I am quite impressed with Richard Hanania’s new book Public Choice Theory and the Illusion of Grand Strategy. It makes a simple but important point: U.S. foreign policy is less due to some persistent grand national strategy than to inconsistent lobbying pressures of various political groups. While at times causes millions to die for no good reason.
US foreign policy is coherent when you understand or just simply admit that like all empires, the US has ended up being ruled by foreigners.
The foreigners that hold decisive sway within the US political system have had very clear goals for the past one hundred years, they have been successful in using American economic power, military power and blood for their benefit, and, it looks like they are pursuing one last attempt at wielding the US military, this time against Russia.
The various lies concocted to justify war in Iraq and Afghanistan never made sense. But it does make sense when you know the “US government” was planning war in the Middle East at least as far back as the early 1990s. Bill Clinton pushed for peace in N.Ireland because they didn’t want the UK military “distracted” at home when they were going to be in the Middle East.
If you work off the basis that government power is guided by Americans for Americans instead of foreigners for foreign interests, that the American people want sanctions against X instead of mass communication controlled by foreign interests controlling the narrative, and if you do not acknowledge massive corruption throughout the political and governmental system, yes, it is all incoherent.
The Federal Reserve Board is effectively a single actor. WRT monetary policy, the Board and only the Board ever takes action: it is the sole authority. There are no details for subordinates to work out. Compare that to the State Department, with its numerous (dozens?) of Under/Deputy/Assistant Secretaries, all of which exercise some degree of discretionary authority.
They could, but I would expect them to be more stable. A lot of voters can just decide not to vote when their preferred party has an embarrassing candidate (which can fluctuate with the news cycle), but a dictator's selectorate won't simply "stay home" and permit some other person to bring in different foreign policy priorities.
US foreign policy is coherent when you understand or just simply admit that like all empires, the US has ended up being ruled by foreigners.
The foreigners that hold decisive sway within the US political system have had very clear goals for the past one hundred years, they have been successful in using American economic power, military power and blood for their benefit, and, it looks like they are pursuing one last attempt at wielding the US military, this time against Russia.
The various lies concocted to justify war in Iraq and Afghanistan never made sense. But it does make sense when you know the “US government” was planning war in the Middle East at least as far back as the early 1990s. Bill Clinton pushed for peace in N.Ireland because they didn’t want the UK military “distracted” at home when they were going to be in the Middle East.
If you work off the basis that government power is guided by Americans for Americans instead of foreigners for foreign interests, that the American people want sanctions against X instead of mass communication controlled by foreign interests controlling the narrative, and if you do not acknowledge massive corruption throughout the political and governmental system, yes, it is all incoherent.
The Federal Reserve Board is effectively a single actor. WRT monetary policy, the Board and only the Board ever takes action: it is the sole authority. There are no details for subordinates to work out. Compare that to the State Department, with its numerous (dozens?) of Under/Deputy/Assistant Secretaries, all of which exercise some degree of discretionary authority.
Single actor? What is his or her name?
Monetary policy is a single activity carried out by a single actor.
"Foreign policy" is melange of wildly varying activities carried out by numerous actors, supervised by the head of government (often loosely).
They could, but I would expect them to be more stable. A lot of voters can just decide not to vote when their preferred party has an embarrassing candidate (which can fluctuate with the news cycle), but a dictator's selectorate won't simply "stay home" and permit some other person to bring in different foreign policy priorities.
Amen. US foreign-trade-military policy is a rolling catastrophy, especially for producers and taxpayers.
The "selectorate" that must be pleased by a dictator will be smaller, but they could still apply inconsistent pressures.
Might it be closer to a unitary actor in a dictatorship?