American Foreign Policy Establishment Research Articles

How Is the American Foreign Policy Establishment Structured? A Multiple Correspondence Analysis of the US China Field

AbstractChallenging visions of the US national security “Establishment” as either hamstrung by ideological homogeneity bordering on groupthink, or riven by irreconcilable party political divisions, we deploy multiple correspondence analysis (MCA) to uncover empirically the structure of the China segment of the US national security community. MCA—a form of geometric data analysis—finds latent structures in categorical datasets. Using an original dataset of organizations with a strong presence on China issues, we show that the China organizational field is far from homogenous, but is split less between left and right than over degree of political engagement, separating older think tanks and cultural organizations from business-focused research and consulting firms, and academic/research institutions outside from politically oriented groups located primarily within the Beltway. We explore our findings using the Trump and Obama administrations’ choice of locations to give speeches and remarks on US–China relations.

American Hegemony and International Theory at the Council on Foreign Relations, 1953–1954

This paper tells the story of a Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) study group on the theory of international relations held in 1953–1954. The study group took place at a time of intense struggle over the nature and value of international relations as an academic and policy field, with theory a key stake. Funded by the Carnegie Corporation, organized by the CFR, and held at the same time as another theory conference at the Rockefeller Foundation, the group illustrates how central organizations of the American foreign policy establishment acted as the midwives of academic International Relations (IR), and IR theory in particular. Despite its ties to American hegemony, the group did not come together behind a theory designed to guide policy-makers in the exercise of American power. Offering a glimpse into a road to theory not taken, the group asserted the essential limits of all knowledge, and the need for a theoretically pluralist International Relations. The vision of theory it entertained was not thereby defined by powerful academic trends toward behavioralism, positivism, and systems-theory, nor by the Realpolitik-inspired ‘realist’ theory promoted by the Rockefeller group.

GEOPOLITICAL FOUNDATIONS OF U.S. FOREIGN POLICY STRATEGY ON ESTABLISHING THE NEW WORLD ORDER

Academic and political establishment in the United States traditionally abides by two approaches towards the implementation of foreign policy. That is isolationism, on the one hand, and globalism (internationalism), on the other. These approaches are based on different principles of foreign policy actions, namely, non-involvement in the affairs of Eurasia and those of the world in general (isolationism) and, on the contrary, active geopolitical and geo-economic expansion (globalism). Despite certain contradictions in choosing foreign policy instruments, in particular, the concepts of “soft power” or “hard power”, unilateral or multilateral actions, representatives of each of these schools of thought adhere to the main fundamental principle of the U.S. foreign policy, that is, the defense of U.S. national interests in the face of the “image of enemy”. Therefore, globalists and isolationists, “realists” and “idealists”, the so-called “hawks” and “doves” in the American foreign policy establishment are jointly countering the “external threat”. Since the Cold War period, such a “threat” has been traditionally identified in the face of Russia. Around her, first and foremost, “the image of enemy” is being formed. The article deals with geopolitical concepts of U.S. foreign policy, which preconditioned global expansion of that country on the international arena, such as the moving “Frontier” concept, the “Anaconda” concept, the “Heartland” concept, the “Rimland” concept and etc. Considering the aggressive nature of the U.S. foreign policy, the analysis of the above concepts allows to considering the latter as being the geostrategy, which is aimed at establishing the new world order. The analysis of its geopolitical foundations allows us to reveal fundamental processes in world politics and to predict possible scenarios of the coming world order. The research of the geopolitical foundations of the U.S. strategy also makes it possible understanding of the true reasons for the U.S. opposing the Eurasian integration process.

The US foreign policy establishment and grand strategy: how American elites obstruct strategic adjustment

