Foreign Policy Orientation, Strategic Interaction, and the Initiation of International Crises

In recent years, scholars studying U.S. foreign policy and the diversionary use of force have begun to focus more attention on when foreign regimes time crises with the U.S. Many argue that U.S. domestic conditions play a role in this. I argue that these models should take into consideration the foreign policy relationship between foreign governments and the U.S. I develop a theory of crisis initiation that considers the foreign policy orientation of states that may initiate a crisis with the U.S., and second, when the crisis may occur. I argue that by virtue of their foreign policy orientation, some regime leaders will be more likely than others to initiate a crisis with the U.S. Those regimes that are either closely aligned with the U.S. or closely identified with anti-U.S. interests will be much more likely to initiate crises with the U.S. than those whose foreign policy interests do not lead to such intimate ties of friendship or enmity. I develop and test hypotheses predicting what regime characteristics will be predictive of crisis initiation and when such crises are likely to occur. The results demonstrate that regime type matters more than U.S. domestic conditions in predicting where and when crises involving the U.S. will take place.     

Darfur and Sino-U.S. Relations

The Darfur issue has been influencing the Sino-U.S. relationship since July 2004. There are at least three reasons to say so. Firstly, China and the U.S. disagree,both on the nature of the issue and on its solution. Secondly,China and the U.S. have conflicting interests, especially their oil interests in Sudan and the African continent.Finally, U.S. domestic political forces have forced the issue onto the agenda of Sino-U.S. relations. Although the issue has become an unharmonious factor in the Sino-U.S.relationship, it has not damaged the bilateral relations too much. Instead, the two countries have been cooperating on the issue.     

Looking Beyond the National Level: Foreign Direct Investment Attraction in U.S. States

International relations scholars need to look beyond the national level because U.S. states and governors are increasingly important actors in world politics. One way to look at their international activities is by examining the ways in which U.S. states seek to attract foreign direct investment (FDI), just one research puzzle at the nexus of international relations and U.S. state politics, two fields that rarely talk to one another. After pointing out the gaps within theories from international relations and international political economy, this paper describes the evolving global roles of both U.S. states and governors and shows how U.S. states attract FDI through the use of their international offices and governor-led overseas missions. Empirical findings indicate that U.S. states' international offices and a higher level of economic interdependence help states attract FDI, and the paper argues that extension of institutional approaches from IPE may be valuable for future research about the international capabilities of subnational governments and their leaders.     

A Comparative Study of China＇s Foreign Aid

Chinese development assistance is totally different in nature in comparison with the aid offered by the United States and Japan. The U.S. sees its aid as a form of "mercy" to less-developed countries and gives it with numerous conditions attached. Japan seems to mainly use it to pursue commercial interests. By contrast, Chinese aid is, in essence, cooperation and mutual support between developing countries. This fundamental difference helps to explain why Beijing's aid is so different from that of the Western donors.     

Towards convergence and cooperation in the global development finance regime: closing Africa's policy space?

The revival of China's interest in Africa is often highlighted as being an opportunity to provide African governments with a choice between development partners that may strengthen negotiation leverage and thereby carve out policy space to define and implement policies that affect social and economic development. This article critically reviews the most recent developments in Chinese and Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) approaches to development finance to Africa. It argues that although we can detect a number of incidents that point towards more policy space for African governments, the revival of China's development finance does not fundamentally alter the power relations between African countries and their financiers, as the tendency now is towards convergence and cooperation between China and Development Assistance Committee (DAC) donors—not divergence and competition, which could have created policy space as it did prior to the end of the Cold War. This follows the trend of other ‘emerging’ donors who increasingly play by DAC rules and thereby minimize the future possibility of playing out one partner against the other.     

