Foreign Policy Analysis: Classic and Contemporary Theory

Foreign Policy Analysis

Foreign Policy Analysis

Classic and Contemporary Theory

Second Edition

Valerie M. Hudson

ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Hudson, Valerie M., 1958–

Foreign policy analysis : classic and contemporary theory / Valerie M. Hudson. -- Second edition.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-4422-2003-4 (cloth : alk. paper) -- ISBN 978-1-4422-2004-1 (pbk. : alk. paper) -- ISBN

978-1-4422-2005-8 (electronic)

1. International relations--Decision making. 2. International relations--Psychological aspects. I. Title.

JZ1253.H83 2014

327.101--dc23

2013038144

TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American

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Printed in the United States of America

Contents

Acknowledgments vii

I: Overview and Evolution of Foreign Policy Analysis 1

1 Introduction: The Situation and Evolution of Foreign Policy

Analysis: A Road Map 3

II: Levels of Analysis 37

2 The Individual Decisionmaker: The Political Psychology of

World Leaders 39

3 Group Decisionmaking: Small Group Dynamics, Organizational

Process, and Bureaucratic Politics 73

4 Culture and National Identity 117

5 Domestic Politics and Opposition 141

6 The Levels of National Attributes and International System:

Effects on Foreign Policy 161

III: Putting It All Together, or Not 183

7 Theoretical Integration in Foreign Policy Analysis 185

8 The Future of Foreign Policy Analysis 211

Bibliography 223

Index 245

About the Author 257

v

Acknowledgments

This book has taken many long years to complete, and I would be remiss if I

did not thank all of those who helped and supported me along the way. First,

to Jennifer Knerr for having faith in my vision of a Foreign Policy Analysis

textbook. Second, to Susan McEachern for so seamlessly picking up where

Jennifer left off, and for encouraging me forward to a second edition. Third,

to Douglas Van Belle, for his helpful suggestions on one of the early chap￾ters, and to Rose McDermott for friendship and good suggestions. Fourth, I

would like to thank my old mentors in Foreign Policy Analysis, such as

Donald Sylvan, Chuck Hermann, and Peg Hermann, for the excellent educa￾tion they provided and the passion for Foreign Policy Analysis they inspired

in me. Fifth, I would like to thank my research assistant, S. Matthew Stearm￾er, for all of his help, especially with the ins and outs of graphics inserted into

text files. Sixth, I would like to thank the George H. W. Bush Chair at the

Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University,

and the David M. Kennedy Center for International Studies at Brigham

Young University, for support given to this effort. Seventh, I would like to

thank those publishers who graciously granted me permission to use some of

my writings previously published with them, including Palgrave, Blackwell,

and Lynne Rienner. Eighth, I would like to thank my Foreign Policy Analy￾sis students, past, present, and future, for all that they have taught me in years

past and will teach me in the years to come. Last, but certainly not least, I

would like to thank my family—my husband, David, and my children Jo￾seph, John, Thomas, Jamison, Hope Rose, and Eve Lily—for their unflag￾ging support. I wish to dedicate this volume to my dear daughter, Ariel, who

died as I was finishing the first edition. We will be together in the eternities,

Ariel, and if you wish it, I will tell you all about Foreign Policy Analysis

then.

vii

I

Overview and Evolution of Foreign

Policy Analysis

Chapter One

Introduction: The Situation and

Evolution of Foreign Policy Analysis

A Road Map

Every theoretical discipline has a ground. A “ground” means the conceptual￾ization of the fundamental or foundational level at which phenomena in the

field of study occur. So, for example, the ground of physics is now that of

matter and antimatter particles. Economists often use the ground of firms or

households. It is upon such ground that theories are built, modified, and even

discarded. Sometimes just the knowledge that the ground exists frees the

researcher from having to anchor his or her work in it, permitting greater

heights of abstraction to be reached. A physicist can work on problems

related to black holes, and economists can speak of trends in world markets

without having to begin each new research effort by going over the ground of

their respective disciplines.

International Relations (IR) as a field of study has a ground, as well. All

that occurs between nations and across nations is grounded in human deci￾sionmakers acting singly or in groups. In a sense, the ground of IR is thus the

same ground of all the social sciences. Understanding how humans perceive

and react to the world around them, and how humans shape and are shaped

by the world around them, is central to the inquiry of social scientists, even

those in IR.

However, your previous training in IR probably gave you the impression

that states are the ground of International Relations. Or, in slightly alternative

language, that whatever decisionmaking unit is involved, be it a state or a

human being or a group of humans, that that unit can be modeled as a unitary

rational actor and therefore be made equivalent to the state. Sometimes this

3

4 Chapter 1

approach is referred to as “black-boxing” the state, or as a “billiard ball

model” of state interaction. You may have even been taught that IR is not the

study of foreign policymaking.

