Foreign Policy Formulation and Implementation of Small States

Abstract

The foreign policy behavior of small states, which in today’s world comprise some sixty countries, is not prominently represented in academia. Studies associated with these states’ foreign policy tend to focus on their behavior in the international arena with a clear dominance of realist thoughts. Small states are often seen from a closed-box approach where the internal factors, leadership, and other domestic issues are given scant attention by scholars, leaving substantial and important gaps in the knowledge. This book which emerged from original and extensive research over five years, attempts to fill some of these gaps. The book is concerned with the foreign policy formulation and implementation of the small Caribbean state of Trinidad and Tobago, and without the claim of generalization, it is hoped that similar studies will encourage scholars to develop a wider theory about small states’ foreign policy behavior. The foreign policy process and the associated factors provide insights and help to develop an epistemic framework as to how the twin-island state behaved under objective and subjective constraints and more specifically, how the decision-makers choose their foreign policy preferences.