Confronting the Myth of Soft Power in U.S. Foreign Policy
Confronting the Myth of Soft Power in U.S. Foreign Policy

Author: Brent A. Lawniczak

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2022-03-31

Total Pages: 181

ISBN-13: 166690953X

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The concept of soft power has caught the attention of policymakers, scholars, and political pundits for the last thirty years. Soft power studies most often focus on measures of public opinion toward a power-wielder and draw conclusions about a state’s level of soft power from that opinion. This research examines soft power influence by focusing on the elite discourse and the foreign policy decisions of states that are the target of soft power influence. Beginning with Joseph Nye’s conception that soft power is an attractive force that influences state policy decisions and its level of support for another state’s policies, Confronting the Myth of Soft Power in U.S. Foreign Policy examines whether U.S. soft power was part of key policymakers’ decision calculus. Soft power is tested against two plausible alternate explanations—balancing and state identity. Data from the discourse of key foreign policymakers in France and Germany indicate that U.S. soft power does not account for those states’ policy decisions to support U.S.-led policy interventions in Kosovo in 1999, or against ISIS in 2014. The results of this research are suggestive regarding the potential of soft power influence and its implications on scholarship and U.S. foreign policymaking.

The Death of Social Democracy
The Death of Social Democracy

Author: Ashley Lavelle

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-03-09

Total Pages: 234

ISBN-13: 1317036379

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Whereas many writers and scholars interested in the field of social democracy have focused on factors such as the role of economic globalization and electoral pressures, Ashley Lavelle explores the importance of the collapse of the post-war economic boom and lower growth rates since then. He examines how these pressures have led social democrats to embrace neo-liberal policies and become threatened by minor parties and independent politicians. Providing an original argument about the decline of social democracy, the author investigates how its decline has increased the popularity of minor parties and independents, along with the reasons for social democratic membership and electoral decline. This is an important book for scholars of social democracy and the broader themes of world politics, political parties, social movements and globalization.

Great Policy Successes
Great Policy Successes

Author: Paul 't Hart

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2019

Total Pages: 353

ISBN-13: 0198843712

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"Or, a tale about why it's amazing that governments get so little credit for their many everyday and extraordinary achievements as told by sympathetic observers who seek to create space for a less relentlessly negative view of our pivotal public institutions."

The Limits of Alliance
The Limits of Alliance

Author: Andrew A. Michta

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

Published: 2006-04-10

Total Pages: 171

ISBN-13: 146164464X

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Are the relationships that the United States forged with North and Central Europe during the Cold War still viable today? As the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) declines and the European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) emerges, can the United States and Europe bridge the transatlantic fissures that opened when the United States prepared to go to war with Iraq? In a post-9/11 world, North and Central Europe have had to adapt their national security policies and rethink their relationship with the United States. In an in-depth look at the security policies of the states in North and Central Europe, Andrew Michta highlights how historical legacies, regional geostrategic constraints, and individual capabilities have shaped their response to the new environment. Michta raises the broad question of whether traditional alliances and NATO are still viable ways to deal with new security concerns. The two key questions that arise from this discussion are to what extent NATO still matters to the United States, beyond its political utility, and whether the European Union as a whole can become a partner for the United States in a new security environment. The Limits of Alliance argues that, although NATO will continue to exist in the coming decade, the hollowing-out of the alliance will be accompanied by a shift in transatlantic security relations toward bilateralism determined by regional security considerations.

Immigration Policy in the Federal Republic of Germany
Immigration Policy in the Federal Republic of Germany

Author: Douglas B. Klusmeyer

Publisher: Berghahn Books

Published: 2009-11-01

Total Pages: 346

ISBN-13: 1845459695

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German migration policy now stands at a major crossroad, caught between a fifty-year history of missed opportunities and serious new challenges. Focusing on these new challenges that German policy makers face, the authors, both internationally recognized in this field, use historical argument, theoretical analysis, and empirical evaluation to advance a more nuanced understanding of recent initiatives and the implications of these initiatives. Their approach combines both synthesis and original research in a presentation that is not only accessible to the general educated reader but also addresses the concerns of academic scholars and policy analysts. This important volume offers a comprehensive and critical examination of the history of German migration law and policy from the Federal Republic’s inception in 1949 to the present.

