US Foreign Policy: Class of September 24, 2004
US Foreign Policy
Class of September 24, 2004
Problem of the tyranny of the majority in democracy
- dissidence is not necessarily a problem because it addresses the weaknesses of a given policy. Dissidence as a purpose. But delaying policy making as its own cost.
5 axis to organize the context of foreign policy
1) Relationship b/w the President and the Congress
4 ways:
a) Cooperation
b) Constructive Compromises
i. listening
ii. negotiate
iii. redesign & improve the policy
c) Institutional Competition
i. Happens when 2 different parties share the executive and the legislative powers. This is a turf-war: both group enters in conflict over their role in policy-making. Majority in Congress can be defiant of President. This doesn’t happen in parliamentary democracies because of what professor call “party-discipline fetishism”
d) Confrontation
Constitutionally, the President and the Congress share similar powers. It is not a question of separations of powers here.
- The Congress as the power over declaring war
- Treatise: the President signs the documents but it’s up to Congress to approve or disprove
- Executive arrangements: a mechanism that allows lesser important decisions to forgo senate approval.
- Declamatory commitments: the President has the power to withdraw from existing treatise without approval from Congress. For example, Bush withdrew unilaterally from the 1972 ABM treaty with Russia.
Executive power:
- Executive orders (decree power): rarely used in the US. Presidential pardons are a good example of this. It often characterizes an authoritarian ‘democracy’, like Menem’s presidency in Argentina in the course of the 1990’s.
- Veto power: the power to block legislation
- Informal power: the personality of the President plays a role, as well as his relations with Congress and the status of his advisors in the Washington circuits.
The role of the president: he’s addressing the people, he has a great audience, he therefore more often than not has a greater reach than the Congress. Through this, he has a capacity to transform the public opinion through speeches.
Legislative powers: Not a rubber stamp machine! The congress as an active role in policy-making.
a) Active role over the substance, content of policies (through committees, sub-committees).
b) Over procedure: can slow down the process, multiple steps, delay adoption of policies.
c) Ability to say how much a policy will be granted, in terms of financing, and until when.
Pattern of appropriate policy-making decisions in US foreign policy.
Means available to office of the President to make sound decisions:
- good information: the executive needs to have reliable info.
- Processing the info: Nowadays, there is way too much information. Executive has to distinguish between good, bad & irrelevant info. Ex: 9/11 commission finding out that executive actually had relevant information not dully processed prior 9/11.
- Identify options: policy options, evaluation of different avenues.
- Make decision
- Implement policy: putting into operation given decision.
- “Fine-tuning”: give room to evaluate and improve policy after a period of time.
A word about Bush “consistency” (vs. change and adaptation)
Bush is trying to make an advantage out of what is actually a bad trait. Politic is never consistent: has the terrain situation change, a policy must be flexible enough to adapt.
Role of the US President
a) Knowledge of foreign affairs and policies
This does matter. If the President is not well aware, he’ll have to rely upon advisors. ‘Puppet President’. Altough, if the President is knowledgeable, it might give him twitches and preconceptions that might not me helpful: Cold-War solutions to today’s problems, for examples.
b) Personality of the President and ability to influence.
c) ‘Belief system’ of the President
- According to values, some people are more willing than others to find middle-ground
- Presidents do make decisions according to their own beliefs.
d) The President as a politician influences policy-making
Pre-election commitments may not materialize in post-election reality!
Role of advisors of President in foreign policy making
Whether a president is knowledgeable or not upon foreign affairs, he is surrounded by many advisors.
a) help processing the info, to determine policy options and to take decisions.
b) Advisors, ideally, do not all agree: this helps to have a debate, assess weaknesses in reasoning and options presented. This is the purpose of having a good number of advisors: if they al say the same thing, this will have consequences upon policies (short-view). The President’s personality comes into play here: his relationship with advisors plays a role. Ex: Colin Powell’s dissident voice was marginalized within the group of Bush’s advisors.