U.S. Policy Towards Southeast Asia

Greater East Asia is expected to be the next theatre for world politics. 1 East Asian cooperation is rapidly developing through the channels of ASEAN Plus Three （APT） and East Asia Summit （EAS）, both driven by ASEAN. Southeast Asia is a region of diverse states and cultures that brings together all the major powers of the Asian-Pacific in a myriad of strategic interests. It is thus an open arena with the potential for a variety of strategic game-playing, options, and uncertain outcomes.2 In recent years, China＇s developing relationship with Southeast Asia has undergone a significant shift as the U.S.＇ distraction elsewhere and neglect of the region have created opportunities for an increased Chinese diplomatic and economic role in Southeast Asia.3 U.S. analysts are concerned about what may lie behind this shift in China-ASEAN relations, how it may affect American interests in the region and how best to react to the changes. Some have expressed concerns that to avoid becoming distanced from the region the U.S. should pay more attention to Southeast Asia, rather than just watching from a distance. This paper attempts to analyze the possible changes of U.S. policy towards Southeast Asia in the current context of East Asian Cooperation and its implications for China.     

U.S. Foreign Aid and UN Voting: An Analysis of Important Issues

Many previous studies assessed the effectiveness of U.S. foreign aid by focusing on voting coincidence rates of all UN votes and found no relationship between U.S. aid distribution and UN voting coincidence rates. Most UN resolutions, however, are simply not important enough for the U.S. to expend its scarce resources in influencing the outcomes. The U.S. government would not be likely to exercise pressure on all UN resolutions but would do so on issues considered vital to America's national interests. If there is any effect from receiving U.S. foreign aid on political outcomes in the UN, it is therefore most likely to emerge in voting coincidence rates on important issues. Using data collected for sixty-five developing countries between 1984 and 1993, a pooled cross-sectional and time-series research design is adopted to examine this hypothesis. Contrary to the argument that foreign aid is an ineffective policy instrument in the pursuit of America's global influence, the currentfindings suggest that the U.S. government has successfully utilized foreign aid programs to induce foreign policy compliance in the UN on issues that are vital to America's national interests.     

Balance of Power Politics and the Rise of China: Accommodation and Balancing in East Asia

Realists agree that great powers balance the military power of rising powers, but there is little agreement regarding secondary-state responses to rising powers. First, there are differences regarding whether secondary states balance or accommodate rising powers. Second, there are differences among realists regarding the distinct roles of economic and military factors in secondary-state alignment policies. Third, some scholars argue that state alignments are not necessarily determined by realist variables, but can reflect preferences shaped by intentions, historical experiences, or cultural influences. This paper addresses these issues in balance-of-power theory. Its empirical focus is the impact of the rise of China on secondary-state alignments in East Asia. After examining the complex mix of China's military and economic reach in East Asia, it concludes that secondary-state behavior is sensitive to local variation in the great power capabilities and that secondary states tend to accommodate rather than balance rising powers. It further concludes that economic capabilities alone are insufficient to generate accommodation, so that the political-economy literature should reexamine cases of apparent secondary-state accommodation to economic dependency, sensitive to the presence of military vulnerability on the part these secondary states to proximate great powers. These conclusions suggest that there is nothing sui generis or culturally-determined in East Asian international politics and that realism can explain alignment behavior among East Asian states as well as it does among European states. Research on East Asia's response to China's rise that is sensitive to intra-regional variations in U.S. and Chinese military and economic capabilities also challenges assumptions of an emerging Chinese regional hegemony or of a costly region-wide U.S.-China competition.     

The Confluence of Domestic and International Interests: U.S. Policy Toward Cuba, 1998–2001

This article examines the confluence of forces at work to shape U.S. policy toward Cuba since the late 1990s. Our approach examines four key factors involved in policymaking toward Cuba in this period: (1) the entry of new interest groups into the Cuba policy process and an "entrepreneurial" Congress; (2) the executive's constitutionally based interests; (3) bureaucratic interests; and (4) pressure from outside the United States. We examine U.S.–Cuba policy by describing each determinant in isolation and then by looking at the dynamic interaction among them, showing how they are linked together. In doing so, we argue that an analysis including multiple factors better explains U.S. policy toward Cuba than one that focuses on a single factor such as the power of the Cuban-American community.     

Chinese Military Power: What Vexes the United States and Why?

