Annotated Bibliography 1

Mintz, A., & DeRouen, K. R,. 2010, ‘Understanding foreign policy decision making, pp. 1-11, New York, Cambridge University Press

In this book Mintz and DeRouen states the decision making approach in the study of foreign policy analysis. The essence of the approach as it explains the processes and outcomes of decisions made at the international stage as well as the decision dynamics. The provision of real world case studies where leaders of countries such as the US, Israel, New Zealand, Cuba, Iceland, United Kingdom and others decisions are exemplified.

The authors were both qualified professionals in many several fields such as International Relations, Political Science, Peace & Conflict and Psychology. The information shared was vastly through methodological experiment and their personal knowledge. There were many other books, journal articles and reviews that were also consulted to gain data. Some of these sources were both these author’s works. The research carried out is tremendous.

The emphasis of the literature was on the breaking down of Foreign Policy Decision Making into four main dimensions. The decision environment explains, the types of decisions, levels of analysis and biases in foreign policy decision making. The models of FPDM particularly emphasizes on the rational actor model and its alternatives such as Bureaucratic Politics. Moreover on the determinants of FPDM which are the psychological, international and domestic factors that influence or affect decision making, then the marketing of decisions such as the Marketing of the US Invasion of Grenada in 1983.

The book is very useful to my study in the unit IR333 Foreign Policy Analysis as the works in the literature obviously helps me to understand Foreign Policy Decision Making.  It gives a perspective based on theories, concepts and its respective case studies to justify the information given more clearly. The works explain twelve types of decisions made in the three levels of analysis. It gives a clear understanding of how the environment, psychological, international and domestic factors influence individuals, groups and coalitions to make any of the 12 decisions. It typifies prior examples like decision to attack Iraq, occupy Iraq, increase or decrease troop levels, whether to withdraw or stay and finally when the operation should end to illustrate sequential decision making and the case study of Israel’s Foreign Policy Making by Coalition. The others explained similarly and descriptions of the seventeen different types of biases such as the misperception of Saddam Hussein that led Iraq to Invade Kuwait on the perception that US would not intervene in the border dispute between Iraq and Kuwait. The outcomes of Saddam Hussein’s misperception, was Iraq’s economic crisis. There is also the case of US decision to invade Iraq in 2003 on the basis justified by the British Administration that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and threatened the security of the Middle East and US. The case of New Zealand’s defiance of the United States and the ANZUS Treaty analyses the rational actor model where it showed that NZ decision to formulate the policy of preventing nuclear ship visits was irrational and the outcomes were depraved as such where NZ security was destabilized during the Cold War. The other five models of decision making explains Foreign Policy Decisions.

The main limitation of the book was straight focus on the decision making approaches in Foreign Policy Analysis.

Thus, the authors stated that foreign policy decision making is a complicated task made by individuals such as presidents, groups like congress and coalitions like in parliamentary democracies because foreign policy problems are deeply complex. It was indicated there is no single means of accessing and understanding FPDM and the overview will help set the stage for further integration of the different approaches to FPDM.

The book will be very useful in my research as being a student in International Relations but mainly the unit Foreign Policy Analysis. The unit is about critically analysing the foreign policy decisions made in the international system. A fair understanding of FPDM vastly fits in line with the research and will be very helpful particularly on decision making approaches. The authors put a tremendous effort and I would recommend this book for all PNG Studies & International Relations students in Divine Word University.