2) Bureaucratic politics:
Bureaucracy is a big machine, difficult to control entirely, and where it is often hard to see information being communicated properly. Ex: lack of exchanges between agencies like CIA and FBI, inter-agencies competitions, not willing to recognize and assess powers they share.
State Department: the foreign policy bureaucracy
The bureaucracy concerned with FP has been around & played a role in FP making for longer than any president as been in exercise.
The info in the SD goes up and down the dept.
This bureaucracy is needed.
Foreign affairs network: There is a vast network of bureaucracies who focus on foreign affairs, on economic policies, on intelligence. They all play a role in FP making.
3) Interest Groups:
a) economic IG: US multinationals in Latin-America did constitute an important interest group that influenced US FP in Latin-America in the past.
b) Identity groups: Cubans of Miami, Jewish influences on US middle-eastern & Israel politic, Latinos of California
c) Groups organized around political issues: environmental groups, anti or pro abortion groups. Usually they are one-issue groups continually engaging Congress to shape policy according to their stand. This – like environmental issues – shapes FP making since some internal issues are being internationalized, like US environmental laws (Kyoto accords, effects of pollution abroad).
d) Influence of foreign governments: for example, the influence of the Saudis on FP making in the US. This is tricky since it technically threatens the sovereignty of a nation. Responding favourably to a foreign government lobbying can also be seen as selling out in the public opinion.
Strategies of interest groups to alter policy making
A) lobbying the Congress
- by lobbying members of committees, members of specific constituencies.
- This takes place at every (5) stages of policy-making:
a) when policy is being spelled out
b) when it’s going before committees
c) when the vote happens on legislations
d) when it goes upon revision
e) during the appropriation (funding) of policy
B) lobbying the President
- through briefs sent to the White House
- through friends and relations that have direct access to the President
C) Through the public opinion
- Through medias: interest groups project their opinions
- ‘Protest politics’: marches, manifestations, rallies
D) By mean of money
- ‘Corruption Index’
- A strategy that is hard to measure: open to speculation
How influential really are the different IG?
- hard to measure what does determine a policy, but IG have an impact and contribute to changes in FP making, although it is yet to be empirically studied
4) The Medias
- Medias simply echoes what policy makers say
- In the US, there is private ownership of medias. In some other countries, there is state-ownership, and/or strong state control of media regulations.
- Private ownership sometimes creates problems, like possible conflicts of interests.
- The problem of the concentration of large news-medias ownership into too few hands (5/6 companies currently controls 90% of medias in the US). This affects representativity.
- If it happens that there is a coincidence of interest b/w a given party and given media owners, this can affect the treatment of the news.
- Medias monopolizes the mediatic access of parties.
Setting the agenda:
- One would think this is the job the President or/and of Congress. To a certain extent, this is true.
- But media involvement and reporting of issues put – or do not - the ‘spotlight’ over issues – as well as giving an a one-dimensional view about given issue.
- Media is the one most reliable tool to influence public opinion.
- Influence of medias as an influence over policy-makers: the ‘tone’ given to issues are seen as a ‘feedback’ by policy-makers, that will in turn try to shape policies in order to please medias and get favourable ‘tone’ & ‘feedback’.
4) The Public Opinion
Professor asks: how ignorant are we? As far as foreign policy making is concerned, public opinion should not be considered at all, says he.
PO is a strange thing. For ex: 50% of anti-globalization protesters do not know what exactly they are protesting against.
But the public learns over a period of time. Ex: at the beginning there was opposition to ‘globalization’, but it as evolve more concretely toward ‘fair trade’.
So: only over a period of time does PO can be recognized as reliable.
Elected leaders are responsive to PO, albeit it is a strange relationship. They also try to shape the public opinion by various means.
Studies shows that, left or right governments, adopted policies in accordance with ideologies tend to be adopted in first 2 years of tenures. Than, left or right, policies will make a shift towards the center.
This Bush administration although seems less to make this move toward the center.
