This text brings together 3 key elements for both students and professors. It provides an overview of the historical information to make sense of current U.S. foreign policy; it supplies case studies to give students grounding in key events in U.S. foreign policy and information on contemporary issues; and it incorporates concepts that structure an investigation into U.S. foreign policy. The focus is on U.S. policy itself and not on U.S. foreign policy toward specific regions or issues.