Foreign Policy Beliefs Research Articles

Wedges and Widgets: Liberalism, Libertarianism, and the Trade Attitudes of the American Mass Public and Elites

What are the ideological sources of free trade attitudes? Free trade plays a crucial role in classical liberal theory as a way of increasing the prospects of peace between states. Are liberal individuals more supportive of free trade? The literature on foreign policy beliefs largely neglects the question of trade, and those exceptions that find support for the liberal hypothesis generally rely on faulty conceptualization. Using surveys of the American mass public and American elites, this article finds that the combination of views that marks classical liberalism does not in fact predict support for free trade at either the mass or the elite level. Support for free trade at the mass level has libertarian, not liberal, foundations, predicted by a combination of social and economic libertarianism. At the mass level, the combination of cosmopolitanism and dovishness that constitutes foreign policy liberalism has no effect on trade attitudes. At the elite level, cosmopolitanism is actually generally negatively associated with support for free trade. Free trade is a wedge issue that creates strange alliances at the elite level between cosmopolitans and isolationists generally hostile to one another on foreign policy and at the mass level between social and economic libertarians typically antagonistic to each other's domestic agenda.

War and Torture as “Just Deserts”

Ordinary citizens sometimes favor making foreign actors �pay� for their crimes at punishment levels that exceed the dictates of national security. In an online survey of adult U.S. citizens, individual differences in the general approval of retributive justice predict support for military responses to international crimes, but only when the casualties are mentioned. Retributivists also are more supportive of torturing captured terrorists. These relationships control for partisanship, ideology, humanitarianism, and hawkish foreign-policy beliefs, and occur only among citizens with low and medium levels of political sophistication. Sophistication increased citizens� reliance on instrumental hawk/dove beliefs, and�in the case of torture�their reliance on political ideology, thus attenuating the temptation to support policies aimed at retribution. These findings suggest that less sophisticated citizens� gut-level desires for retribution heighten their support for the torture of terrorist detainees and for the use of military action to retaliate for vividly described international offenses.

Engaged or Not? Perceptions of Australian Influence among Asian Publics

AbstractDespite Australia's increasing economic ties with Asia, little is known about how it is perceived by the typical citizen in the region. This paper seeks to contribute to the Australian discussion on ‘Asian engagement’, as well as to a general understanding of the structure of foreign policy beliefs, by examining perceptions of Australia's influence among the mass publics of 14 Asian polities. Despite some anxiety in Australia on national op-ed pages and among political leaders over how the country is perceived, we find that the average person in Asia probably does not have a strong or meaningful opinion about Australia's foreign policy. Using survey data covering the years 2006 through 2008 from the AsiaBarometer project, we find that, on average, far more people view Australia's influence on their country favorably (40.5%) than view it unfavorably (6.1%). A similar percentage (41.5%), however, have neutral views of Australia's influence, and 12% of people in Asian nations express no opinion on the topic. We suggest these high frequencies of neutral perceptions and non-response are evidence of considerable indifference towards Australia. Furthermore, we investigate the correlates of perceptions of Australia's influence and find that in almost all cases citizens’ views about US and Chinese influence on their country are much better predictors of their views of Australia's influence than core values, identity, information, and demographic characteristics. We posit that opinions about Australia, even those that are favorable, may have less to do with perceptions of Australia specifically, and more to do with respondents’ general internationalist sentiment or perceptions of major powers.

The Risks of Ignoring Strategic Insolvency

A moment has arrived when a great power with global responsibilities is having a crisis of confidence. Its economy has grown sluggish and it is being overtaken by a number of rising competitors. Financial pressures loom, notably the ability to keep a balance between government revenues and expenses. It is losing long-standing superioritiespsychological as well as technological and numericalin key categories of military power; this great power, whose diplomats and military leaders manage active or potential conflicts from Afghanistan to Europe with treaty alliances as far flung as Japan and Australia, confronts the need for constraints on its global ambitions and posture. This urgent reckoning has been prompted in part by a painful and largely unnecessary counterinsurgency war far from home that cost many times more than initially thought and exhausted the country's overstretched land forces.

