Global Perspectives on US Foreign Policy

From the Outside In

S. Burt, D. Añorve, S. Burt, D. Añorve

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9781137363671, 9781137363664
• eBook ISBN: 9781137357663
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: European Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book explores aspects of US foreign policy, including the development process as well as the policy itself in respect to various countries and regions and some significant issues around the globe today. Providing insight into non-US perspectives of American foreign policy, the book contextualizes the effects of policy on external nations.

PART I

US Foreign Policy in Asia

CHAPTER 1

At the President’s Pleasure: Constraints on Presidential Development of Foreign Policy in Sino-US Relations

Sally Burt*

Introduction

The foreign policy-making process of the US government is very complex. There is no single process for the development of policy, much less its implementation. Many agencies, committees, departments of the executive, and branches of government play a role in the determination of US foreign policy. Over time scholars have sought to develop models to examine the process. The usefulness of the model depends on the aspect of policy-making under study. No one article or chapter can attempt to cover the entire process. This chapter will explore the role of the executive in foreign policy-making. It will analyze the relationship between the State Department and the president in terms of influence over decision making, and the influence that domestic factors, such as Congress and public opinion, have over a president’s foreign policy. These areas demonstrate the complexity of the entire process well, and provide some clues for understanding foreign policy development in the United States. These are two areas that are also particularly bewildering to non-US scholars.

These different approaches can be seen in the way successive administrations have formulated their policy toward China. China’s rise has been an area of focus for several years now, as its rise generates issues for the rest of the world, particularly the Western world, to face. China is a complex nation and one that requires a great deal of study to understand its functioning in the international system even at a very basic level. The relationship between the United States, the current global hegemon, and China, the potential holder of this position, is likely to determine the course of international relations in the coming decades. The significance of understanding Sino-US relations for scholars attempting to study international relations, then, is obvious. Developing a level of understanding about how the United States determines and implements its China policy is a starting point for that outcome.

This chapter seeks to assist in the development of that understanding. It will explore Sino-US relations from World War II until the Obama administration. Foreign policy-making during the Cold War led to the development of certain patterns of interaction between the key institutions, which are still visible. The primacy of the military institutions such as the Department of Defense and the National Security Council (NSC) in US foreign policy has long been evident and is the result of certain elements of the political system. The relationship between Congress and the president, in terms of control over foreign policy-making and the pattern of centralization of this power into the president’s office, developed from World War II on. It is also the result of some important features of the political system, such as the ambiguity in the constitution, and often the issues under consideration determine who dominates the process. These institutional relations have a large impact on Sino-US relations.

Traditionally, the relationship between the United States and China has been based on economic and trade matters. In more recent years it has followed global trends and focused on ideology; human rights and democratic values in particular. The overall tone of Sino-US relations has waxed and waned according to the area the United States has tended to focus on at any given time. If economic issues are at the fore then there is generally a mood of cooperation and constructive dialogue follows. When the United States is more focused on China as a threat in the global community then the military’s ability to influence foreign policy becomes more apparent and the mood shifts to confrontation and conflict. Many presidents have played a major role in determining the focus of the relationship and, thus, the policy that flows from that. Others have been inhibited from following their own instincts because of the checks and balances the US Constitution places on the president as foreign policy-maker. How well a president has managed those constraints has also often decided the success of his legacy in the international arena. Sino-US relations are so crucial to the global community at the moment that the world sits and waits with bated breath to see just how Obama’s foreign policy-making will impact the US China policy in the future.

Historical Development of Sino-US Relations

US-China policy was developed through a long historical tradition originating with the Open Door Policy, which was espoused in notes written by Secretary of State John Hay in 1899. It urged other foreign (European) powers, who claimed parts of China as trading ports under their control, not to exclude US commercial enterprises from the Chinese market. The policy has often been explained in more benign terms to have merely been an espousal of the principles of free trade. Whatever the motive of its original adoption, the outcome of the Open Door Policy has been of great benefit to the US economy by allowing access to the huge Chinese market. The Open Door Policy and trade in general has been the dominant feature of Sino-US relations since the turn of the twentieth century.

