Post-Westphalian America? Religious Conservatism and American Exceptionalism

In the sociology of globalization there has been much talk of porous borders, the effects of the international flow of labour, legal pluralism, the fragmentation of civil society by multiculturalism, and the decline of state sovereignty. America however appears, as ever, to be an exception. After 9/11 and the Patriot Act, there has been considerable emphasis on the securitization of society as a whole. The focus of national security is echoed in the agenda of the Republican Party which has opposed the naturalization of illegal migrants, supported a hawkish foreign policy, warned against the dangers of creeping Shari’a,  and rejected cuts to the Pentagon budget. Despite its ideological opposition to ‘big government’, the Tea Party has driven the GOP further to the right over national security and defence expenditure. While the rightward drift of Republican Christians is consistent with traditional millenarianism and Christian Zionism in America, it is reinforced by fears of American decline. Confronted by economic weakness foreign policy now faces a dilemma: isolationism versus confrontation. The foreign policy of Christian conservatism in the United States was famously captured by Sarah Palin in her recommendation ‘Let Allah sort it out’. Despite the cultural divisions, there is however little evidence of any post-Westphalian erosion of American state sovereignty.