Politics and Paradigm Preferences: The Implicit Ideology of International Relations Scholars1

Are international relations scholars objective observers of political events, or do our political preferences influence the way in which we see the world? This article explores that question using data from a survey of international relations scholars. It develops and tests hypotheses about how we might expect adherents of particular paradigms to identify themselves politically on a left-right scale based on the resonance between the content of ideology and the key propositions of different schools of thought in IR. Although they are relatively centrist, I find that realists are the most conservative and right-leaning of international relations scholars, while Liberals are more liberal and left-leaning. Although neither approach has any intrinsic ontological content, rationalism and constructivism also have a distinct ideological profile, the former being more conservative than the latter. Post-positivist epistemological commitments are associated with the political left. More importantly, there is an interaction between ontology and epistemology. Positivism plays a role in breaking the link between political values and paradigm choice. Nonpositivists demonstrate the strongest connection between ideology and international relations approach. I consider the implications of these findings for the use of paradigms in international relations theorizing, arguing that they should make us more circumspect about the use of paradigms in our discipline. Do the political beliefs of those who study international relations affect their beliefs about international relations and the way they study them? Is there an association between the values that guide us in the voting booth and the approaches we adopt in our professional lives? Are we drawn to particular paradigms and epistemologies based on our underlying political opinions? In other words, is our research orientation to some degree ideological, part of an underlying structure of attitudes? Does our prescriptive and normative sense of politics at home influence our positive and empirical understandings about politics abroad? Survey data have indicated that the domestic and foreign policy beliefs at both the mass and elite levels are indeed related (Holsti and Rosenau 1988; Wittkopf 1990; Murray 1996). Is this true of international relations scholars as well? Many in the field would not be surprised to learn that our politics are connected to our political science. Critical theorists and postmodernists reject the notion of the ‘‘subject‐object distinction,’’ that is that international relations scholars can objectively observe and theorize about international politics independent of their values. Political orientation is likely one of those influences. These scholars typically employ post-positivist epistemologies in keeping with this belief. There is some evidence for the contention. In a remarkable book, Oren (2003) traces how the trends in political science and international relations scholarship in the United States are informed and affected by the historical context. Positivistically inclined scholars of international relations, however, would most likely object to this accusation. Although a contentious term, all notions of positivism imply a detached and objective analysis of our phenomena of interest. If there were such an influence, what would it be?

Foreign Policy Beliefs in Contemporary Britain: Structure and Relevance1

This paper examines the structure and domestic political relevance of foreign policy beliefs in contemporary Britain. Confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) of data gathered in five national surveys conducted between May and September 2008 show that the British public's foreign policy beliefs are organized by two latent factors, which we label Liberal Internationalism and British Militarism. These factors closely resemble those reported in studies of the foreign policy beliefs of the American public. Analyses reveal significant covariation between the two foreign policy belief factors and voting intentions, as well as with partisanship and feelings about party leaders—key predictor variables in voting behavior models. These relationships remain significant in the presence of several controls, including measures of incumbent government performance in domestic and foreign policy domains. Demonstrating that foreign policy beliefs matter for the fates of political parties and their leaders helps to explain how public opinion in democratic politics affects the conduct of international relations.

A Study of Foreign Policy Beliefs in American Elites

A Study of Foreign Policy Beliefs in American Elites

Norms, Indian Foreign Policy and the 1998–2004 National Democratic Alliance

How do national and political identities impact on a state's foreign policy? In turn, how does the analysis of different normative beliefs advance our understanding of India's foreign policy during the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) period? This article utilises a norm-based approach to investigate the composite entrenched beliefs underpinning Indian foreign policy. Such an approach generates historically contingent understandings of foreign policy beliefs across different political generations and ideologies. By focusing on pre-1998 Indian government and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) foreign policy norms, and comparing them with the actions of the BJP-led NDA in government, the paper assesses whether differing ideological beliefs either constrain or influence (Indian) foreign policy. In particular, two elements of Indian foreign policy are analysed—dealing with Pakistan and going nuclear—in order to evaluate continuity and change in the formation and development of foreign policy in India. It is found that although the BJP-led NDA were frequently constrained by underlying norms present in Indian foreign policy, their own established policy beliefs often challenged these norms and influenced new foreign policy directions.

Transformation of Korea-U.S. Alliance and North Korean Threat

이 글은 2008년 이명박 정부 출범 이후 한미동맹의 변환과 북한에 대한 핵문제에 관해 한국인들이 어떤 의식을 갖고 있는가를 실증적으로 분석하는 데 목적이 있다. 이 글은 한국인들의 여론구조는 아무런 특성이나 일관성이 결여되어 존재하는 것이 아니라 자신들이 갖는 이념과 외교정책 목적, 그리고 이에 기반하여 특정 외교정책에 대한 지지여부를 표현하는 방식으로 체계적이고 일관적인 구조 형태로 존재한다는 사실을 분석 틀로 사용한다. 이 글은 2008년 6월에 동아시아연구원이 실시한 여론조사 결과를 그 분석대상으로 삼는다. 분석결과는, 첫째, 한국인들은 한미동맹에 관해 강한 신뢰감을 갖고 있고 이는 정권교체와 관계없이 지속성을 띠고 있다. 주한미군의 전략적 유연성 역할에도 긍정적이다. 둘째, 한국인들의 한미동맹에 대한 결의와 북한문제를 보는 견해와는 상당히 밀접한 연관성이 있다. 한미동맹 자체와 시대적 변화를 긍정적으로 보는 한국인들일수록 북한에 대한 위협 인식을 자각하고 북한 핵 문제에 대한 강경한 입장을 보인다. 셋째, 시대적 변화에 따른 한미동맹의 성격변화는 한국인들에게도 불가피한 현실로 받아들여지고 있지만 이는 한미동맹이 균열을 보이는 단초라고 볼 만한 증거는 찾기 어렵다.

The Shape of Elite Opinion on U.S. Foreign Policy, 1992 to 2004

Research has demonstrated considerable diversity in the evolution of foreign policy beliefs of elite opinion leaders. Holsti and Rosenau's three‐headed eagle, Wittkopf's four‐headed eagle, and Rosati and Creed's six‐headed eagle produced a number of categories that help to explain the significance of this diversity since the collapse of the Cold War consensus. This article expands upon this research by observing even greater complexity and diversity in the shape of foreign policy beliefs of elite opinion leaders since the end of the Cold War. Using a content analysis of national opinion and foreign policy journals between 1992 and 2004, it identifies and details nine foreign policy orientations (missionaries, hegemonists, globalizers, global capitalists, narrow realists, progressive internationalists, anti‐imperialists, neighbors, and disengagers) held by elite opinion leaders. It also suggests that elites are altering their foreign policy orientations by absorbing profound global changes into their belief systems.

American Foreign Policy Opinion in 2004: Exploring Underlying Beliefs

This analysis identifies some underlying foreign policy beliefs of Americans in 2004 and explores the impact of those beliefs upon attitudes about specific foreign policies. We find, following Wittkopf (1986, 1987, 1990), that there remains a coherence to American mass foreign policy opinion. Americans can be described as clustering into four belief sets about foreign policy— accommodationists, internationalists, isolationists and hardliners. Further, these beliefs explain variation in public responses regarding specific foreign policies, such as the proper U.S. role in world affairs, the choice of multilateral or unilateral approaches, and support of increased defense spending.

Singapore's foreign policy beliefs as ‘Abridged Realism’: pragmatic and liberal prefixes in the foreign policy thought of Rajaratnam, Lee, Koh, and Mahbubani1

Singapore's foreign policy beliefs as ‘Abridged Realism’: pragmatic and liberal prefixes in the foreign policy thought of Rajaratnam, Lee, Koh, and Mahbubani1

Italy's policy towards European monetary integration: Bringing ideas back in?

This article deals with Italy's policy towards European monetary integration over the period 1978-99 addressing the questions of whether, how and which 'ideas' influenced Italian policy-makers' choices. This theoretically informed and empirically grounded analysis argues that cognitive and normative elements, encompassing both 'economic ideas' and 'foreign policy beliefs', bring significant added value in explaining the 'Italian road' to economic and monetary union (EMU). Secondly, economic ideas alone do not explain Italian policy-makers' choices and, whenever different cognitive factors pulled in opposite directions, it was pro-European foreign policy beliefs that eventually prevailed in shaping policy. Thirdly, both foreign policy beliefs and economic ideas represent an intriguing case of the Europeanization of the Italian élites and the impact that such processes had on the trajectory of the country within the European Union.

