AMERICAN STUDIES QUARTERLY Summer 2012, Vol. 26, No. 2 ARTICLES An Analysis of U.S. Soft Power (Kong Xiangyong and Mei Renyi) Joseph Nye first developed the concept of “soft power” in 1990 in response to a popular belief that the American power was in decline. Nye argued that the United States was still the strongest nation not only in military and economic power, but also in a third dimension of the soft power， which rested primarily on three sources: its culture, its political values and its foreign policy. In recent years, antiAmericanism increased throughout the world, and many people shed doubt on the United States' soft power-its ability to attract others by the legitimacy of U.S. policies and the ideological values that underlay them. This paper analyzes some essential components of American soft power-competitiveness in science and technology, in thought and in norm and in agenda setting, in education and population, and concludes that American soft power will continue to grow. What really hamper American soft power are not its international rivals, but the frustrated mood of American people and domestic partisan divisions. Some Thoughts on U.S. National Power and its Global Status (Zhu Chenghu and Meng Fanli) The U.S. national power and global status have been crippled by the financial crisis starting from 2008, and the United States falls into recession. However, this fact doesn't mean that the United States will embark on a path of permanent decline, since its national mechanisms are conducive to its recovering from the crisis. Besides, the impact of the financial crisis on US is limited, and US dominant position in world affairs has not been fundamentally shaken and will maintain that dominance for a fairly long time. SameSex Marriage Issue and American Politics (Zhang Yeliang) The issue of samesex marriage is highly controversial in the making of American public policy, and very complex and sensitive in current American politics. From the perspective of party politics and electoral politics, and based on a historical survey of the evolution of samesex issue, this article holds that with the development of LGBT rights movement, public acceptance of homosexuality and equal rights for gay people has been growing, but American society still split on the samesex marriage issue. The disputes over samesex marriage are about whether gay and lesbian couples should have the right to marry, and whether gay marriage should be granted federalsanctioned benefits equal to heterosexual spouses. The controversy, in reality, reflects two different cultural and moral values and indicates conflicts between traditional views on marriage and modern views on equal rights. Toward samesex marriage, there are remarkable different attitudes in the areas of American political parties, ideology, race, ethnicity, religion, gender, age, and regions. For American politics, the samesex marriage issue is one of defining issues for two major parties images and an important part and a “wedge issue” in presidential elections. A Brief Analysis of Obama Administration's Minilateral Diplomacy in the Asia-Pacific (Zhang Yong) Since the Obama Administration came into power, the United States has laid more emphasis on “Smart Power” strategy to achieve the goal of forging a multi-partner world under American leadership by containing world multipolarization and by integrating new variables. In particular, the Obama Administration is convinced that the US dominant position in the Asia-Pacific area is challenged by the rapid integration of the area, which is driven by the rise of China. It follows that the Obama Administration has relied on expanding “minilateral” security groupings to support its reconstruction of the AsiaPacific security architecture. The U.S. is weaving a new multi-level security network, which is centered on bilateral alliance, linked by “minilateral” security groupings, and circled by multilateral engagement. The minilateral diplomacy reveals the U.S.'s intention to relieve its hegemony burden through encouraging cooperation and to adopt a policy alternative to make China embedded into the net. In the foreseeable future, this new security infrastructure, as is signified by “multilateral and minilateral” approaches, will continue in the Asia-Pacific area. Driving Force of America's Foreign Policy: Dualist Approach or Material Interest? (Gao Cheng) This paper studies the driving force of America's foreign policy through a historical review. According to the mainstream interpretation of “dualist approach”, US foreign policy making is not only directed by traditional interests, but also influenced, to a large extent, by its aspiration of realizing idealist values, which are rooted in American Exceptionalism. Behind the intertwined dualist goals, foreign policy making and strategic choices of the US are essentially affected by material interests. Under the circumstance when the maximization of its interests is ensured, influences of idealist values on America's foreign policy making are so weak that they can hardly work as an independent driving force. U.S. Policy towards Iraq in the 1980s: From “Tilting” to “Bottomup”(Leng Xuemei) With the transformation of international structure, and the changes of the strengths between America and the Soviet Union in the 1980s, the strategic consideration of America's Persian Gulf policy changed dramatically. The newly declassified US National Security documents presented a great diversity of inconsistent even conflicting policies done by the US government towards Iraq. Nevertheless, under the seemingly chaotic inconsistency in the policies, the principle and objectives of American policy to Iraq was clear and coherent, and was followed all the time. It aimed at approaching and influencing Iraq through economic and diplomatic measures, surpassing the present “Constructive Engagement” relationship with Iraq, and finally turning Iraq into a proAmerican regional power. This adjustment of American policy to Iraq was preconditioned by the operation regulation of American Foreign policy's decisionmaking mechanism. At the same time, it represented a strategic shift of American regional policy from ideology-oriented one to national interest-oriented one. The U.S. Governance of Illegal Immigration and Its Dilemma: Focusing on Immigration Enforcement (Chen Jimin) Immigration enforcement is an important part of illegal immigration governance in the United States. The U.S. government tries to achieve the desired goals in the treatment of illegal immigrants mainly by integrating immigration enforcement resources, strengthening border enforcement efforts and upgrading domestic worksite enforcement. However, these measures do not effectively control and manage the illegal immigrants in the United States, which reflects the dilemmas in the handling of U.S. illegal immigration. ESSAYS AND REVIEWS ScholarPractitioner Relations: A View from the White House (Richard Feinberg) A Review of Bending History: Barack Obama's Foreign Policy (Zhao Tianyi) A Review of Gordon S. Wood's Empire of Liberty, A History of the Early Republic, 1789～1815 (Ye Fanmei) ACADEMIC ACTIVITIES Summary of the Symposium on “Nuclear Security and Regional Antiproliferation Situation”(Li Hengyang) New Books Editor's Note