In this article, I demonstrate that there are compelling reasons why the USA should reconsider its current grand strategy—variously described as primacy or deep engagement—and, instead, adopt a less activist strategy such as offshore balancing, or restraint. The most salient reason for the USA to make a change of direction is that its current strategy has set the USA on a collision course with China. Nevertheless, the American foreign policy establishment is resistant to strategic adjustment. In this article, I offer a two-pronged explanation for this resistance. First, the American foreign policy establishment imposes a broadly uniform world view on those who comprise it. In this sense, the foreign policy establishment’s very existence is a barrier to strategic adjustment. Second, the foreign policy establishment’s preferences invariably prevail because it exercises discourse dominance, which allows it to frame issues, and to set the bounds of discussion by signaling to a wider audience what policy positions are legitimate, and, perhaps even more important, which are not. In this article, I begin by discussing how the American foreign policy establishment’s members are recruited, and focus on its links to America’s corporate and financial elite. Then, I lay out the key elements of the foreign policy establishment’s world views. I show how the foreign policy establishment uses discourse dominance to ensure that US grand strategy reflects its core beliefs about America’s international political role. Finally, I demonstrate that with respect to China, the foreign policy establishment’s world view, and the discursive practices it employs, make it unlikely that the USA will be able peacefully to accommodate China’s rise.

Who's afraid of China? Neo-conservative, realist and liberal-internationalist assessments of American power, the future of “the West” and the coming new world order

In 2012, three of America's most influential public intellectuals – Robert Kagan, Zbigniew Brzezinski and Charles A. Kupchan – published books which reflect on what the rise of China entails for the future world order and which foreign policy the USA should pursue in response to the Chinese challenge. Since these authors represent three different political ideologies with significant bearing on the American foreign-policy establishment – neo-conservatism, realism and liberal internationalism – a comparison of their analyses will allow us to systematize current trends in American debates about world affairs and to identify today's fault lines between the political-ideological camps. As the article will demonstrate, at the root of the disagreements between the three schools of thought as represented by these authors are their diverging evaluations of America's relative power, their different conceptions of the nature of America's alliances, the unequal degree of importance they each attach to a state's form of government for its foreign policy and consequently their competing views on America's role in the coming world order.

Terrorism, democratization, and US foreign policy

Members of the American foreign policy establishment argue that the United States should combat transnational terrorism by encouraging democratization. Yet, empirical studies indicate that democratization may increase political violence, thereby raising the question: why would American policymakers favor democratization when the empirical record shows that this course of action is so dangerous? This study develops a game theoretic model to analyze the effect of democratization on terrorism. The model demonstrates that the United States uses the commitment problems created by democratization to solve the moral hazard problem created by supporting autocratic hosts. These empirical implications are tested using a combination of two datasets.

Debating Detente in the Twenty-first Century

“T and Iran are the only Muslim countries in the Middle East where democracy is deeply rooted. This makes their future bright. It also makes them America’s logical partners.”1 With this sweeping proclamation, veteran journalist and award-winning author Stephen Kinzer cleans out America’s foreign policy closet. He advocates nothing less than a radical rebalancing of United States-Middle East alliances in his latest book Reset: Iran, Turkey, and America’s Future. The United States should tilt away from Israel and Saudi Arabia, toward Turkey and Iran, to improve regional and national security because Cold Warera politics is long dead, argues Kinzer. Kinzer’s professional role is that of an expert-outsider to the American foreign policy establishment, having served as bureau chief for the New York Times in multiple continents over the course of two decades. Though not an academic or policymaker, he does not hesitate to put on these hats and deconstruct American strategic thinking. In Reset, we learn how the masses, and sometimes governments, in Turkey and Iran have strived to see the “American project”—meaning modern notions of liberty and democracy promotion—in a bright light. The two nations’ republican founders, Kemal Ataturk in Turkey and Reza Shah in Iran, threw off the yoke of the Caliphate and Islam’s Shia clergy respectively to radically reform their countries. Their goal was to bring their nation’s culture and political climate up to speed with the West, which entailed emancipating women, implementing new legal codes, banning religious garb in public, sending unprecedented numbers of children to school, and giving voice to public opinion, rich and poor. Despite the autocratic ruling styles, these men were quite progressive in implementing most of their policies. In his fairly straightforward storytelling Kinzer succeeds in explaining these histories, though one does not walk away with a full understanding of what would happen if his grand recommendation—which would amount to a major recalibration of American foreign policy in the Middle East—is implemented. One does however sense the gravity of the political earthquake Kinzer proposes—one ironically designed to solve a Middle East set-up (i.e., U.S.-Iran tensions and the Israel-Palestine conflict) already on shaky ground. The first

The transatlantic American foreign policy elite: its evolution in generational perspective

