As Others See Us: The Causes and Consequences of Foreign Perceptions of America

Extract

As Others See Us: The Causes and Consequences of Foreign Perceptions of America, Stephen Brooks, Peterborough ON: Broadview, 2006, pp. 178.

As its title indicates, As Other See Us seeks to explain how the United States of America is perceived abroad. Stephen Brooks argues that while it is more important than ever to understand how foreigners view America, academics and policymakers alike have tended to do a poor job of it, because they overemphasize what America does and underemphasize what America “is seen to be” (16). In other words, he suggests that foreign interpretations of America are at least as important as American actions or policy. For Brooks, perceptions matter a lot.