Introduction 引言；前言；绪言The opening decade of the twenty-first century has been overwhelmingly shaped by the American and world response to the terror attacks of 11 September 2001.Many analysts speak of a paradigm shift in foreign policy alignments, global economies, and domestic affairs.The events of the post (=late)-11 September world make the 1990s seem a vast, quaint ( 奇怪的 ) universe away.But we should note that analysts had christened ( 洗礼仪式 ) the last decade of the twentieth century as a New World Order under the common umbrella of democracy and free market capitalism.Certainly the decade marked a decisive end to the post (after)-World War II or Cold War world and ushered in a new era.The 45-year period following the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki the, division of the world into “ free” and “ communist” influences, and the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989 changed things.The world is still adjusting to those changes and countries rush (run) to realign ( 重新排列 , 再结盟 ) the geopolitical order. 美国和世界对于 2001 年 9 月 11 日恐怖袭击的反应已经压倒性地充斥了 21 世纪的头十年。许多分析家谈到一个关于外交政策路线，全球经济和国内事务的范式转变。 9 月 11 日世界发生的事件让 20 世纪 90 年代不再是一个巨大的， 奇怪的宇宙。 但是， 我们应该注意到，那些分析师已经把二十世纪的最后十年， 洗礼成了民主和自由市场资本主义在 世界新秩序 下的共同的庇护所。当然，这十年标志着一个决定性 二战后的 或 冷战 的世界的结束，也开辟了一个新的时代。 在向广岛和长崎投下原子弹后的 45 年间， 世界被 自由 和 共产主义 影响着， 1989 年柏林墙的倒塌也让事情产生了变化。世界仍然在适应这些变化，各个国家也趋向于重新调整地缘政治的秩序。Historically, the world s nations have always been involved in a struggle for power. In the twentieth century the rise of the United States of America to superpower status prompted many to label the era the American Century and the dominance of American popular culture and products came to be called Americanization (美国化 ). Currently there is a rise in what might be termed America-phobia ( 恐怖症 ) as some groups seek to tear down the hegemony (霸权 ) held by the United States.There are widespread complaints about the cheapness of American culture with its runaway 逃跑 , 失控的 materialism.Others fear the transformation of their own culture to mirror changing American patterns, from birth-control pills to gender equality. Still others, who refuse, or are too young, to remember when the United States was an indispensable part of the West buttressing (支持 ) Europe with an economic aid package called the Marshall Plan and protecting European and Japanese growth through military security only see a selfish nation that goes its own way without a due respect for world opinion.There is no doubt that American military and economic power is in a league of its own. 从历史角度来看，世界各国一直被卷入一场权力斗争当中。在 20 世纪，美国超级大国地位的上升， 促使许多人将这个时代为 美国世纪 的时代， 同时美国流行文化和产品所占的主导地位，逐渐被称为 美国化 。目前有一种可能被称之 美国恐惧症 （的趋势）在上升，因为一些团体试图推倒美国持有的霸权。 对于伴随着失控的廉价的唯物主义美国文化存在着广泛的投诉。 其他一部分人担心自己的文化转型， 所折射出的从避孕药到性别平等 （等方面）不断变化的美国模式。还有一些人，他们（选择）拒绝，或者是（因为）太年轻了，而忘记了美国作为 西部大开发 不可缺少的一部分扶持欧洲经济的紧急措施的马歇尔计划。同时，它通过军事安全和保护欧洲和日本的增长， （这让人们）只看到一个自私的国家按照自己的方式行事而没有给以世界舆论应有的尊重。 毫无疑问， 美国的军事和经济力量只有它自己的作为联盟。The criticism is as justified as it is expected.As the leading world power, the United States gets the focus of world criticism on every issue domestic and international.This is not new. The discovery and colonization of the New World thrust America into the spotlight ( 聚光灯 ) in the fifteenth to the seventeenth centuries. The eighteenth-century revolution against Britain that established a liberal nation and the unprecedented population and territorial growth of the nineteenth century kept the nation highlighted.The twentieth-century world wars of nationalism forged coalitions ( 合并 ) that put the United States in the preeminent ( 卓越的 ) global position by 1945, and the Cold War advanced American power t o the position it now holds. The country s unique standing has brought criticism not only for what it is and has been, but for the ways it acts and portrays its actions. 这种批评像它所预期的一样是合乎道理的。 作为世界领先的力量， 美国对于国内和国际的每一个问题都成为世界批评的焦点。 这并不新鲜。 在十五到十七世纪， 新世界的发现和殖民将美国变成举世瞩目的焦点。 十八世纪的英国革命反对建立一个自由和 （拥有） 前所未有的人口的国家，同时， 19 世纪的领土增长使它一直在被注视。 20 世纪的世界民族战争所锻造的联盟于 1945 年美国将美国推进了全球的卓越位置，同时，冷战又让美国的实力提升到和现在相同的位置。 它的独特地位带来了批评， 不仅因为它过去和现在是什么， 同时也因为它起作用的方式对其行动的描绘。America is new, or likes to assert that notion. Americans often think of themselves as a people of the future whose personal pasts can be overcome or reinvented, even if they will volunteer upon the first meeting with any stranger that their families came from Ireland, from Germany, from Vietnam, or from elsewhere outside the US.The key word is from as in, the Old World is a good place to be from. With Americans, it is the right here and right now that has their attention.They seem to care more about the future and of what could become.Most Americans see themselves as risk-takers who grasp at chances to get a new life for themselves and their children.Sometimes that means leaving family and national ties behind to cross an ocean or a continent. Americans imagine themselves and their country in many ways; but when looking into a mirror, they