美国国家身份的重塑与“西方”的形成

The Reshaping of America's National Identity and the Making of ‘the West’

自18世纪末期以来,美国人在界定自身文化身份时将欧洲视为美国的对立面和文化"他者",信奉的是"美国例外"论;在思考美国的地缘政治特性时,把欧洲视为威胁,奉行的是远离欧洲纷争和排斥欧洲影响的大陆主义。一战后,美国精英逐渐用突出美欧文化同源性和一致性的"西方文明"叙事取代"美国例外"论,用强调美欧休戚与共的"大西洋共同体"观念瓦解大陆主义,从而完成了美国文化与地缘政治身份的重塑。二战后,美国利用这一新的国家身份观念,把实施马歇尔计划和建立北约解释为保卫"西方文明"和"大西洋共同体"、从而维护美国自身文化存续与国家安全的重要步骤,成功地将美国与西欧凝聚成文化、意识形态与安全共同体,最终打造出一个新"西方"。

When defining their own cultural identity,the Americans had long embraced the American exceptionalism and considered Europe the cultural antithesis and the‘other’to America since the late 18 th century.In America s geopolitical imagination,Europe was regarded as the greatest threat to the American national security,impelling the U.S.to pursue the continentalism with an emphasis on keeping distance from the European disputes and repelling the European penetration into the Western Hemisphere.After the First World War,the American elites started a process of reshaping the America s self-understanding and completed the transformation of its cultural and geopolitical identity by substituting the American exceptionalism for the Western civilization narrative,which stresses the homology and similarity between the European and American culture,as well as by disintegrating the continentalism through inventing and spreading the concept of the Atlantic community,which imagines the common tradition,interests and fate between the U.S.and Europe.During the early Cold War,in virtue of this new national identity,the U.S.explained the Marshall Plan and the founding of North Atlantic Treaty Organization(NATO)as the necessary measures to protect the Western civilization and the Atlantic community,aiming at safeguarding the American culture and security.This successfully forged the U.S.and Western European nations into a cultural,ideological and security community,eventually creating a new‘West’.