Mintz, A., & DeRouen, K. R., 2010, ‘Understanding foreign policy decision making, pp. 121-129, New York, Cambridge University Press, Retrieved from https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/0c7a/42d12a3710ba23fea4459fa2515728d0683f.pdf
Alex Mintz is currently the dean of Launder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy at IDC-Herzliya, Israel. The recipient of the Distinguished Scholar Award for distinguished contribution to the field from the Foreign Policy Analysis of the International Studies Association. He has published edited or co-edited nine books and is an author of multiple articles in top journals such as the American Political Science Review and American Journal of Political Science.
Karl DeRouen Jr. is a Professor of Political Science, Director of the International Studies Program and a college of Arts and Science Leadership Board Faculty Fellow at the University of Alabama. His works have appeared in a number of journals such as Journal of Politics, International Organizations, Journal of Peace research and so forth. He is currently working on Civil war related projects funded by the Folke Bernadotte Academy of Sweden and the Marsden Fund of New Zealand and a National Science Foundation funded project on negotiated settlements.
In the chapter of determinants in foreign policy decision making the authors focus mainly on the influence of international factors. According the authors, in an interactive setting adversaries and allies affect foreign policy decisions like the US foreign policy during the Georgian crisis in the summer of 2008 that was implemented in response to Russia’s actions in Georgia. The international factors that influence foreign policy decisions include arms race, deterrence, the regime type of adversary, strategic surprise and alliances.
The authors sought to target foreign policy makers and students of international relations who would one day be foreign policy decision makers in order for them to critically analyze and understand the various international factors that sways FPDM. For example, by understanding cognitive factors in regards to deterrence, foreign policy makers will avoid decisions such as Saddam Hussein misperceiving the US commitment to defend Kuwait.
The methodology used was by consulting works of various scholars such as Michael Wallace with his tinderbox and preparedness hypothesis to explain how arms races influence foreign policy decisions.
They further elaborate on the different international factors, firstly on how general deterrence and extended deterrence plays role in an anarchic international system. The authors then emphasize on arms races by defining them as competitive bouts of defense spending and military capability building between two states or coalitions like during the Cold War. The authors used Wallace’s hypothesis to provide explanations on how wars occur and why wars do not escalate in in terms of arms race. However, based on Diehl’s study the authors explained that arms race does not have any link with war. On the other hand, the authors used the Prisoners Dilemma to explicate how arms racing can keep on or to stop and cooperate. Another factor discussed was strategic surprise where an unexpected target is hit by force in an unexpected way at an unexpected time. For example, the famous 9/11 attacks on the US, that shifted US foreign policy to ‘either you with us or against us’. In terms of alliance the military is the most common form which was defined as agreement between signatory states that clarify what each will do in the event of armed aggression. For example, the leaders of Turkey and Greece were faced with decisions when invited to join the NATO alliance. The authors explained the three types of military alliances which are neutrality pact, commitment and defense pacts. Lastly, the authors described how the regime type of adversary becomes an influential factor when a state faces a decision during an international crisis. They provided the normative and structured models that explains democratic peace phenomenon.
The literature is essential in the unit Foreign Policy Analysis because it provides the international factors that influence foreign policy decision making along with descriptive explanations and the illustration of examples to justify statements or facts. The main limitation was the minor focus on deterrence and alliances.
The authors concluded that deterrence theory is understood through the rational lens. Arms race leads crisis that escalate to war and Game theory can be used to understand arms race. They can also be related to outbreak of war. When the adversary is a democracy, leaders of democracies eliminate the attack alternative because attacking another democracy would be viewed as a failure of foreign policy. The information is important for all the students of PNG Studies and International Relations students. The vocabulary used was very simple and easy to understand.
whatsREEL 