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America in the Great War: The Rise of the War Welfare State
After such conflicts as World War II, Vietnam, and now the Persian Gulf, the First World War seems a distant, almost ancient event. It conjures up images of trenches, horse-drawn wagons, and old-fashioned wide-brimmed helmets--a conflict closer to the Civil War than to our own time. It
hardly seems an American war at all, considering we fought for scarcely over a year in a primarily European struggle. But, as Ronald Schaffer recounts in this fascinating new book, the Great War wrought a dramatic revolution in America, wrenching a diverse, unregulated, nineteenth-century society
into the modern age.
Ranging from the Oval Office to corporate boardroom, from the farmyard to the battlefield, America in the Great War details a nation reshaped by the demands of total war. Schaffer shows how the Wilson Administration used persuasion, manipulation, direct control, and the cooperation of private
industries and organizations to mobilize a freewheeling, individualist country. The result was a war-welfare state, imposing the federal government on almost every aspect of American life. He describes how it spread propaganda, enforced censorship, and stifled dissent. Political radicals,
religious pacifists, German-Americans, even average people who voiced honest doubts about the war suffered arrest and imprisonment. The government extended its control over most of the nation's economic life through a series of new agencies--largely filled with managers from private business, who
used their new positions to eliminate competition and secure other personal and corporate gains. Schaffer also details the efforts of scholars, scientists, workers, women, African- Americans, and of social, medical, and moral reformers, to use the war to advance their own agendas even as they
contributed to the drive for victory. And not the least important is his account of how soldiers reacted to the reality of war--both at the front lines and at the rear--revealing what brought the doughboys to the battlefield, and how they went through not only horror and disillusionment but felt a
fervent patriotism as well.
Some of the upheavals Schaffer describes were fleeting--as seen in the thousands of women who had to leave their wartime jobs when the boys came home--but others meant permanent change and set precedents for such future programs as the New Deal. By showing how American life would never be
the same again after the Armistice, America in the Great War lays a new foundation for understanding both the First World War and twentieth-century America.
hardly seems an American war at all, considering we fought for scarcely over a year in a primarily European struggle. But, as Ronald Schaffer recounts in this fascinating new book, the Great War wrought a dramatic revolution in America, wrenching a diverse, unregulated, nineteenth-century society
into the modern age.
Ranging from the Oval Office to corporate boardroom, from the farmyard to the battlefield, America in the Great War details a nation reshaped by the demands of total war. Schaffer shows how the Wilson Administration used persuasion, manipulation, direct control, and the cooperation of private
industries and organizations to mobilize a freewheeling, individualist country. The result was a war-welfare state, imposing the federal government on almost every aspect of American life. He describes how it spread propaganda, enforced censorship, and stifled dissent. Political radicals,
religious pacifists, German-Americans, even average people who voiced honest doubts about the war suffered arrest and imprisonment. The government extended its control over most of the nation's economic life through a series of new agencies--largely filled with managers from private business, who
used their new positions to eliminate competition and secure other personal and corporate gains. Schaffer also details the efforts of scholars, scientists, workers, women, African- Americans, and of social, medical, and moral reformers, to use the war to advance their own agendas even as they
contributed to the drive for victory. And not the least important is his account of how soldiers reacted to the reality of war--both at the front lines and at the rear--revealing what brought the doughboys to the battlefield, and how they went through not only horror and disillusionment but felt a
fervent patriotism as well.
Some of the upheavals Schaffer describes were fleeting--as seen in the thousands of women who had to leave their wartime jobs when the boys came home--but others meant permanent change and set precedents for such future programs as the New Deal. By showing how American life would never be
the same again after the Armistice, America in the Great War lays a new foundation for understanding both the First World War and twentieth-century America.
- GenresHistoryWorld War I
Hardcover
First published November 28, 1991
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
April 19, 2016
Having read on this subject quite a bit, this historiography does a few unique things. It presents some different information on the government bureaucracies as they related to business, labor, social and intellectual forces in the country during the war. We get a new perspective in that not everything was as compliant with the government's efforts as many have portrayed. Other topics such as justification for entering the war, the CPI efforts and the entire section on the battlefield experience were nothing new. I had to question why the battlefield experiences were even included considering the topic of the book.
February 13, 2011
The war left the United States as a stronger industrial nation, with increased wages, and an improvement in our standing throughout the world. Wilson’s hypocritical administration would not have gained my support during the war due to the racist turmoil in the country and the true winners being huge corporations and capitalist “big business” men. The scare tactics and charges against anyone who professed their “disloyalty” and the dishonesty of propaganda do not impress me.
June 20, 2012
Gives you a different insight into all the political and economically changes going on in American leading up to and through World War One, and not all of it is good for the American image
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews