Policy Analysis and Foreign Policy Decisions

Extract

Foreign policy decisions constitute a main dimension of governmental activities from early history. Their significance for society varies with the acceptance of different ideological commitments in respect to external national goals, with changes in degrees of interdependence between nations and with transformations of the capacity to influence interaction with other countries through nationally controlled and goal-oriented activities. Changes in international scenery, in accepted values, in technology and in internal political structures are among the variables which illustrate factors that influence the significance of foreign policy decisions, and — even more so — their contents and role.

Looking at contemporary foreign policy decisions, we gain the impression that, for most European countries, the significance of such decisions is decreasing, with priority going to the domains of economics, quality of life and internal politics. But this is an illusion caused by too conservative and narrow a conception of “foreign policy decisions”. True, in many European countries the traditional main concerns of foreign policy decisions, such as defence matters, are regarded as decreasing in importance within the given situation. This may be correct at present, as far as it goes. But to deduce from so singular and narrow a phenomenon any general conclusions in respect of the diminishing significance of foreign policy decisions is, it is submitted, a serious mistake.