Citation/Abstract

This thesis applies the Gramscian concept of organic crisis to examine the role of domestic problems in the formulation of U.S. foreign policy. By analyzing the social changes that preceded the Spanish American and Second Gulf Wars I argue that both were initiated by a crisis of social identities and a crisis of political legitimacy, or organic crisis. By applying critical discourse analysis this paper elucidates how the organic crises were ultimately overcome and a hegemonic political bloc was reconsolidated through a U.S. exceptionalist discourse. By examining the congruence between these cases I construct a causal model of the preceding socio-economic shifts that laid the foundation for the reunification of collective subjectivities through a discourse of national greatness and expansion; this discourse simultaneously legitimated imperialist policies, and overcome the organic crises.