Imitation in International Relations: Analogies, Vicarious Learning, and Foreign Policy

Do states learn from other states' experiences in international relations? This is the expectation of prominent theories. But empirical research indicates that foreign policy learning is based overwhelmingly on direct experience. I argue that vicarious learning has not been uncovered because we have not known where to look: there has been no well-developed theory leading to falsifiable expectations. Here I suggest a theory and test it on data for foreign policy beliefs and analogies used by Ukrainian and Russian elites. The results indicate that learning from vicarious success, or imitation, has a strong impact on beliefs following a major failure. This has implications for foreign policy decision making and for concepts of interests and change in systemic theories of international relations.

The Foreign Policy Beliefs of Political Campaign Contributors: A Post‐Cold War Analysis

Objective. In this article we address two questions raised by the literature on the structure of foreign policy beliefs. First, has the end of the Cold War brought about any major changes in these belief systems? Second, how do ideology and economic interests shape these beliefs? Methods. We analyze data from a 1996 survey of U.S. presidential campaign contributors conducted by the Ray Bliss Center to determine the foreign policy belief systems of contributors. We then compare those results to the belief systems found in a 1988 survey of contributors. Results. We find that Cold War belief systems are quite durable. There was surprisingly little change in the structure or content of contributors' foreign policy beliefs between 1988 and 1996. We also find that both ideology and economic interests help shape these beliefs and examine the circumstances under which each of these two considerations appears to have the most important effects. Conclusions. Policymakers face new challenges since the end of the Cold War, but domestic political elites still approach foreign policy with a Cold War perspective. Also, although ideology is very important in determining how individuals think about foreign policy, material interests also make a difference for campaign contributors.

The Role of "Enemy Images" and Ideology of Elite Belief Systems

We use data from the Leadership Opinion Project (LOP), a panel survey of American opinion leaders which brackets the end of the Cold War, to investigate two interrelated questions about the structure of elites' foreign policy beliefs. We assess, first, whether the militant internationalism/cooperative internationalism scheme, developed primarily by Wittkopf (1981, 1990) and Holsti and Rosenau (1990), has continued relevance now that the USSR has collapsed; and second, whether Hurwitz and Peffley's (1987, 1990; see also Peffley and Hurwitz, 1992; Hurwitz, Peffley, and Seligson, 1993) domain-specific, hierarchical model of mass belief structure can be applied to elite belief systems. The evidence indicates that respondents' past stances toward military and cooperative ventures are highly predictive of their views once the Cold War ends. This continuity in leaders' postures toward international affairs, in itself, suggests that “enemy images” of the Soviet Union were less important within elite belief systems than Hurwitz and Peffley (1990; see also Peffley and Hurwitz, 1992) posited for the mass public. The starkest difference, however, between their findings for mass samples and our findings for a leadership sample centers on the importance of ideology in constraining foreign policy beliefs, and the close interconnection with domestic beliefs. Consequently, as we illustrate, predictable ideological divisions among opinion leaders persist in the post-Cold War era. In sum, our evidence demonstrates considerable continuity in elites' beliefs despite profound changes in the global system, and reaffirms the importance that ideology plays in structuring attitudes within elite belief systems.

The convergence of American elites’ domestic beliefs with their foreign policy beliefs

Contemporary scholarship on elites’ foreign policy beliefs is based upon the implicit assumption that the dimensions underpinning these attitudes are separate and distinct from those which undergird attitudes about domestic politics. Indeed, the dominant conception of Americans’ foreign policy beliefs uses labels to describe dimensions—militant internationalism and cooperative internationalism—which are relevant to international affairs but meaningless to domestic policy attitudes and disputes. Such accounts imply that people do not possess common principles, or ideology, that structure beliefs across both issue domains. We argue that the analytical barrier between foreign and domestic policy beliefs is artificial, at least for elite beliefs. Data from the 1988 Foreign Policy Leadership Project survey and the 1988–1992 Leadership Opinion Project panel study demonstrate that foreign and domestic policy beliefs share a common structure. Since this structure is strongly associated with simple self‐placement scores on a left/right continuum, we label it liberalism/conservatism. This finding reaffirms earlier research about the importance of ideology in constraining elites’ beliefs. It also provides a possible explanation for the evidence that elites’ general stances towards militant internationalism and cooperative internationalism have remained remarkably stable despite the end of the Cold War: because these dimensions are anchored in ideology and reflect core values, they were not moved much by transformations within the international arena.

