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The Formation of Soviet Foreign Policy: Organizational and Cognitive Perspectives

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2011

Robert M. Cutler
Robert M. Cutler
Affiliation:
University of Michigan
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Abstract

Several recent studies of Soviet foreign policy formation have sought to bring oganizational and cognitive considerations to bear on the subject. The article evaluation these perspectives and suggests how future research may, through the use of cognit methods of analysis, distinguish formally between different conceptualizations of viet foreign policy formation, thus permitting a more rigorous empirical examination of the organizational issues involved. A model of inference that accounts for organiational and cognitive links between the Soviet press and Soviet foreign policy formation is also constructed; examples are drawn from the items under review. In conclusion the article outlines a research strategy for cumulating knowledge about how the Sov system works, and specifies what the organizational and cognitive frameworks the study of Soviet foreign policy formation may contribute to such a project.

Type
Review Articles
Information
World Politics , Volume 34 , Issue 3 , April 1982 , pp. 418 - 436
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 1982

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References

1 Bialer, Seweryn, ed., The Domestic Context of Soviet Foreign Policy (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1981)Google Scholar, was received too late to be included for review in this article. The volume should be consulted by anyone seriously interested in the subject. Although none of its constituent chapters can properly be called a case study of Soviet foreign policy formation, it is the best survey currently available of the domestic aspects involved. The factors covered range from demographic trends (Warren W. Eason) to Eastern Europe as an “internal determinant” of Soviet foreign policy (Andrzej Korbonski). The contributions are coherently interrelated, but the contributors do not always agree about everything. The book is richer for these differences.

2 Horelick, Arnold L., Ross Johnson, A., and Steinbruner, John D., The Study of Soviet Foreign Policy: A Review of Decision-Theory-Related Approaches, Report R-1334 (Santa Monica: Rand Corporation, December 1973), 37.Google Scholar

3 Allison, , Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis (Boston: Little, Brown, 1971).Google Scholar

4 Compare Mohr, Lawrence B., “The Concept of Organizational Goal,” American Political Science Review, Vol. 67 (June 1973), 470–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

5 Indeed, one of the more surprising findings is that the ideologist Suslov, who is almost invariably and with good reason considered a hardliner, did not like the idea of intervention because he thought it would disrupt the World Communist Conference (held in Moscow in 1969); he had the responsibility of planning the conference.

6 See also Valenta, Jiri, “The Bureaucratic Politics Paradigm and the Soviet Invasion of Czechoslovakia,” Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 94 (Spring 1979), 55–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Another point of view is expressed by Dawisha, Karen, “The Limits of the Bureaucratic Politics Model: Observations on the Soviet Case,” Studies in Comparative Communism, XIII (Winter 1980), 300–326.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Dawisha's principal contribution is to point out the informal organizational structures that figure in Soviet foreign policy formation; see the comments on her article by Allison, Eidlin, and Valenta, and Dawisha's rejoinder, ibid., 327–46.

7 Steinbruner, , The Cybernetic Theory of Decision: New Dimensions of Political Analysis (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1974), esp. 125–35.Google Scholar Steinbruner's sometimes difficult reasoning is clarified in Cutler, Robert M., “Decision Making in International Relations: The Cybernetic Theory Reconsidered,” Michigan Journal of Political Science, 1 (Fall 1981), 57–63.Google Scholar

8 Hough, , “The Soviet System: Petrification or Pluralism?” Problems of Communism, XXI (March-April 1972), 25–45Google Scholar; reprinted in Hough, , The Soviet Union and Social Science Theory (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1977), 19–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

9 Compare, for example, Kass, pp. 223–25, and Aspaturian, Vernon V., “The Soviet Military-Industrial Complex: Does It Exist?” Journal of International Affairs, XXVI (No. 1, 1972), 3, 14–15Google Scholar; Kass, p. 3, and Gordon Skilling, H., “Interest Groups and Communist Politics: An Introduction,” in Skilling, and Griffiths, Franklyn, ed., Interest Groups in Soviet Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971), 3, 8Google Scholar; Kass, pp. 1–2, and Zimmerman, William, “Elite Perspectives and the Explanation of Soviet Foreign Policy,” Journal of International Affairs, XXIV (No. 1, 1970), 84–85.Google Scholar

