Military Intelligence and Social Science Knowledge: Global Conflict, Territorial Control and the Birth of Area Studies during WW II

• Type of Material: Conference Paper
• Authors: David L Nugent, Emory University
• Language: English
• Date: 2007-07-14
• Publisher: Emory University Libraries
• Publication Version: Final Published Version
• Copyright Statement: 2007 SSRC
• License: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommerical-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported
• Final Published Version (URL): http://ssrc-cdn1.s3.amazonaws.com/crmuploads/new_publication_3/%7B4CE2A5DD-2E5C-DE11-BD80-001CC477EC70%7D.pdf
• Title of Journal or Parent Work: Producing Knowledge on World Regions: Issues of Internationalization and Interdisiplinarity
• Conference or Event Name: SSRC Workshop
• Volume: 6
• Keywords: American century; 20th century; WWII; WWI; social science; knowledge; world's leading power; Neil Smith; empire formation; Giovanni Arrighi; imperial domains
• Research Categories: History, Modern; Political Science, General; Sociology, Social Structure and Development

Abstract

This paper is part of a larger project that seeks to understand the conditions of possibility of different forms of social science knowledge. The time frame is what Giovanni Arrighi (1994) has called “the long 20th century” and what Neil Smith (2003) refers to as “the American century”—the period from the late 19th to the early 21st century, during which the US first rose and then fell from the position of the world’s leading power. In the larger project, I suggest that the social sciences in the US are inextricably linked to the process of empire formation, and that they may be divided into three periods, each of which corresponds to a shift in the relationship between the US and its imperial domains. These three periods are: (1) The Formation of Empire (circa 1900-1940; in particular, the period between WW I and WW II); (2) The Consolidation of Empire (circa 1945-1975); and (3) The Reconstitution of Empire (circa 1975-the Present).