Introducing Foreign Policy Analysis

Summary

In this lecture, Jess Blankshane introduces Foreign Policy Analysis (FPA), explaining it as a subfield of international relations focused on understanding how policies are made and their real-world effects. The lecture covers key analytical frameworks, including Levels of Analysis (systemic, state, individual), various perspectives on foreign policy decision-making (unitary state, organizational process, bureaucratic politics, etc.), and Putnam’s Two-Level Games, which examine how international negotiations overlap with domestic politics. These models help create a toolkit for analyzing foreign policy from different angles, integrating both domestic and international factors.

Takeaways

• 😀 Foreign policy analysis is an academic field that focuses on understanding how foreign policies are made and their effects.
• 😀 It involves studying cause-and-effect relationships between policy-making processes, actions, and real-world outcomes.
• 😀 Foreign policy analysis is not deterministic, and analysts must consider uncertainty and think probabilistically about outcomes.
• 😀 Descriptive analysis predicts or explains events, while normative analysis makes value judgments about how things should be.
• 😀 In this course, the focus is primarily on descriptive analysis—predicting and explaining outcomes rather than evaluating them.
• 😀 Models and frameworks are used to simplify the world and focus on specific aspects of foreign policy.
• 😀 Levels of analysis, based on Ken Waltz's work, categorize theories into systemic, state, and individual levels.
• 😀 The unitary state perspective sees the state as an actor optimizing its decisions for the best possible outcome.
• 😀 The organizational process perspective sees organizations within a government as key actors that process information and act based on pre-existing procedures.
• 😀 Bureaucratic politics involves bargaining among organizations or their representatives, resulting in policies that reflect their interests.
• 😀 Two-level games, based on Robert Putnam's theory, explore the interaction between domestic and international politics, where foreign policy outcomes are shaped by both internal and external negotiations.

Q & A

What is foreign policy analysis?

Foreign policy analysis refers to the academic subfield of international relations that focuses on understanding how policy is made, analyzing the processes and outcomes of policy decisions, and identifying cause-and-effect relationships. It involves studying policy-making processes and predicting the likely effects of different policies.

What is the difference between descriptive and normative analysis?

Descriptive analysis aims to understand how things are in the world and focuses on explaining what happened or predicting future outcomes. Normative analysis, on the other hand, makes value judgments about what should be done or what would be good in a given situation, evaluating policies based on their desirability.

What are the primary types of analysis discussed in the script?

The primary types of analysis discussed are predictive (descriptive before events happen), explanatory (descriptive after events happen), advocacy (normative before events happen), and evaluation (normative after events happen). The focus in this course is mainly on predictive and explanatory analysis.

What is the purpose of using models or frameworks in foreign policy analysis?

Models or frameworks are used to simplify complex realities and help focus on specific aspects of a case or policy. They provide a structured way to analyze different dimensions of policy-making, allowing analysts to make sense of the world and predict or explain outcomes more effectively.

What are the three major frameworks discussed in the script for analyzing foreign policy?

The three major frameworks are: 1) Levels of Analysis, which organizes theories based on the scope of their focus (systemic, state, or individual); 2) Analytical Perspectives on Foreign Policy Decision-Making, based on Graham Allison's models, focusing on different actors and their behaviors; and 3) Two-Level Games, which integrates the interaction between domestic and international politics in policy-making.

What is the 'Levels of Analysis' framework, and how does it categorize explanations of world events?

The 'Levels of Analysis' framework categorizes explanations based on three levels: 1) The systemic (international) level, which looks at interactions between states and their global environment; 2) The state and societal level, which focuses on the structure and political culture of states; and 3) The individual level, which examines how individual leaders and their backgrounds influence decisions.

What is the Unit of Analysis in Graham Allison's model of decision-making?

In Graham Allison's model, the unit of analysis refers to the primary actor in decision-making, which can be a state or organization. The model assumes that the state (or organization) acts as a rational actor, optimizing its decisions to achieve desired outcomes.

How does the Organizational Process Perspective differ from the Unitary State Perspective?

The Unitary State Perspective assumes that a state acts as a rational actor, optimizing decisions based on available options. In contrast, the Organizational Process Perspective focuses on the actions of organizations within the government, where decisions are influenced by pre-existing procedures, organizational culture, and the way these institutions process information.

What does the Bureaucratic Politics Perspective focus on in foreign policy decision-making?

The Bureaucratic Politics Perspective focuses on how decisions are made through bargaining between organizations within the government, with each organization represented by its leaders. These leaders advocate for their organization's interests, resulting in compromise policies based on bureaucratic interests.

What is the main concept behind Putnam's Two-Level Games theory?

Putnam's Two-Level Games theory explains that foreign policy is shaped by overlapping negotiations at both the international and domestic levels. A country's lead negotiator must balance the demands of international negotiations with the interests and constraints of domestic constituencies, thus creating a complex interaction between both levels.