The Protectorate's foreign relations are among the most misunderstood aspects of a little-known period of British history, usually seen as an interlude between regicide and Restoration. Yet Cromwell's unique political and military position and current European conflicts enabled him to play a crucial role in international affairs, playing off France against Spain and arousing Catholic fears. Financial and security problems determined the nature of Cromwell's policies, but he achieved great influence among his neighbours in five turbulent years Until recent studies the Protectorate has been regarded as a political cul-de-sac lying uncomfortably between regicide and Restoration. Its foreign relations presented outdated 'Elizabethan' hatred of declining Spain, neglect of rising French and Dutch power, and excessive admiration of Protestant Sweden. A close study of Cromwell's domestic and international position in 1653 casts new light on his problems and successes, restoring pragmatism above religious idealism as the determining factor despite Cromwell's undoubted miscalculations. It is to his credit that England's international prestige stood at its highest during the century in 1658, helped by his unprecedently powerful (though expensive) armed forces. Despite unpopularity and subversion at home, and a narrow base of support, Cromwell utilised the Franco-Spanish war to auction his services between them, obtained England's only Continental foothold after 1558, and pressed his claim as leader of European Protestantism at a time of renewed religious tension.

A stunningly insightful account of the global political and economic system, sustained first by Britain and now by America, that has created the modern world. The key to the two countries' predominance, Mead argues, lies in the individualistic ideology inherent in the Anglo-American religion. Over the years Britain and America's liberal democratic system has been repeatedly challeged—by Catholic Spain and Louis XIV, the Nazis, communists, and Al Qaeda—and for the most part, it has prevailed. But the current conflicts in the Middle East threaten to change that record unless we foster a deeper understanding of the conflicts between the liberal world system and its foes.

Greenspan examines a selection of Cromwell’s conflicts, policies and imperial ventures to explore the ways in which the media was instrumental in developing, promoting and legitimizing government actions.

This book offers the first full study of the challenges posed to an emerging English nationalism that stemmed from the powerful appeal exerted by the leaders of the international Protestant cause. By considering a range of texts, including poetry, plays, pamphlets, and religious writing, the study reads this heroic tradition as a 'connected literary history,' a project shared by Protestants throughout Northern Europe, which opened up both collaboration among writers from these different regions and new possibilities for communal identification. The work’s central claim is that a pan-Protestant literary field existed in the period, which was multilingual, transnational, and ideologically charged. Celebrated leaders such as William of Orange posed a series of questions, especially for English Protestants, over the relationship between English and Protestant identity. In formulating their role as co-religionists, writers often undercut notions of alterity, rendering early modern conceptions of foreignness especially fluid and erasing national borders.

'A compelling and wry narrative of one of the most intellectually thrilling eras of British history' Guardian. ***************** SHORTLISTED FOR THE CUNDILL HISTORY PRIZE 2020 England, 1651. Oliver Cromwell has defeated his royalist opponents in two civil wars, executed the Stuart king Charles I, laid waste to Ireland, and crushed the late king's son and his Scottish allies. He is master of Britain and Ireland. But Parliament, divided between moderates, republicans and Puritans of uncompromisingly millenarian hue, is faction-ridden and disputatious. By the end of 1653, Cromwell has become 'Lord Protector'. Seeking dragons for an elect Protestant nation to slay, he launches an ambitious 'Western Design' against Spain's empire in the New World. When an amphibious assault on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola in 1655 proves a disaster, a shaken Cromwell is convinced that God is punishing England for its sinfulness. But the imposition of the rule of the Major-Generals – bureaucrats with a penchant for closing alehouses – backfires spectacularly. Sectarianism and fundamentalism run riot. Radicals and royalists join together in conspiracy. The only way out seems to be a return to a Parliament presided over by a king. But will Cromwell accept the crown? Paul Lay narrates in entertaining but always rigorous fashion the story of England's first and only experiment with republican government: he brings the febrile world of Oliver Cromwell's Protectorate to life, providing vivid portraits of the extraordinary individuals who inhabited it and capturing its dissonant cacophony of political and religious voices. ***************** Reviews: 'Briskly paced and elegantly written, Providence Lost provides us with a first-class ticket to this Cromwellian world of achievement, paradox and contradiction. Few guides take us so directly, or so sympathetically, into the imaginative worlds of that tumultuous decade' John Adamson, The Times. 'Providence Lost is a learned, lucid, wry and compelling narrative of the 1650s as well as a sensitive portrayal of a man unravelled by providence' Jessie Childs, Guardian.

A provocative challenge to the standard ideology that Western power is a benevolent force in the world.

"God has a special providence for fools, drunks and the United States of America."--Otto von Bismarck America's response to the September 11 attacks spotlighted many of the country's longstanding goals on the world stage: to protect liberty at home, to secure America's economic interests, to spread democracy in totalitarian regimes and to vanquish the enemy utterly. One of America's leading foreign policy thinkers, Walter Russell Mead, argues that these diverse, conflicting impulses have in fact been the key to the U.S.'s success in the world. In a sweeping new synthesis, Mead uncovers four distinct historical patterns in foreign policy, each exemplified by a towering figure from our past. Wilsonians are moral missionaries, making the world safe for democracy by creating international watchdogs like the U.N. Hamiltonians likewise support international engagement, but their goal is to open foreign markets and expand the economy. Populist Jacksonians support a strong military, one that should be used rarely, but then with overwhelming force to bring the enemy to its knees. Jeffersonians, concerned primarily with liberty at home, are suspicious of both big military and large-scale international projects. A striking new vision of America's place in the world, Special Providence transcends stale debates about realists vs. idealists and hawks vs. doves to provide a revolutionary, nuanced, historically-grounded view of American foreign policy.

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