Abstract
One reads a lot, especially in Europe, about American hegemony, unilateralism and even imperialism. For a lot of observers, that the current United States administration is pursuing an unilateralist foreign policy is obvious. On issues ranging from the Iraqi war to global warming to the International Criminal Court, the United States is currently loosening its commitments to the international community's common agreements. This appears to be tremendously important to America's partners who cannot disentangle themselves from such a set of rules and fear from the viability of the international system inherited from the post World War II era. Therefore, a first set of questions are raised: is America really taking an unilateralist turn? What are the causes that might provoke such an attitude? In such a case, does America differ from other historical dominating countries? The most common answer would be a realistic approach, linking the tremendous power of the United States to a go-it-alone behaviour. The US doesn't need the help of any other country in pursuing its interests and therefore, one can assess that power breeds unilateralism. Thus, the means of action are more important than the ideology in explaining why a country develops a rather unilateralist foreign policy pattern.