This article applies a generational perspective to approach the phenomenon of the development of an American foreign policy Establishment, an elite that was, from the late nineteenth century onward, committed to an expansive United States role, preferably in collaboration with the British empire. It argues that one can discern four generational groupings, stretching across a period of around a century: (a) the late nineteenth and early twentieth-century founders or forerunners, a group clustered around Theodore Roosevelt, who looked back to the Civil War as a formative experience; (b) those Americans already well into their careers, for whom World War I served as an epiphany, giving them new consciousness of the existence of Europe, and often converting them to a long-term belief in the importance of either Rooseveltian or Wilsonian internationalism; (c) those younger men whom one might term the ‘wise men’ generation, a group whose first formative experience was usually military experience in World War I,...

Book Reviews

A timely reassessment of modernization theory and its international impact; Beginning in the 1950s, the theory of modernization emerged as the dominant paradigm of economic, social, and political develoment within the American foreign policy establishment. Purporting to explain the stages through which all nations pass on the road to industrial modernity, it provided a rationale for a broad range of cultural and political projects aimed at fostering Third World growth while simultaneously combating communism. But modernization theory was more than simply an expression of Cold War ideology. As the essays in this volume show, the ideal of modernization proliferated throughout the postcolonial world and across ideological lines in places as diverse as East Asia, Southern Africa, and South Asia. Indeed, it was embraced by all who shared the American enthusiasm for the increased production and higher standards of living promised by industrialization - enemies and allies alike. Situating modernization theory historically, Staging Growth avoids conventional chronologies and categories of analysis, particularly the traditional focus on conflicts between major powers. The contributors employ a variety of approaches - from economic and intellectual history to cultural criticism and biography - to shed fresh light on the global forces that shaped the Cold War and its legacies. Most of the pieces are comparative, exploring how different countries and cultures have grappled with the implications of modern development. At the same time, all of the essays address similar fundamental questions. Is modernization the same thing as Westernization? Is the idea of modernization universally valid? Do countries follow similar trajectories as they undertake development? Does modernization bring about globalization? In addition to the editors and Akira Iriye, contributors include Michael Adas, Laura Belmonte, Gregg Andrew Brazinsky, Christina Klein, J. Victor Koschmann, and Michael R. Mahoney.

‘‘The Council has been your Creation'': Hamilton Fish Armstrong, Paradigm of the American Foreign Policy Establishment?

He was born in 1893 in the New York brownstone house near Washington Square where he lived all his adult life, a member of Edith Wharton's settled, circumscribed world of ordered privilege whose affluent, well-travelled, and sophisticated men and women traced their lineage back to the Founding Fathers and their principles to the American Revolution. His father was an artist who served as Consul General to Italy, and Armstrong was brought up in a milieu which took for granted the fact that there existed a world outside the United States. He died in 1973, as the United States finally withdrew from the Vietnam War, a conflict which deeply distressed him and shattered the foreign policy elite and its controlling consensus, whose creation had been a major part of his life's work. In an obituary notice Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., described him as “a New York gentleman of a vanishing school,” who “treated every one, old or young, famous or unknown, with the same generous courtesy and concern.”

“All the Right People”: The Historiography of the American Foreign Policy Establishment

“All the Right People”: The Historiography of the American Foreign Policy Establishment

Systematic Bias in U.S. Foreign Affairs Reporting: A Rejoinder

To defend the American foreign policy establishment in 1971 is like defending Louis XVI in 1792. To come to the defense of that establishment in the summer of 1971, post-Pentagon Papers, when its faults are hanging out for all the world to see, may even seem more stupid than foolhardy. Yet I propose to do something akin to that-not only because stomping on the establishment one more time is too easy by half, but because I think Professor; Appleton's diagnosis of the reporting problem within the foreign policy-making structure is faulty. And it follows that his proposal, built on that diagnosis, is, in my view, flawed. There is perhaps an unfair advantage in commenting, postPentagon Papers, on something written before their publication. Indeed, these Papers are such an important landmark for foreign policy scholars that we might contemplate an automotive-type recall of earlier scholarly papers for revision (Daniel Ellsberg, the Ralph Nader of foreign policy, has implicitly suggested such a recall in his obviously informed attack on the quagmire hypothesis; Ellsberg, 1971). But I do not base my comments