Allison Clark

INR2002
February 23, 2015

Foreign Policy Analysis

The study of foreign policy decision making is concerned with how states make
decisions and foreign policies. There are models which are used to explain how decisions of a
state are made. These models have the purpose of reducing complexities. They focus on factors
such as the interests of the actors and their goals. Two models in foreign policy analysis are the
rational actor model and the bureaucratic politics model.
Rational Actor Model
According to this model, a rational process was used by the state to make its foreign
policy decision. There are three key assumptions about how foreign policy decisions get made.
First, Policy-makers begin with a shared sense of national interest (Bova 81).These decision
makers have national goals and agree with the national goals on a general level. Second, it says
that the foreign policy decision(s) was made by intelligent, rational, objective decision makers.
Key foreign policy decision-makers will collectively and systematically canvass the range of
policy choices and, ultimately settle on the choice that will most effectively and efficiently
promote national interests (Bova 82). These decision makers have made the decision on behalf of
state interests using all the necessary information they could possibly get such as consultation
with international relations scholars, middle-east scholars, and the CIA. After carefully weighing
the costs and benefits (cost-benefit analysis) of each of the options the decision-makers chose the
option that allows for the goal to be met at the lowest cost; they have chosen the least-worst
decision for their state by being purposeful. Finally, once a policy choice is made, it will be

implemented more or less as the decision-makers had intended (Bova 82). This decision was
made by a unitary government and assumes a unitary purpose between the decision makers and
those who carry out the decision.
There are several problems with this model. It is a legitimate model in which to use for
understanding a foreign policy decision, however, this model is rarely achieved in practice
because of the issues with it. The human beings involved in making foreign policy decisions
cannot and do not achieve the level of comprehensive rationality implied in the model (Bova 84).
In decision making, actors usually settle for satisficing instead of maximizing national interests.
The model assumes that national interest must be the best interest, but usually the decisions made
are made because they are good enough. The ability of human beings to canvass, evaluate, and
predict the consequences of all the policy alternatives available will be limited (Bova 84).
Information is endless and the time allotted to consider every alternative is not enough time for a
human being. The theory used to describe how decision-making is made given this scenario is
poliheuristic theory. This theory suggests that decision making is a two-step process. It says that
in the first step decision-makers take a quick, first cut at any options that clearly impose high
political cost, and then in they do the second step of engaging in a more detailed analysis of the
limited set of options (Bova 84).
The next issue with the RAM is misperception. This model assumes that the decisionmakers will act rationally. This model assumes that decision-makers have a clear understanding
of their own interests as well as the interests and motives of their adversaries (Bova 85). Foreign
policy decision making is usually shaped by misperceptions. Common misperceptions include
tendencies such as: decision-makers tend to fit and shape new information into their preexisting
theories and images of the world rather than allow new information to alter their preexisting

notations; decision-makers tend to view other states as more hostile than they are, and also do
not normally accept that other states see them as a menace; decision-makers tend to see the
behavior of others as more centralized and coordinated than it actually is (Bova 86). There is also
the tendency by which decision-makers engage in worse-case analysis. This includes an over
exaggeration of hostile intentions and assumption that the decision must be made in accordance
to the worst-case scenario, and then making a policy based on that assumption
The last issue is a tendency called groupthink. Groupthink limits the ability to
maximize national interest by abandoning critical thinking in favor of viewpoints and consensus
that reflect group solidarity (Bova 86). Groupthink often leads to faulty decisions and
perpetuation if misguided policy because it leads to a decision based on the consensus of the
group and not critical decision making.
Bureaucratic Politics Model
This model of foreign policy decision-making sees foreign policy making as a
competitive struggle among various government institutions and actors to promote, or act as
advocates for, their version of the national interest (Bova 88). It accentuates the political
process of the individuals and groups within the government. It assumes that different
individuals have different interests and that their interests depend on where they are in the
government. The BPM sees foreign policy as a two-dimensional game of politics, influence, and
negotiation. This model rests on four key assumptions regarding the specific policy-making
process (Bova 88).
In this model, the state is not seen as a unitary actor like in the RAM. There is no single
rational actor making the decisions. It supplies that policy-making is a social process (Bova 88).

This ties in with the third assumption in the text: policy decisions are compromises. Certain
leaders in the government may have ultimate responsibility for a policy to play out, but they do
not have control over how it is shaped. Policies are a result of bargaining and interaction. This
bargaining and interaction is because different individuals in the state have different views of the
world and so where the individual stands on the issue depends on where they sit in the state.
The second key assumption is that there is no single version of the national interest (Bova
88) this is why the individuals in the state are advocates; all players might have a sense of shared
national interest, but where you stand depends on where you sit. Each individual brings a set of
interests or perspectives shaped by the bureaucratic role he or she fills (Bova 88). Once the
process of making a decision ends, politics does not stop once a decision is made (Bova 88).
Losers of the policy debate may still be able to get their way and go through with their policy.
These individuals can drag their feet, fail to follow through with the policy, and follow the letter
but not the spirit of the policy in order to have opportunities to influence the policy at the
implementation stage (Bova 88).
Bushs War
An overview of how the US implemented the decision to go to war with Iraq was shown
during the lecture through Frontline. The USs involvement in Iraq can be explained using the
bureaucratic politics model. The actors in this event were not being rational. Options throughout
Bushs war were not debated; the individuals just went through with them. Intelligence was used
selectively like Powells use of Black and Tenet. There was talk amongst the state right when the
second plane crashed that this was Osama Bin Laden. The actors, or bureaucrats, had a general
idea that they should go after Al-Qaeda after news of the attack came in. The decision to go to
war with Iraq did not even start off as a decision to go to war with Iraq. The decision which was

