From 1896 to 1924, motivated by fears of an irresistible wave of Asianmigration and the possibility that whites might be ousted from their positionof global domination, British colonists and white Americans instituted stringentlegislative controls on Chinese, Japanese, and South Asian immigration.Historians of these efforts typically stress similarity and collaborationbetween these movements, but in this compelling study, David C. Atkinsonhighlights the differences in these campaigns and argues that the main factorunifying these otherwise distinctive drives was the constant tensions theycaused. Drawing on documentary evidence from the United States, GreatBritain, Australia, Canada, South Africa, and New Zealand, Atkinson traceshow these exclusionary regimes drew inspiration from similar racial, economic,and strategic anxieties, but nevertheless developed idiosyncraticallyin the first decades of the twentieth century. Arguing that the so-called white man's burden was often white supremacyitself, Atkinson demonstrates how the tenets of absolute exclusion-meant to foster white racial, political, and economic supremacy-onlyinflamed dangerous tensions that threatened to undermine the BritishEmpire, American foreign relations, and the new framework of internationalcooperation that followed the First World War.

From 1896 to 1924, motivated by fears of an irresistible wave of Asianmigration and the possibility that whites might be ousted from their positionof global domination, British colonists and white Americans instituted stringentlegislative controls on Chinese, Japanese, and South Asian immigration.Historians of these efforts typically stress similarity and collaborationbetween these movements, but in this compelling study, David C. Atkinsonhighlights the differences in these campaigns and argues that the main factorunifying these otherwise distinctive drives was the constant tensions theycaused. Drawing on documentary evidence from the United States, GreatBritain, Australia, Canada, South Africa, and New Zealand, Atkinson traceshow these exclusionary regimes drew inspiration from similar racial, economic,and strategic anxieties, but nevertheless developed idiosyncraticallyin the first decades of the twentieth century. Arguing that the so-called white man's burden was often white supremacyitself, Atkinson demonstrates how the tenets of absolute exclusion-meant to foster white racial, political, and economic supremacy-onlyinflamed dangerous tensions that threatened to undermine the BritishEmpire, American foreign relations, and the new framework of internationalcooperation that followed the First World War.

Harvard University inaugurated a new research center devoted to international relations in 1958. The Center for International Affairs (CFIA) was founded by State Department Director of Policy Planning Staff, Robert R. Bowie, at the invitation of McGeorge Bundy, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Joined by Henry A. Kissinger, Edward S. Mason, and Thomas C. Schelling, Bowie quickly established the CFIA as a hub for studying international affairs in the United States. CFIA affiliates produced seminal work on arms control theory, development and modernization theory, and transatlantic relations.

Digging deep into unpublished material in the Harvard, MIT, and Kennedy Library archives, this book is punctuated with personal interviews with influential CFIA affiliates. Atkinson describes the relationship between foreign policy and scholarship during the Cold War and documents the maturation of a remarkable academic institution. Atkinson's history of the Center's first twenty-five years traces the institutional and intellectual development of a research center that, fifty years later, continues to facilitate innovative scholarship. He explores the connection between knowledge and politics, beginning with the Center's confident first decade and concluding with the second decade, which found the CFIA embroiled in Vietnam-era student protests.