Japan and Germany as Regional Actors
Japan and Germany as Regional Actors

Author: Alexandra Sakaki

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2012-09-10

Total Pages: 225

ISBN-13: 1136250999

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The end of the Cold War and the bipolar era constituted a significant change in Germany's and Japan's foreign policy settings, granting both countries greater leeway to pursue policies divergent from Washington's strategy. This important book fills a gap in the existing literature by employing an explicitly comparative framework for analyzing and evaluating Germany's and Japan's post-Cold War regional foreign policy trajectories. Recent non-comparative studies diverge in their assessments of the extent to which the two countries' foreign policies are characterized by continuity or change, as while the majority of analyses on Germany find overall continuity in policies and guiding principles, prominent works on Japan see the country undergoing drastic change. Through a qualitative content analysis of key foreign policy speeches, this book traces and compares German and Japanese national role conceptions by identifying policymakers' perceived duties and responsibilities of their country in international politics. Further, through two case studies on missile defence policies and textbook disputes this study investigates actual foreign policy behaviour in order to question the assertion that post Cold War Germany and Japan are following very different paths. Providing a much needed new analysis of German and Japanese foreign policies, this book will be of great use to students and scholars interested in Japanese politics, German politics, comparative politics and international relations more generally.

US Hegemony and International Legitimacy
US Hegemony and International Legitimacy

Author: Lavina Rajendram Lee

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2010-02-05

Total Pages: 209

ISBN-13: 1135166277

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This book examines US hegemony and international legitimacy in the post-Cold War era, focusing on its leadership in the two wars on Iraq. The preference for unilateral action in foreign policy under the Bush Administration, culminating in the use of force against Iraq in 2003, has unquestionably created a crisis in the legitimacy of US global leadership. Of central concern is the ability of the United States to act without regard for the values and interests of its allies or for international law on the use of force, raising the question: does international legitimacy truly matter in an international system dominated by a lone superpower? US Hegemony and International Legitimacy explores the relationship between international legitimacy and hegemonic power through an in depth examination of two case studies – the Gulf Crisis of 1990-91 and the Iraq Crisis of 2002-03 – and examines the extent to which normative beliefs about legitimate behaviour influenced the decisions of states to follow or reject US leadership. The findings of the book demonstrate that subordinate states play a crucial role in consenting to US leadership and endorsing it as legitimate and have a significant impact on the ability of a hegemonic state to maintain order with least cost. Understanding of the importance of legitimacy will be vital to any attempt to rehabilitate the global leadership credentials of the United States under the Obama Administration. This book will be of much interest to students of US foreign policy, IR theory and security studies. Lavina Rajendram Lee is a lecturer in the Department of Modern History, Politics and International Relations at Macquarie University, Australia, and has a PhD in International Relations from the University of Sydney.

International Crisis Management
International Crisis Management

Author: Marc Houben

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2004-11-23

Total Pages: 338

ISBN-13: 1134326033

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Over the past fifty years, crisis management has become essential to achieving and maintaining national security. This book offers a comparative analysis of the preconditions and constraints nine European states place on their participation in international crisis management operations and the important consequences of such decisions, and provides a theoretical framework to help the reader understand this complex decision-making process.

Securitized Societies
Securitized Societies

Author: Peter-Alexis Albrecht

Publisher: BWV Verlag

Published: 2011-01-01

Total Pages: 368

ISBN-13: 3830527063

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HauptbeschreibungThe path towards Securitized Societies reconstructs this paradigm shift by looking at penal law and the criminal justice system. Over a time span of 40 years, the development from a social-integrative penal law of the welfare state to the preventive state to the securitized society is followed from the perspective of a criminologist and professor of penal law. The novelty lies in the perspective of the participating observer who comments on the criminal justice system not from the lectern but who ventures into the system and reports from experience, whether at the very end of the process of law enforcement in discussions with prisoners with life-long sentences, at the beginning of the process by tracing police strategies of prevention, or in the area of criminal policy by participating in parliamentary expert commissions or legislative processes. In retrospect, the observed legal developments show an erosion of the rule-of-law state. The shift from the preventive state to the securitized society is imbedded in global processes of change which endanger the individual's freedom and dignity and which equally affect global society and national societies. The general feeling of insecurity and lack of orientation created by these processes for broad parts of the population can no longer be restrained with the methods of individualizing social controls of the traditional kind - penal law. This insecurity brings forth forms of control which eat away at the rule of law in a securitized society which, for its apparent protection, is prepared to give up its foundations in the rule of law in favor of an ostensible security. This phenomenon is not restricted to Germany, but the country serves as an example case study for global processes of legal erosion - with the background of the unilateral development of leadership.