The economic relationship was interrupted when the Communists assumed control of the mainland and established the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1949. Diplomatic relations were severed with the recall of Ambassador John Leighton Stuart. The relationship was not restored until 1979, but the restoration began with Nixon’s most famous visit to the PRC in 1972, and the normalization of relations that followed. At that time, and in the decade that followed, China played a strategic role for the United States in balancing out Soviet power. The Tiananmen Square incident in June 1989, again, changed the nature of the relationship substantially. By that time Gorbachev had taken power in the USSR and this left the United States in a more secure global position. China was no longer needed to provide a counterbalance in the Cold War and so President George H. Bush felt freer to act in response to the crisis.

The end of the Cold War left the United States without a clearly defined mission in the world and its foreign policy with a much less certain direction. As a result, the 1990s saw the development of humanitarian operations, and human rights became a global issue. During the United Nations’ debate on Iraq in 1991 there began to be some acknowledgment of the implications of human rights abuses for the peace and security of the international community. Prior to that time the treatment of the population was seen as an internal matter for any state. After the passing of Resolution 688, in April 1991, which stated that the consequences of the repression of the Iraqi people “threaten international peace and security of the region,” it increasingly became the view of the international community that this was the case with many instances of human rights violations.¹ Human rights also found a place in the US China policy, as it became easy for the United States to find ways to limit Chinese access to its markets by imposing conditions based on human rights standards.

These foundations of US China policy—trade and human rights—seem to fit more neatly into the areas covered under the Department of State’s purview than that of the Defense Department or National Security Council (NSC). Despite the nature of the relationship, and the key issues on which it is based, the tendency over many decades has been for the United States to deal with China through mechanisms other than the Department of State and the Foreign Service. There is a clear connection between trade and defense, as other US relationships in the region, such as with Taiwan, Japan, and Korea, are based on trade in defense materiel, and have obvious implications for Sino-US relations. More than this, though, the reason for the heavy involvement of the National Security bureaucracy in the US China policy is that it reflects the perception of the relationship by policy-makers in the United States. It also reflects a long historical trend of increasing military and presidential involvement in foreign policy and the decreasing influence of the State Department.

The President and the State Department

The international community generally views the president as the prime determiner of US foreign policy. This perception has become more pointed over recent decades due to a number of factors. Media and the increased visibility of the president on the international stage is a major contributor to this interpretation. In a globalized world the areas of domestic politics that impact foreign policy has also increased and this means that the president’s key statements, such as the State of the Union address, also include elements of foreign policy in them.² The president is also considered the US chief diplomat, and that role has been made feasible in a more practical sense with technological innovation that allows travel and communication in workable diplomatic timeframes. In truth, there are many and varied influences on the development and implementation of US foreign policy. The president can be severely limited in his freedom to act in the international arena by domestic factors, the international community, and by bureaucratic intervention. John Ikenberry and others identified these three approaches in their study of the process of US foreign policy-making.³ This chapter will not seek to address the international community’s impact on an administration’s foreign policy-making, but it will focus on the state-centered and societal approach, in which the president is said to have a little more control. First, it will explore the machinery of the state and its role in foreign policy formulation, and particularly the functioning of relationships within the executive branch.

Most scholars agree that the role of the State Department in foreign policy-making has been in decline since World War II. President Franklin Roosevelt was renowned for the lack of attention he paid to his State Department, and particularly his secretary of state of 11 years, Cordell Hull. Hull was nominated to his position on the grounds that he would provide influence with Congress rather than any foreign policy expertise he may have had.⁴ (The importance of Congressional-Executive relationships will be examined in the next section). Since Roosevelt’s time, and partly due to his actions, the foreign policy...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Introduction
• Part I   US Foreign Policy in Asia
• Part II   US Foreign Policy in South America
• Part III   US Foreign Policy in Africa
• Part IV   US Foreign Policy in Europe
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Notes on Contributors
• Index