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Conclusion: an institutional approach to American foreign economic policy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 May 2009

G. John Ikenberry
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It may well be that Poincaré's observation is correct, that natural scientists discuss their results and social scientists their methods. if so, it is because our guides to social reality are so frail. Approaches to political investigation are difficult to separate from the substantive puzzles that drive inquiry and the results that follow. In collective enterprises, such as this volume, the problem of approach or method becomes all the more central. We are left with no choice but to reflect on the tools that we use as well as the social reality that they promise to reveal.

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Research Article
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International Organization , Volume 42 , Issue 1 , Winter 1988 , pp. 219 - 243
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 1988

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References

I gratefully acknowledge the comments and suggestions of David Lake and Michael Mastanduno as well as the other authors in this volume. I have also received helpful comments from David Bachman, Peter Hall, Stephen Krasner, Charles Kupchan, Ken Oye, Theda Skocpol, and participants in the conference on The American State in the International Political Economy, sponsored by the Program on Interdependent Political Economy, University of Chicago, 29 April 1987.

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2. This point is my own judgment. My characterization of the volume should not suggest that the contributors have reached an explicit consensus.

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30. Alexander, Gerschenkron, “Economic Backwardness in Historical Perspective,” in Gerschenkron, Economic Backwardness in Historical Perspective: A Book of Essays (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1962), pp. 5–30Google Scholar. The argument has been developed further by Kurth, James R., “The Political Consequences of the Product Cycle: Industrial History and Political Outcomes,” International Organization 33 (Winter 1979), pp. 1–34CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Kurth, , “Industrial Change and Political Change: A European Perspective,” in David, Collier, ed., The New Authoritarianism of Latin America (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1979)Google Scholar. A discussion of this theme in terms of the U.S. case is presented by Chandler, Alfred D. Jr., “Government versus Business: An American Phenomenon,” in Dunlop, John T., ed., Business and Public Policy (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1980)Google Scholar; Chandler, , The Visible Hand: The Managerial Revolution in American Business (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1978)Google Scholar; and Chandler, , “The Coming of Big Business,” in Woodward, C. Vann, ed., The Comparative Approach to American History (New York: Basic Books, 1968), pp. 220–35Google Scholar. David, Vogel, “Why Businessmen Distrust Their State: The Political Consciousness of American Corporate Executives,” British Journal of Political Science 8 (01 1978), pp. 45–78Google Scholar. See also Andrew, Shonfield, Modern Capitalism, pp. 298–329.Google Scholar

31. World War I did have some institutional repercussions. In the area of labor relations, see Julie, Strickland, “War, the State, and Labor: The Case of the United States, 1917–1935,” paper prepared for delivery at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association,28–31 August 1986,Washington, D.C.Google Scholar

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33. See Pletcher, David M., “1861–1898: Economic Growth and Diplomatic Adjustment,” in Becker, William H. and Wells, Samuel F. Jr., eds., Economics and World Power: An Assessment of American Diplomacy Since 1789 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1985).Google Scholar

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