A ‘Distinctively British Response’ to the End of the Cold War?: An Anglo-American Intellectual History of the End of History and Beyond

This article examines the intellectual landscape of the late Cold War and early post-Cold War years. It argues that this era was more intellectually diverse than is often remembered, and that a transatlantic exchange took place between British and American intellectuals which helped to shape the leading narratives of the nineties. Challenging the retrospective focus on triumphalist predictions such as Francis Fukuyama's ‘End of History,’ it situates this thesis alongside competing frameworks which offered more pessimistic or pragmatic visions of the post-Cold War world, and draws upon theories of institutional change and the emotional dimensions of policymaking to contend that these ideas played a structural role in shaping emerging conceptions of a post-Cold War world order. Moreover, it shows that Britain was not a passive recipient of American intellectual currents but an active participant in a transatlantic dialogue over the future of international order and Britain's place within it. Through close analysis of British foreign policy commentary, particularly debates surrounding European integration, Atlanticism, and national capability, it reveals a range of competing visions that reflected both opportunity and constraint, summarised as ‘wide horizons, slender means.’ Rather than producing a coherent post-Cold War role, this overflowing marketplace of ideas generated fragmentation and indecision, contributing to Britain's prolonged difficulty in defining a stable foreign policy identity in the final years of the twentieth century and beyond.