The enhancement of Chinese military power over the past decade is generating ample debate over its meaning and consequences for American security interests. China's characterization in larger conceptions of U.S. national security strategy has experienced repeated shifts over the decades. China is now an arrived major power according to virtually all relevant power criteria, without U.S. policy makers conclusively resolving the implications of China's military modernization for American security interests. Comparable uncertainties bedevil Chinese thinking about American military power. The latent elements of strategic rivalry (if not outright confrontation) are beyond dispute, and could readily take deeper root in the bureaucratic processes of both countries. Without leaders in both systems fully imparting and communicating to one another their respective strategic equities in Asia and the Pacific, the emergence of a reconfigured regional security order fully accepted by both states remains very uncertain.     

从美、日、英跨国并购看会计的国际化障碍

采用案例分析法,对美国DAL跨国公司出售子公司RCD时,美、日、英 3国企业在收购价格一定的情况下,谁能获得更大的获利空间,进行多指标计算的结果表明,由于这 3个国家的会计制度和税收制度的差异,使得英国有最大的收购优势,其次是日本,再次是美国。这说明在参与国际经济竞争时,每个国家都是理性的“经济人”, 在考虑了本国的政治、经济和文化等因素后,他们都会对外制定出使自身利益最大化的政策,从而阻碍了会计国际化的进程。中国的会计国际化进程在加速,通过本案例我们不能不思考,国际化后的中国企业在国际竞争中的优势。     

Small carrots,few sticks: EU good governance promotion in sub-Saharan Africa

The European Union has developed a one-size-fits-all approach to promote good governance reforms in African countries, focusing on strengthening the effectiveness of state institutions while increasingly asking for reforms that also target their democratic quality. Assessing the EU's policies in Angola and Ethiopia reveals, however, that the implementation of this approach is more differential. While the EU has a hard time making the two governments address governance issues, it has been more successful in implementing its policy approach in Ethiopia than in Angola. These differences are largely explained by these countries' different degrees of interdependency with the EU rather than differences in stability and democracy. Unlike Angola, Ethiopia heavily relies on EU development aid, giving the EU greater leverage to push for governance reforms. While conditionality is more effective in making African governments address governance issues, it undermines the legitimacy of the EU's development cooperation, which emphasizes partnership and ownership.     

Political Violence and the Illicit Economies of West Africa

This comparative analysis draws on field research in several West African countries to illustrate the dynamic relationships between political violence and organized crime in this sub-region. These relationships are often transactional, and almost always on a temporary basis. While some alliances of convenience may be forged, in other cases an adversarial relationship exists between organized crime and terrorist networks. In some cases, key actors within West African governments have benefited from these relationships. We then examine recent policies and strategies pursued by the U.S. and the international community that, in the name of combating terrorism, seek to constrain the illicit economies of the region, but in doing so may do more harm than good. The article concludes with some policy recommendations based on this analysis.     

奥巴马治下美国“大中东”政策前瞻

奥巴马治下的美国对外政策的重点仍将是“大中东”。从伊拉克撤军,与伊拉克在政治、经济和安全关系协议方面作出规划,以解决美国在伊拉克长期利益和军事存在;可能与伊拉克进行谈判．但难度很大;中东和平进程有可能取得进展;阿富汗和巴基斯坦将成为美国的反恐重点地区;中国因素会受到越来越多的关注。     

Mind the Gap: Civilian Protection and the Politics of Peace Operation Design

Protecting civilians from conflict and atrocities has become a major focus of governments, the UN, and activists. Yet peace operations—the main policy instrument for directly shielding civilians from violence—vary widely in how well they are designed to do so. One much-maligned problem is a gap between a force's ambitions to protect civilians and its physical resources for doing so. Missions plagued by these ambitions–resources gaps gesture toward protecting civilians but are not designed to do so effectively. They can also worsen civilian suffering. This article explores the politics behind these gaps, focusing on the role of powerful states—especially major Western democracies—in creating and facilitating them. It argues that ambitions–resources gaps represent a form of organized hypocrisy that helps political leaders balance competing normative and material pressures to protect civilians while limiting costs and risks. Case studies of France's Operation Turquoise in Rwanda and US support for the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS) in Darfur support the argument.     