Alas, dear students, you have been taught amiss.

If you are taking this course, then someone in your department feels that

the ground of IR is human decisionmakers who are not best approximated as

strictly unitary rational actors, and who are not equivalent to the state. And,

furthermore, that “the state” is a metaphysical abstraction that is useful as a

shorthand for IR’s ground, but cannot be a realistic conceptualization of it. In

this course, you are entering a realm of IR theory that you may have never

been exposed to otherwise; remember to thank your professor for this oppor￾tunity.

HALLMARKS OF FOREIGN POLICY ANALYSIS THEORY

If the ground of IR is human decisionmakers acting singly or in groups,

several other theoretical hallmarks follow naturally and serve to characterize

Foreign Policy Analysis (FPA).

Explanandum: That Which Is to Be Explained in FPA

The explanandum, or that which is to be explained or understood, will be

decisions taken by human decisionmakers with reference to or having known

consequences for entities external to their nation-state. Such decisions entail

action, inaction, and even indecision. Usually such decisions directly target

external entities in the form of influence attempts (even influence in the first

place of domestic actors), but they may include decisions that target domestic

entities but have ramifications for external entities. One is almost always

examining not a single decision, but a constellation of decisions taken with

reference to a particular situation. Indeed, as Brighi and Hill note, “Foreign

policy decisions should be seen primarily as heightened moments of commit￾ment in a perpetual process of action, reaction, and further action at many

different levels and involving a range of different actors” (2012, 166). Fur￾thermore, decisions may be modified over time, requiring an examination of

sequences of decisions. Furthermore, the stages of decisionmaking may also

be the focus of inquiry, from problem recognition, framing, and perception to

more advanced stages of goal prioritization, contingency planning, and op￾tion assessment. Last, FPA traditionally finds itself most interested in deci￾sions taken by human decisionmakers in positions of authority to commit the

resources of the nation-state, though it is quite possible to analyze decision￾makers who do not hold such positions.

Indeed, the only things not examined are likely to be accidents or mis￾takes, or decisions that cannot be conceptualized as having an international

The Situation and Evolution of Foreign Policy Analysis 5

component. In the first case, the action was not purposeful. It is difficult to

explain nonpurposeful action. In the latter case, the decision can be analyzed,

but probably would not be analyzed by foreign policy analysts, but rather by

domestic policy analysts. Though some have opined that “in conditions of

globalization, all politics has become foreign policy in one way or the other,”

there is still a meaningful distinction to be made (Brighi and Hill 2012, 153).

Even if one were to concede that point, which we are not inclined to do, the

same conceptual and methodological tools used in FPA would still be useful

in examining non–foreign policy decisions. That is, what you learn in FPA

may help you to analyze human decisionmaking regardless of substantive

focus.

In the world of foreign policy, however, the actual decisions (or indeci￾sions) made may not be immediately observable to the analyst. Indeed, they

may be secret, and may remain so for decades due to national security con￾cerns. In many cases, this means the analyst is working with historical data,

or contemporary data insofar as public sources provide that information

(which may be incomplete or even false). Another approach is to use artifacts

of decisions—the traces that decisions to act leave in newspapers or chronol￾ogies, and which are eventually concatenated into histories. These artifacts

are termed “events,” and the data produced by accumulating them are called

“events data.” (We will examine events data in more detail in a following

section of this chapter.)

This distinction between the foreign policy decision and the foreign poli￾cy action bears additional discussion. The distinction is worth making for

several reasons. First, a decision may never result in action; indeed, there

may be a decision taken not to act, or there may be insufficient consensus

among the members of the decisionmaking group to act. While leaving no

action artifact, such decisions are as likely to be as important as decisions to

act, and well worth analyzing. Second, a decision may be taken to act in a

way that does not reveal, and indeed, is possibly designed to conceal, the true

decision taken. Such deceptions, insincerities, and concealments are quite

common in foreign policy. The Soviets stated they had shut down their

biological weapons program after signing the BWC (Biological Weapons

Convention), but in fact such a program persisted even past the demise of the

USSR, and perhaps continues to this very day. Last, implementation issues

routinely plague even the most important decisions to act, often leading to

profound slippage between the direction of the decision taken and the direc￾tion of the action executed. These issues of implementation may be logistical

and unintentional; on the other hand, they may be political and purely inten￾tional on the part of subordinates or other actors. Furthermore, the coordina￾tion of policy in different policy areas may be lacking, resulting in policies in

one area seemingly contradictory to policies in another, such as the United

States’ tacit economic support of the Hugo Chávez regime. Multilateral