Class of September 24, 2004
Problem of the tyranny of the majority in democracy
- dissidence is not necessarily a problem because it addresses the weaknesses of a given policy. Dissidence as a purpose. But delaying policy making as its own cost.
5 axis to organize the context of foreign policy
1) Relationship b/w the President and the Congress
4 ways:
a) Cooperation
b) Constructive Compromises
i. listening
ii. negotiate
iii. redesign & improve the policy
c) Institutional Competition
i. Happens when 2 different parties share the executive and the legislative powers. This is a turf-war: both group enters in conflict over their role in policy-making. Majority in Congress can be defiant of President. This doesn’t happen in parliamentary democracies because of what professor call “party-discipline fetishism”
d) Confrontation
Constitutionally, the President and the Congress share similar powers. It is not a question of separations of powers here.
- The Congress as the power over declaring war
- Treatise: the President signs the documents but it’s up to Congress to approve or disprove
- Executive arrangements: a mechanism that allows lesser important decisions to forgo senate approval.
- Declamatory commitments: the President has the power to withdraw from existing treatise without approval from Congress. For example, Bush withdrew unilaterally from the 1972 ABM treaty with Russia.
Executive power:
- Executive orders (decree power): rarely used in the US. Presidential pardons are a good example of this. It often characterizes an authoritarian ‘democracy’, like Menem’s presidency in Argentina in the course of the 1990’s.
- Veto power: the power to block legislation
- Informal power: the personality of the President plays a role, as well as his relations with Congress and the status of his advisors in the Washington circuits.
The role of the president: he’s addressing the people, he has a great audience, he therefore more often than not has a greater reach than the Congress. Through this, he has a capacity to transform the public opinion through speeches.
Legislative powers: Not a rubber stamp machine! The congress as an active role in policy-making.
a) Active role over the substance, content of policies (through committees, sub-committees).
b) Over procedure: can slow down the process, multiple steps, delay adoption of policies.
c) Ability to say how much a policy will be granted, in terms of financing, and until when.
Pattern of appropriate policy-making decisions in US foreign policy.
Means available to office of the President to make sound decisions:
- good information: the executive needs to have reliable info.
- Processing the info: Nowadays, there is way too much information. Executive has to distinguish between good, bad & irrelevant info. Ex: 9/11 commission finding out that executive actually had relevant information not dully processed prior 9/11.
- Identify options: policy options, evaluation of different avenues.
- Make decision
- Implement policy: putting into operation given decision.
- “Fine-tuning”: give room to evaluate and improve policy after a period of time.
A word about Bush “consistency” (vs. change and adaptation)
Bush is trying to make an advantage out of what is actually a bad trait. Politic is never consistent: has the terrain situation change, a policy must be flexible enough to adapt.
Role of the US President
a) Knowledge of foreign affairs and policies
This does matter. If the President is not well aware, he’ll have to rely upon advisors. ‘Puppet President’. Altough, if the President is knowledgeable, it might give him twitches and preconceptions that might not me helpful: Cold-War solutions to today’s problems, for examples.
b) Personality of the President and ability to influence.
c) ‘Belief system’ of the President
- According to values, some people are more willing than others to find middle-ground
- Presidents do make decisions according to their own beliefs.
d) The President as a politician influences policy-making
Pre-election commitments may not materialize in post-election reality!
Role of advisors of President in foreign policy making
Whether a president is knowledgeable or not upon foreign affairs, he is surrounded by many advisors.
a) help processing the info, to determine policy options and to take decisions.
b) Advisors, ideally, do not all agree: this helps to have a debate, assess weaknesses in reasoning and options presented. This is the purpose of having a good number of advisors: if they al say the same thing, this will have consequences upon policies (short-view). The President’s personality comes into play here: his relationship with advisors plays a role. Ex: Colin Powell’s dissident voice was marginalized within the group of Bush’s advisors.