African Liberation Movement Governments and Democracy

Using polyarchy as an analytical frame of reference in combination with other democracy performance evaluation methods, this article offers a longitudinal analysis interrogating the democratic credentials of African decolonization and second liberation movement governments. Characteristically, upon victory and rise to power, some liberation movement governments failed to implement the democratic values that kindled their struggle. One subsequent result of this anomaly is the emergence of ‘movement governments' caught between internal and external pressures to democratize and the movements' desire to maintain their grip on power and the control of the personnel and resources of government at any cost. The article attempts to explain these tendencies against the backdrop of structural factors both internal and external to the African state, culminating in democratic deficits in both decolonization and second liberation movement governments.     

Norms Are What States Make of Them: The Political Psychology of Norm Violation

I examine why states violate norms they embrace as members of international society. The rationalist answer, that norms are violated whenever they conflict with interests, is underspecified and empirically challenged. Constructivists cannot address violations well from their structural, sociological perspective. I argue from political psychology that violations stem from the motivated biases of actors who face a moral dilemma between personal desires and social constraints. These biases compel leaders to interpret norms and situations in a manner that justifies violation as socially acceptable. The ability to do so depends on the norm and the situation. The more parameters a norm possesses, and the more ambiguous those parameters are, the easier it is for actors to interpret them favorably to justify violation. Oftentimes norms are what states make of them. If the situation is plausible for states to claim exemption, they violate; otherwise they are constrained. The U.S. invasion of Panama illustrates these dynamics.     

Soft Power in a Hard Place: China, Taiwan, Cross-Strait Relations and U.S. Policy

Soft power, like so much else in relations between the People's Republic of China and Taiwan, is asymmetrical and freighted with implications for U.S. policy and U.S.-China relations. For China, soft power largely serves—or strives—to reduce alarm (or at least reaction) among other states concerned about China's new-found hard power or, perhaps more realistically, the hard power that China's economic rise can underwrite. Much of the value for Beijing of soft power is—and is likely to remain for quite some time—its potential contribution to reducing the likelihood that other states will react to China's rising hard power in ways that could threaten China's interests.     

Fresh Thinking on U.S. Engagement with Africa: Probing the Limits of Engagement

The Biden administration faces the opportunity to reset U.S. policy towards Africa and possesses a variety of tools to use in doing so, including traditional diplomacy, economic statecraft, development assistance, and military engagement. With the increased militarization of U.S. foreign policy over the past few decades, there is an unfortunate tendency to default to military engagement when confronted with even remote threats to U.S. national security interests, and Africa is no exception. With vital security interests in Africa, it can be argued that military engagement should be limited in its application and targeted to those situations that do not lend themselves to solution through traditional diplomacy or development assistance.     

Building a U.S.-Soviet working relationship

Conclusion The crucial determinant of U.S. and Soviet security, and the security of the world, will not depend on technological development, breakthroughs in deterrence theory, or even on agreements the two countries might sign at the summit talks. The future depends on whether the two governments are able to work together.Both the United States and the Soviet Union have developed procedures for solving conflicts with other governments, even former enemies, without hostilities or threats of force. The essential difference between these relationships and the U.S.-Soviet relationship lies not in the degree of difference in cultural heritage or security interests, but in the way the two governments approach their problems—through consultations and dispute resolution procedures, or through conflict and recrimination.The process of interaction is the essence of a working relationship. It means the difference between hostile confrontation and constructive collaboration, between fear and security, between war and peace. The summit meeting provides an opportunity to change the nature of the relationship, to change the focus of U.S.-Soviet interaction from antagonistic bargaining over divisive issues to constructive collaboration on possible solutions and working procedures. Roger Fisher is Williston Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and Director of the Harvard Negotiation Project, 523 Pound Hall, Harvard Law School, Cambridge, Mass. 02138.Scott Brown is Associate Director of the Harvard Negotiation Project.