Charley Du
Prof. Peter Katzenstein
GOVT 1817
Nov. 17 2015
Neo-Constructivism: The Propagation of Domestic Politics onto the International Stage
The Cuban Missile Crisis is, for many, one single incident the Cold War in which the threat of a nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union escalated the closest to the point of no return. The end of the incident during the presidency of John F. Kennedy inspired a general change in attitudes from both the American and Soviet sides that they never want to come that close again. In the decades that followed, much has been written about the causes of the so called “crisis” and whether the United States had compelling reason to act when faced with evidence that the Soviet Union was installing …show more content…
He starts his argument by saying that analysts look at world events through “conceptual lenses,” preconceived notions and ideas of relative importance that impact their thoughts and conclusions. This point was important to make because at the time of his writing, the dominant international relations theory was systemic realism, which is extremely similar to Allison’s Rational Policy Model. Allison, however, criticizes the Rational Policy Model because it treats nations as “black boxes” without a differentiated decision-making structure and bureaucracy. In his argument, Allison claims that there are variations of the Rational Policy Model which considers the national leaders, their interests as well as different actors, such as parties, within a government. The aforementioned variations are differentiated from Allison’s alternative models, which he terms the Organizational Process Model and Bureaucratic Politics Model. In the Organizational Process Model, the analyst confronts different organizations within a government and the behavior of those particular organizations whereas in the Bureaucratic Politics Model, the analyst sees the reasoning and perceptions of important players involved in an international decision. After further analysis of …show more content…
A criticism specific to Allison is his treatment and division of different models in his essay. The Rational Policy Model, Allison claims, focuses on “acts of nations,” effectively removing internal decision making processes from the international arena. However, when he proceeds to illustrate the model using the Cuban Missile Crisis, Allison adds the caveat that the “pure” Rational Policy Model can have variants. Furthermore, he discusses the different ways in which these variants can affect international relations by dividing them into three obscure categories, when the national actor’s choice is taken, when the national actor’s personal or party values are maximized, and when there are several actors and the winning actor’s values are maximized. The variants to the Rational Policy Model do not view states as “black boxes” as Allison previously argued. Using the same model, whereas the President’s role is rendered obsolete in the “pure” model, it is given some relevance in the variants. Allison’s nuanced approach to how the three types of variants differ is also perplexing. Not only is domestic politics—in Allison’s case, “Hawks and Doves”—given a role in international relations, so are national leaders and human nature. Thus, Allison’s
Prof. Peter Katzenstein
GOVT 1817
Nov. 17 2015
Neo-Constructivism: The Propagation of Domestic Politics onto the International Stage
The Cuban Missile Crisis is, for many, one single incident the Cold War in which the threat of a nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union escalated the closest to the point of no return. The end of the incident during the presidency of John F. Kennedy inspired a general change in attitudes from both the American and Soviet sides that they never want to come that close again. In the decades that followed, much has been written about the causes of the so called “crisis” and whether the United States had compelling reason to act when faced with evidence that the Soviet Union was installing …show more content…
He starts his argument by saying that analysts look at world events through “conceptual lenses,” preconceived notions and ideas of relative importance that impact their thoughts and conclusions. This point was important to make because at the time of his writing, the dominant international relations theory was systemic realism, which is extremely similar to Allison’s Rational Policy Model. Allison, however, criticizes the Rational Policy Model because it treats nations as “black boxes” without a differentiated decision-making structure and bureaucracy. In his argument, Allison claims that there are variations of the Rational Policy Model which considers the national leaders, their interests as well as different actors, such as parties, within a government. The aforementioned variations are differentiated from Allison’s alternative models, which he terms the Organizational Process Model and Bureaucratic Politics Model. In the Organizational Process Model, the analyst confronts different organizations within a government and the behavior of those particular organizations whereas in the Bureaucratic Politics Model, the analyst sees the reasoning and perceptions of important players involved in an international decision. After further analysis of …show more content…
A criticism specific to Allison is his treatment and division of different models in his essay. The Rational Policy Model, Allison claims, focuses on “acts of nations,” effectively removing internal decision making processes from the international arena. However, when he proceeds to illustrate the model using the Cuban Missile Crisis, Allison adds the caveat that the “pure” Rational Policy Model can have variants. Furthermore, he discusses the different ways in which these variants can affect international relations by dividing them into three obscure categories, when the national actor’s choice is taken, when the national actor’s personal or party values are maximized, and when there are several actors and the winning actor’s values are maximized. The variants to the Rational Policy Model do not view states as “black boxes” as Allison previously argued. Using the same model, whereas the President’s role is rendered obsolete in the “pure” model, it is given some relevance in the variants. Allison’s nuanced approach to how the three types of variants differ is also perplexing. Not only is domestic politics—in Allison’s case, “Hawks and Doves”—given a role in international relations, so are national leaders and human nature. Thus, Allison’s