2) Bureaucratic politics:
Bureaucracy is a big machine, difficult to control entirely, and where it is often hard to see information being communicated properly. Ex: lack of exchanges between agencies like CIA and FBI, inter-agencies competitions, not willing to recognize and assess powers they share.
State Department: the foreign policy bureaucracy
The bureaucracy concerned with FP has been around & played a role in FP making for longer than any president as been in exercise.
The info in the SD goes up and down the dept.
This bureaucracy is needed.
Foreign affairs network: There is a vast network of bureaucracies who focus on foreign affairs, on economic policies, on intelligence. They all play a role in FP making.
3) Interest Groups:
a) economic IG: US multinationals in Latin-America did constitute an important interest group that influenced US FP in Latin-America in the past.
b) Identity groups: Cubans of Miami, Jewish influences on US middle-eastern & Israel politic, Latinos of California
c) Groups organized around political issues: environmental groups, anti or pro abortion groups. Usually they are one-issue groups continually engaging Congress to shape policy according to their stand. This – like environmental issues – shapes FP making since some internal issues are being internationalized, like US environmental laws (Kyoto accords, effects of pollution abroad).
d) Influence of foreign governments: for example, the influence of the Saudis on FP making in the US. This is tricky since it technically threatens the sovereignty of a nation. Responding favourably to a foreign government lobbying can also be seen as selling out in the public opinion.
Strategies of interest groups to alter policy making
A) lobbying the Congress
- by lobbying members of committees, members of specific constituencies.
- This takes place at every (5) stages of policy-making:
a) when policy is being spelled out
b) when it’s going before committees
c) when the vote happens on legislations
d) when it goes upon revision
e) during the appropriation (funding) of policy
B) lobbying the President
- through briefs sent to the White House
- through friends and relations that have direct access to the President
C) Through the public opinion
- Through medias: interest groups project their opinions
- ‘Protest politics’: marches, manifestations, rallies
D) By mean of money
- ‘Corruption Index’
- A strategy that is hard to measure: open to speculation
How influential really are the different IG?
- hard to measure what does determine a policy, but IG have an impact and contribute to changes in FP making, although it is yet to be empirically studied
4) The Medias
- Medias simply echoes what policy makers say
- In the US, there is private ownership of medias. In some other countries, there is state-ownership, and/or strong state control of media regulations.
- Private ownership sometimes creates problems, like possible conflicts of interests.
- The problem of the concentration of large news-medias ownership into too few hands (5/6 companies currently controls 90% of medias in the US). This affects representativity.
- If it happens that there is a coincidence of interest b/w a given party and given media owners, this can affect the treatment of the news.
- Medias monopolizes the mediatic access of parties.
Setting the agenda:
- One would think this is the job the President or/and of Congress. To a certain extent, this is true.
- But media involvement and reporting of issues put – or do not - the ‘spotlight’ over issues – as well as giving an a one-dimensional view about given issue.
- Media is the one most reliable tool to influence public opinion.
- Influence of medias as an influence over policy-makers: the ‘tone’ given to issues are seen as a ‘feedback’ by policy-makers, that will in turn try to shape policies in order to please medias and get favourable ‘tone’ & ‘feedback’.
4) The Public Opinion
Professor asks: how ignorant are we? As far as foreign policy making is concerned, public opinion should not be considered at all, says he.
PO is a strange thing. For ex: 50% of anti-globalization protesters do not know what exactly they are protesting against.
But the public learns over a period of time. Ex: at the beginning there was opposition to ‘globalization’, but it as evolve more concretely toward ‘fair trade’.
So: only over a period of time does PO can be recognized as reliable.
Elected leaders are responsive to PO, albeit it is a strange relationship. They also try to shape the public opinion by various means.
Studies shows that, left or right governments, adopted policies in accordance with ideologies tend to be adopted in first 2 years of tenures. Than, left or right, policies will make a shift towards the center.
This Bush administration although seems less to make this move toward the center.
posted by Jean-Sébastien Lévesque at 7:26 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home