Extending the Three‐ and Four‐Headed Eagles: The Foreign Policy Orientations of American Elites During the 80s and 90s

With the breakdown of the foreign policy consensus of the Cold War years, there has been a resurgence in examining the beliefs of the public and their role in U.S. foreign policy. The most extensive of these studies has been conducted by Holsti and Rosenau who have found first three and then four competing schools of thought. Our purpose is to build off Holsti and Rosenau's analyses and extend their argument. Research based on the content analysis of foreign policy and national opinion journals from 1980 to 1989 demonstrates that there is more diversity and complexity in the range and content of beliefs held by American leaders than Holsti and Rosenau have yet been able to capture through their “three‐” and “four‐headed eagles.” Although the three‐headed eagle serves as a useful scheme for categorizing the broad foreign policy perspectives of American leaders, it de‐emphasizes important differences in beliefs and ignores at least two foreign policy orientations that exist within their general categories. This is not a mere academic exercise, for it sheds light on the level of diversity and complexity of elite beliefs, which enriches an understanding of the politics of U.S. foreign policy since Vietnam. A preliminary examination of foreign policy and national opinion journals from 1990 to 1994 indicates that American elites are changing and adapting while at the same time, they are absorbing profound global changes into their prevailing belief systems, as predicted by the political psychological literature. This suggests that the diversity and complexity present in the 80s is likely to persist and grow throughout the 90s. Our research also suggests the importance of developing alternative methods to complement reliance on survey research in order to capture more fully the diversity and complexity of the foreign policy beliefs of Americans.

The Foreign Policy Beliefs of Political Campaign Contributors

Since the Vietnam War, scholarly interest in public and elite opinion of U.S. foreign policy has grown. Because elites generally have greater access to policy makers and more consistent political views, most work on this topic has focused on elite opinions of foreign policy. Most research has defined the term elite broadly, often placing more emphasis on social status than political power. We will reexamine elite foreign policy beliefs using a different elite, presidential campaign contributors. We have two main goals in this article. First, we will assess the differences between the foreign policy outlooks of political campaign contributors and other elites. While many types of elites may influence policy, political contributors are particularly likely to gain access to policy makers. The second part of this research note offers some food for thought on the origins of these beliefs. We present evidence that foreign policy beliefs are related to the same ideological orientations that shape contributors' views on domestic issues. The origins of foreign and domestic policy views should probably be considered together.

Anchors against change: American opinion leaders' beliefs after the Cold War

The end of the Cold War also ended the organizing paradigm of American foreign policy since World War II, containment of Communism. How the attitudes towards American involvement abroad of opinion leaders were affected by the collapse of the Soviet Union is critical in predicting the shape of future American foreign policy. Shoon Murray investigates how American leaders' foreign policy opinions changed once they revised their views about the Soviet Union and explores what this tells us about the sources and structure of their belief system.The end of the Cold War provides a rare opportunity to explore the causal connection between external circumstances and Americans' belief systems. While it is true that, for Americans, the denouement of the Cold War was a peaceful process, and therefore less shocking and traumatic than some past wars, the event still marked an enormous change within the international environment. If Americans' perceptions about the former Soviet Union did in fact dictate many other foreign policy beliefs then we could expect deep attitudinal change to accompany the end of the Cold War.Murray argues that the upheavals in the international system had only limited effect on the foreign policy beliefs of American leaders and that opinion leaders have adhered to their old postures about how the United States should conduct itself in the world. Murray explains this continuity by finding a strong relationship between the domestic beliefs of leaders and their orientation toward American activities abroad. Domestic political orientation was a stronger influence on the elite's attitude toward foreign policy than the elite's image of the Soviet Union. Murray suggests that elite political actors apply the same or kindred values to circumstances at home and abroad.This book will appeal to social scientists interested in studying elite opinion as well as students of the foreign policy process and those interested in the formation of American foreign policy in the post cold war era.Shoon Kathleen Murray is Assistant Professor of Political Science, School of International Service, American University, Washington, D.C.