Foreign Policy Interest Groups, Mass Public Opinion and the Arab-Israeli Dispute

Abstract

TH HE DOMESTIC political environment surrounding the governmental foreign policy-making system in the United States includes a variety of elements that have the potential to affect policy outputs. The domestic sources of foreign policy are widely recognized, and include interest groups, mass public opinion, and the printed and electronic media. These nongovernmental elements are assumed by many to have a significant impact on the course of the government's foreign policy activities. However, as yet there has been very little systematic research on the relationships among domestic political forces and foreign policy behavior. As a result, the nature and degree of the direct effects, and even more so the secondary effects, of domestic factors on governmental policy remain lively topics of debate. This paper seeks to address some of the important issues that center on the potential versus actual impact of the domestic political environment on American foreign policy. We shall focus attention on two sets of nongovernmental forcesinterest groups and mass public opinion and consider, in general terms, how each may have a direct impact on policy. We shall then examine how and why interest groups attempt to mold public opinion into a supportive political force that can assist them in influencing decision-makers, and how public opinion may constrain the ability of groups to achieve their political objectives. We shall study these interaction effects empirically by examining the relationships among pro-Israel and proArab interest groups and mass public opinion on the Arab-Israeli conflict during the period from 1966 through 1977. Public opinion polls and events data will be used in an attempt to dispel some of the confusion and misunderstanding that surrounds American public opinion toward the Arab-Israeli dispute. This analysis of how interest groups and public opinion influence each other, and the implications of these interaction effects for policy impact, is facilitated by the amount of interest group activity, the general awareness of the mass public, and the persistent nature of the Arab-Israeli conflict during the period under consideration.