10 On tendencies of articulation, see Griffiths, Franklyn, “A Tendency Analysis of Soviet Policy Making,” in Skilling and Griffiths (fn. 9), 335–77Google Scholar; Griffiths, , “Images, Politics, and Learning in Soviet Behavior toward the United States,” Ph.D. diss. (Columbia University, 1972).Google Scholar

11 See, further, Jönsson, Christer, “Foreign Policy Ideas and Groupings in the Soviet Union,” in Kanet, Roger E., ed., Soviet Foreign Policy and East-West Relations (Elmsford, N.Y.: Pergamon Press, forthcoming 1982).Google Scholar Compare Griffiths, Franklyn, “Ideological Development and Foreign Policy,” in Bialer (fn. 1), 19–48Google Scholar, esp. 21–31, 41–45.

12 Heradstveit, Daniel and Narvesen, Ove, “Psychological Constraints on Decision Making. A Discussion of Cognitive Approaches: Operational Code and Cognitive Map,” Cooperation and Conflict, XIII (No. 2, 1978), 77–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Hannes Adomeit adopts the operational-code approach in his attempt to demonstrate that “[d]ecision making in international crises in the Soviet system is shaped much more by consensus on political issues and operational principles than by domestic conflict”; Alexander Dallin maintains that “whenever it comes to fundamental choices in preferences, orientations, and values, the dominant decision makers in the Soviet Union remain fundamentally wedded to the primacy of domestic over foreign affairs.” Adomeit, “Consensus Versus Conflict: The Dimension of Foreign Policy,” in Bialer (fn. 1), 76 (emphasis added); Dallin, “The Domestic Sources of Soviet Foreign Policy,” ibid., 339–40. Dallin's chapter includes (but is more than) an exhaustive review, discussion, and critique of the literature. On the potential utility of studies of noncrisis decision making in Soviet foreign policy, see the last section of this article, and fn. 30.

13 Axelrod, Robert, “Argumentation in Foreign Policy Settings: Britain in 1918, Munich in 1938, and Japan in 1970,” Journal of Conflict Resolution, XXI (December 1977). 727–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

14 Cutler, Robert M., “Unifying the Cognitive-Map and Operational-Code Approaches: An Integrated Framework with an Illustrative Example,” in Jönsson, Christer, ed., Cognitive Dynamics and International Politics (London: Frances Pinter, forthcoming 1982).Google Scholar

15 George, Alexander, Propaganda Analysis: A Study of Inferences Made from Nazi Propaganda in World War II (Evanston, Ill.: Row, Peterson, 1959), 61.Google Scholar

16 Ibid., 43.

17 Ibid., 41.

18 Paul, , “Soviet Foreign Policy and the Invasion of Czechoslovakia: A Theory and a Case Study,” International Studies Quarterly, XV (June 1971), 159–202.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

19 Personal interview. This section of the article draws directly on a series of interviews that the author conducted in Europe and the U.S.S.R. in 1980. Further information is available from the author upon request.

20 Reference to such circles is found, upon occasion, even in the Soviet press. One example of this occurs in July 1974. During the last days of that month, Komsomol'skaia pravda ran a long two-part article by a section head in the Central Committee Propaganda Department, lauding détente without qualification—at the height of the Cyprus crisis: “It is possible to speak with plenty of reason of an expansion of détente, of realistic prospects for the realization of numerous new possibilities, on the basis of [those] already achieved.” What is even more striking, this article, in a catalogue of influences contributing to détente, excludes any mention of the Soviet armed forces. The very next day, a leading article in the armed-forces newspaper reminded its readers: “Despite the achieved détente, the international situation remains difficult. It would be extremely dangerous if a view prevailed in social circles that everything is perfectly all right now, that the danger of war has been eliminated, and that the task of securing peace can be relegated into the background or even further.” (Emphases added.) Since the Soviet Union would not be endangered if such a view prevailed in Washington, the reference must be to “social circles” (obshchestvennye Krugi) in Moscow. It is possible to conclude from this not only that such circles exist in Soviet policy formation, but also that these circles are conscious of their interests (for “securing peace,” read “building arms”) and recognize that other circles may have opposing interests. Such a conclusion would not necessarily imply that the composition of individual circles is constant over time or across issues.

