Rational Expectations is an Aspect of Domestic Policy

Margaret Hermann's Explaining Foreign Policy Behaviour Using the Personal Characteristics of Political Leaders Margaret Hermann’s main conclusion in her 1980 article “Explaining Foreign Policy Behaviour Using the Personal Characteristics of Political Leaders”, is that the personal characteristics and orientations of foreign affairs of political leaders are important. However, one needs to be cognizant of the fact that personal characteristics is only a first step in the process of trying to explain why governments do certain things in the foreign policy arena. Moreover, individual actions are constrained by political, social, bureaucratic, environmental and context.

Kahneman’s article is an analysis of intuitive thinking and how it guides our decision-making. Although primarily aimed at the field of psychology, it is an interdisciplinary article with applications in economic theorising. Kahneman attempts to differentiate between two systems of thought, one of intuition (system 1) and one of reasoning (system 2), and argues that many judgements and choices are made intuitively, rather than with reason (a slower and more deliberate process). Intuitive decision making, which encompasses heuristics, although generally more efficient and rapid, makes the agent potentially subject to errors due to framing effects or violations of dominance. The analysis of the studies and theoretical situations also provides criticism of the commonly held model of the rational agent within economics. The article also further conceptualises Kahneman’s theory, the Prospect Theory (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979), which has descriptive applications of people’s choice in decision-making situations involving risk and known probability of outcomes. These situations are typically unexplained by the more normative rational agent model.

In the international community, a country’s domestic policies may often interfere with that of the community’s wishes. Throughout the Cold War, there was often tension between a country’s autonomy and the wishes of a particular sphere of influence or international body. Despite the great assistance in the attainment of human rights and attempts at peace, often greater conflict occurred due to this interference in each country’s domestic policies rather than serving their original purpose. Although international influence and control promotes singular agreements and policies, countries should be allowed to remain completely autonomous within their domestic policies in order to maintain peace, encourage diverse policy, and allow for independence internationally.

The era of globalization has witnessed the growing influence of a number of unconventional international actors, from non-governmental organizations, to multi-national corporations, to global political movements. Traditional, state-centric definitions of foreign policy as "the policy of a sovereign state in its interaction with other sovereign states is no longer sufficient. Several alternative definitions are more helpful at highlighting aspects of foreign policy

The rational models of policy process are compromising a mechanical process in policy making. Theoretically, the models are helping managers of public sector to manage policy issues by using rigid components of procedure that likely use in laboratory. It means the administrators in public sector will follow some sequences, such as gathering important values that related with policy issue, examining the possible outcomes of policy issue by rating those important values that already established, and then he or she will try to make a decision on what is the best policy. The steps are continuing repeatedly in the same condition. The particular characteristics of the models are having valid data, reliable information and managers

Realism is a theory which believes that sovereign states are the primary actors in the international system. It also believes that the international system has always been anarchic due to the nature of states not trusting each other and each state seeking to gain or maximize its own power capability. The Realist approach to the Cold War was also that of an “anarchical constitutive” and had seen the Cold War as something that was not out of the ordinary. The realists believed that states are always competing to maximize their own power, “the basic premise of its understanding is that the Cold War was not historically unique. the Cold War rather reflected in general terms the ongoing logic of inter-state conflict derived from the anarchical constitutive nature of the international system, and the ‘power maximization’ policies of states” R.Saull (2001:7).

Realism is a theory that depicts world politics as a ceaseless repetitive struggle for power. In other words, political realism seeks to explain international relations between states in terms of power. Realist “views that nation-state as the most important actor…because it answers to no higher authority;” in other words, it is an anarchic system (Kegley, 27). Some traits of realism are that states are sovereign, non-cooperation among states, and the exclusion if morality in policies.

In this essay, we will explain how the levels of analysis allow us to discern and contrast interstates and intrastate conflicts during the Cold War and after it. In international relations and political sciences, three levels of generalization exist to help us to understand the world and its complex problems. The first one, the individual-level, consists in focusing on people on the world stage: it means that individual-level analysis involves understanding how human make decisions and leads to policy. The second one is the state level analysis. Also called domestic level, it suggests an approach to understand world politic by emphasizing the national states as the primary determinant of the course of world affair.

Since International Relations has been academically studied Realism has been the dominant theory of world politics. The theory’s inability to explain the end of the Cold War, however, brought strength and momentum to the Liberalism theory. Today Realism and Liberalism are the two major paradigms of International Relations. The aforementioned theories focus on the international system and the external factors that can lead to two phenomena - conflict and cooperation. Realism believes that as a result of anarchy and the security dilemma, conflict is inevitable. Liberalism argues that this conflict can be overcome through cooperative activities amongst states and international organizations. This paper will explore as well as compare and contrast the strengths and weaknesses of both theories. It will also debate which of the two theories is more valuable in the

After December 26 1991, when the Soviet Union fell, the bipolarity of the international system was effaced. In the post- Cold War era, the United States faced the problem, without a defined enemy, to adopt a new foreign policy. To begin to analyze the political foreign policy of the United States, one must first understand the international system. According to Political Realism, a theory of international thought, the state is the key unit within the acts within the system. These states act according to their key norms, which are allowed by the system. However, these sates are also affected the domestic and external factors which control how they act. The domestic factors include political culture, their economic system, the leadership

Although the aspirations and goals of states are often motivated by external political pressures, analysis of recent foreign policy decisions demonstrates how internal political forces can play equally crucial roles in the pursuit and execution of these objectives. Thus, it would be invalid to claim that domestic politics and the nature of regimes play minor roles in either the goals a state pursues or the means it employs to reach them. By understanding how the diffusion of power in governments affect policy decisions, one can develop increased awareness of the linkages that exist between the internal pressures of domestic politics and the external forces of foreign politics.

In this essay the conservative theories of Realism and Liberalism will be compared and contrasted in connection with the study of International Relations. Post World War I International Relations was established as a formal discipline with the eructation of the Woodrow Wilson Chair at the University of Wales, given the worldwide urgency to create international order and stability in the wake of the war. Realist in International Relations view human nature and the states behaviour practically and truthfully, adopting a matter-of-fact attitude instead of visualising how the political institutions ought to function. Liberalists

When trying to comprehend international politics, current events, or historical context, having a firm grasp on the various international relations theories is essential to understanding patterns when looking at interstate affairs. Realism, liberalism, constructivism, and marxist radical theory are used to provide a framework by which we can dissect international relations.

Revisionist states are seen as “challengers” who wants a “new place or share for themselves in global society” proportionate with their power. Revisionist states are generally unsatisfied with their position in the international society. They have a wish to modify the rules by which affairs among countries work. Robert Gilpin who is amid pragmatist scholars, offers possibly the most precise discussion of revisionist and status quo positioning. He simplifies by breaking down the rules of the game into rather more operationalizable components: the distribution of power, the chain of command of status, rights and norms that oversee relations among states.

In “Structural Realism...” Waltz defends his theory of Structural Realism against criticism that its tenets are no longer valid in a post-Cold War world. The international system, he writes, is still anarchic, even though that system is unipolar instead of bipolar as it was during the Cold War, and that states still seek hegemony and power. A nation 's ideals and internal factors may count for something (he posits that the US intervention after the collapse of Yugoslavia was the result of such pressures),3 but they certainly shouldn 't. States should make decisions based on the idea of maintaining their own security and maintaining a balance of power in the international system.