The Carter and Reagan Years - Essay Example

It is more reasonable to discuss Jimmy Carter first since he came before Reagan and it was during his presidency that the world faced the after effects of the oil shock (Walsh, 1997). Of course the present state of the world shows that we are going through another energy crisis and while our solution to the problem might be technological, the solutions thought of by Carter were practical. He wanted to handle the situation by asking the American people to make sacrifices and by asking them to make adjustments to their lifestyles (Shoup, 1979).

In 1977, Carter used Congress to create the Department of Energy which was supposed to help America get out of dependence on cheap oil. Not only did Carter support the recommendations of the department, he applied them to his own life. To conserve energy, Carter started wearing sweaters to ward off the cold; he installed solar water headers in the White House and even had a wood burning stove in his living area. He also asked Americans to make sacrifices such as conserving energy, using less heating or cooling equipment, turn off Christmas decorations and place measures on how cool or hot commercial buildings could be (Carter, 1995).

Comparatively, the use of force and strong-arm tactics that had become the hallmark of Reagan’s administration might have caused Reagan to attack countries with oil to take over their natural resources for American use. Carter also shifted the American viewpoint of allies and enemies through his focus on human rights. In essence, instead of working with a policy of containing ‘the communist threat’ Carter worked with the idea of human rights violations to suggest that some countries were behaving badly and some were behaving fine.

Previously, the viewpoint on human rights was largely ignored but by bringing a focus on human rights, Carter was able to give a human touch to the policies of the government (Shoup, 1979). The practical