Oganov, G., “Razriadka: nastoiashchee, budushchee. 1. Real'nost' mira” [Détente: Present and Future, 1. The Reality of Peace], Komsomol'skaia pravda, July 30, 1974, p. 3Google Scholar; “V interesakh bezopasnosti narodov” [In the Interests of the Security of the Peoples] (editorial), Krasnaia zvezda, July 31, 1974, p. 1. Translations are by the author.

21 Care should be taken not to confuse what Western policy analysts usually mean by “decisions” with resheniia (also meaning “decisions”), which are authoritative state ments, rather like resolutions, adopted at Party gatherings.

22 Ricoeur, Paul, “The Model of the Text: Meaningful Action Considered as a Text,” Social Research, XXXVIII (Autumn 1971), 557.Google Scholar

23 Ibid., 558 (original emphasis omitted).

24 See Rush, Myron, “The Role of Esoteric Communication in Soviet Politics,” in The Rise of Khrushchev (Washington, D.C.: Public Affairs Press, 1958), 88–94Google Scholar; Rush, , “Esoteric Communication in Soviet Politics,” World Politics, XI (July 1959), 614–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

25 Wright, Georg Henrik von, Explanation and Understanding (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1971), 93–97Google Scholar, 115–17, and nn.

26 George (fn. 15), 60.

27 George mentions this variable but does not discuss it: ibid., 41.

28 Rosenau, , “Moral Fervor, Systematic Analysis, and Scientific Consciousness Foreign Policy Research,” in Ranney, Austin, ed., Political Science and Public Polit (Chicago: Markham, 1968), 212Google Scholar, 215. For operationalizing the concept of a foreig policy “undertaking” at the case study level, the notion of the “decisional flow” adopte by Karen Dawisha, among others, appears especially promising. See Dawisha, , “The Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia, 1968,” in Brecher, Michael, ed., Studies in Crisis B havior (New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Books, 1978), 143–71.Google Scholar

29 Rosenau (fn. 28), 221.

30 On the utility of studying noncrisis situations, see Dallin (fn. 12), 342–43; Pan(fn. 18), 171, 176–77; and, more generally, Bloomfield, Lincoln P., The Foreign Polic Process: Making Theory Relevant, Sage Professional Paper in International Studies NO:02–028 (Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage Publications, 1974), 41.Google Scholar

31 Richard Löwenthal has pointed out that the totalitarian model denied only the autonomy of domestic groups having such interests, and never suggested that the: groups do not exist; Franklyn Griffiths has addressed this issue in terms of “system dominance” versus “subsystem dominance.” Löwenthal, , “Kommunistische Einparteiher schaft in der Industriegesellschaft,” in Meissner, Boris, Brunner, Georg, and Löwenthal, Richar, eds., Einparteisystem und bürokratische Herrschaft in der Sowjetunio (Cologne: Markus Verlag [1979]), 33Google Scholar; Griffiths, , “A Tendency Analysis …” fn. 10 335–37” 335–37, 351, 358.Google Scholar The best case for continuing to use the totalitarian approach to analyzing Soviet external behavior has been made by Schapiro, Leonard, “Totalitarianisi in Foreign Policy,” in London, Kurt, ed., The Soviet Impact on World Politics (New York: Hawthorn Books, 1974), 3–21.Google Scholar

32 Zimmerman, William, “Choices in the Postwar World (1): Containment and the Soviet Union,” in Gati, Charles, comp., Caging the Bear: Containment and the Cold War (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1974), 99.Google Scholar

33 Tarschys, , “The Soviet Political System: Three Models,” European Journal of Political Research, V (September 1977), 287–320CrossRefGoogle Scholar, reprinted in Tarschys, , The Soviet Political Agenda: Problems and Priorities, 1950–1970 (White Plains, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1979), 10–39CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hough, Jerry F., “The Bureaucratic Model and the Nature of the Soviet System,” Journal of Comparative Administration, 11 (August 1973), 134–68CrossRefGoogle Scholar, reprinted in Hough (fn. 8), 49–70.

34 There is a high-quality Soviet literature on this subject that Western specialists on Soviet policy making have yet to tap. To cite but two examples: Zhurnalistika V politicheskoi struktuke obshchestva [Journalistics in the Political Structure of Society], la. N. Zasurskii, ed. (Moscow: Izdatel'stvo MGU, 1975); Teoriia i praktika sovetskoi periodicheskoi pechati [Theory and Practice of the Soviet Periodical Press], V. D. Pel' ed. (Moscow: “Vysshaia shkola,” 1980).