Wilsonian Idealism: War and Peace in World War I

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-597-3_50How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Woodrow Wilson; Idealism; World War I; U.S. Foreign Policy; Liberal Internationalism

Abstract

During World War I, U.S. foreign policy underwent a series of significant shifts — from strict neutrality to pro-Allied partiality, and finally to full military intervention. Whether adopting “war” or “peace,” all these policy changes were fundamentally rooted in Woodrow Wilson's international political idealism. This article traces the evolution of U.S. policy across three distinct phases: the impartial neutrality period (1914-1915), the pro-Allied tilt (1915-1917), and the interventionist phase (1917-1918). Drawing on archival materials and recent historiography, it argues that Wilson's idealism was neither naive moralism nor a calculated disguise for imperialist expansion, but rather a coherent strategic framework that fused liberal internationalist principles with a pragmatic assessment of American national interests. While the ultimate failure of Wilsonianism at the Paris Peace Conference and the Senate's rejection of the League of Nations marked a significant setback, Wilson's vision fundamentally reshaped the trajectory of American foreign policy and continues to inform contemporary debates over the U.S. role in global order. Understanding this paradox at the heart of Wilsonian idealism — its simultaneous embrace of universal moral principles and particularistic national interests — is essential for comprehending the deep structure of modern American foreign policy.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Sui Zhang
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/07/13
TI  - Wilsonian Idealism: War and Peace in World War I
BT  - Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Language and Cultural Communication (ICLCC 2026)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 468
EP  - 474
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-597-3_50
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-597-3_50
ID  - Zhang2026
ER  -