pages: 500
Release: 1997-07-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780160882685

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CMH 30-15. Army Historical Series. 2nd of three planned volumes on the history of Army domestic support operations. This volume encompasses the period of the rise of industrial America with attendant social dislocation and strife. Major themes are: the evolution of the Army's role in domestic support operations; its strict adherence to law; and the disciplined manner in which it conducted these difficult and often unpopular operations.

Taking Haiti

Taking Haiti
Author: Mary A. Renda
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
Total Pages: 435
Release: 2004-07-21
Genre: History
ISBN: 0807862185

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The U.S. invasion of Haiti in July 1915 marked the start of a military occupation that lasted for nineteen years--and fed an American fascination with Haiti that flourished even longer. Exploring the cultural dimensions of U.S. contact with Haiti during the occupation and its aftermath, Mary Renda shows that what Americans thought and wrote about Haiti during those years contributed in crucial and unexpected ways to an emerging culture of U.S. imperialism. At the heart of this emerging culture, Renda argues, was American paternalism, which saw Haitians as wards of the United States. She explores the ways in which diverse Americans--including activists, intellectuals, artists, missionaries, marines, and politicians--responded to paternalist constructs, shaping new versions of American culture along the way. Her analysis draws on a rich record of U.S. discourses on Haiti, including the writings of policymakers; the diaries, letters, songs, and memoirs of marines stationed in Haiti; and literary works by such writers as Eugene O'Neill, James Weldon Johnson, Langston Hughes, and Zora Neale Hurston. Pathbreaking and provocative, Taking Haiti illuminates the complex interplay between culture and acts of violence in the making of the American empire.