originally implemented was to go to war with Afghanistan, but after Bin Laden escaped, the set
changed.
The BPM bargaining and compromising component of this decision started with
Secretary of State, Colin Powell. Powell suggested a worldwide coalition during the meeting of
the war cabinet. Donald Rumsfeld did not want a coalition. He was the individual who raised the
idea during the meeting of invading Iraq. As far as Powell was concerned, Al-Qaeda was the
main enemy and the terrorist group should be the main concern and focus for the state, and the
best version of the national interest was to take the steps to create a coalition. The next morning,
Powell began to advocate to President Bush about building a coalition, and called in the CIA.
Cofer Black from the CIA came in the next morning with an intricate plan for a coalition that
would span across eighty countries. Black was from the counter terrorism attack center of the
CIA, which explains why he was advocating this idea.
The bargaining picked up with Vice President, Dick Cheney. Cheney was in the meeting
listening to Black and George Tenets plan for the coalition. He deeply distrusted the CIA and
wanted his oldest political ally, Rumsfeld and the Pentagon to take the lead. Cheney wanted
Rumsfeld to come up with a plan to attack Al-Qaeda and for the pentagon to lead this attack, but
the state had no plan for Afghanistan at that point. Rumsfeld and Tenet began to have a tug of
war because Rumsfeld wanted quick action, but Tenet and the CTC wanted to create a coalition
and act slowly. Later the war cabinet met again, and it becomes apparent that not everyone in the
state is on the same page or has the same national interest. Powell had no idea that many
individuals in that meeting were going to advocate for the invasion of Iraq. At this point the CIA
and Tenet had the upper hand and presented the idea for the coalition.

At the meeting, Paul Wolfowitz spoke up and then the ideas for the national interest
changed. Discussion of whether or not Iraq and Suddam Husein should be targets in this attack
emerged. Powell and Wolfowitz argued, and Powell claimed that Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld were
just fixated with Iraq and were looking for any excuse to attack Iraq. Powell and the state
department saw no need to focus on Iraq. The question later was that while Afghanistan was the
priority, who was going to lead? Eventually the President made his final decision and told the
CIA to take charge and create a plan for war.
Bush later appointed Powell to be the Secretary of State, but also appointed Rumsfeld to
be the Secretary of Defense. This meant that Powell and the state department could do very little
to influence the policy during the implementation stage. Powell became very concerned about
Rumsfeld and the fact that the President could now use force by any means necessary on
terrorists as long as the US was at war through the works of Dick Cheney and Cheneys lawyer,
Addington. There was not enough opportunities to discuss this concern with Bush because
Powell was effectively isolated by Rumsfeld; this was the design of Bush. What Powell did not
know was that Bush had tabled Iraq and definitely had Afghanistan as his main priority.
There were many sources of conflict between Rumsfeld and others throughout this war.
Many of the decisions after were compromises and the complexities of how to achieve the
national interest at the time was never set in stone meaning that the implementation of this
decision never really played out as it was planned. Rumsfeld went to the President and a
compromise was made. He did not like that he was three yards behind the CIA, and so he said
he had to lead the CIA, or this isnt going to work. Bush later placed Rumsfeld in charge of the
CIA. This leads into another issue that highlights how Bushs war was done using the BPM is the
concerns for a lack of US troops. The US did not have enough troops to block off the east of

Afghanistan. To supplement this, CIA officer Bernsen, without any permission from the defense
department, sent a small group to Nangarhar province. He should have opened this for debate
and at least discussed this with Rumsfeld. This shows one of the many places where there was a
lack of communication. Despite him secretly sending in troops, the border around Pakistan was
not closed, and Osama Bin Laden escaped. This relatively minor problem lead into a larger
concern and cause for a split in the state.
The state now had thousands of Taliban prisoners, but no clear answer yet on what to do
with them. As John Woo put it, you cant kill them, you cant release them because theyre too
powerful and potentially far too valuable as a reliable source of information. This is where
Cheneys secret plan came in. Cheney gave the President a secret four page document, and from
there no one was allowed to view this document; Bush signed off on a document for military
trials of the prisoners with rules set by Rumsfeld. Cheney completely bypassed National Security
Advisor, Condoleezza Rice and Powell by electing to secure this document. Later after capturing
and sending al-Libbi, a high value prisoner of war, to Egypt to have information extracted from
him, Cheney made the claim that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and was able
to get what he wanted in the first place: a war against Iraq. The US finally went to the war with
Iraq because Cheney falsely linked Osama bin Laden and Suddam Hussein together as a scape
goat. There were not any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and the state was not ever in
agreement to get involved in Iraq until Cheney lied. This was not in the national interest of
America. This highlights the fourth key assumption of the BPM and why the decision to go to
war with Iraq can be analyzed using the BPM. Politics does not stop once a decision is made.
Cheney was a loser in reference to the decision of how to respond to the 9/11 attacks. He found
his way to influence policy given the position he was in.

Conclusion
The two models discussed during the lecture are the Rational Actor Model (RAM) and
the Bureaucratic Politics Model (BPM). These two models are used to explain foreign policy
decisions. The overview of the invasion of Iraq by the US as presented by frontline shows that
this decision can be explained using the BPM.

Works Cited
Bova, Russel. How the World Works: A Brief Survey of International Relations. 2nd ed.

Bush's War. Dir. Micheal Kirk. Prod. Jim Gilmore. Frontline, 2008. Film.