The Shape of Elite Opinion on U.S. Foreign Policy, 1992 to 2004
Research has demonstrated considerable diversity in the evolution of foreign policy beliefs of elite opinion leaders. Holsti and Rosenau's three-headed eagle, Wittkopf's four-headed eagle, and Rosati and Creed's six-headed eagle produced a number of categories that help to explain the significance of this diversity since the collapse of the Cold War consensus. This article expands upon this research by observing even greater complexity and diversity in the shape of foreign policy beliefs of elite opinion leaders since the end of the Cold War. Using a content analysis of national opinion and foreign policy journals between 1992 and 2004, it identifies and details nine foreign policy orientations (missionaries, hegemonists, globalizers, global capitalists, narrow realists, progressive internationalists, anti-imperialists, neighbors, and disengagers) held by elite opinion leaders. It also suggests that elites are altering their foreign policy orientations by absorbing profound global changes into their belief systems.
The Structure of Foreign Policy Attitudes among American Leaders
The recent renaissance of interest in public opinion and foreign policy has generated a vigorous debate about the dimensions that characterize foreign policy attitudes. This paper assesses a scheme that emerged from Wittkopf's analyses of the Chicago Council on Foreign Policy surveys. Two dimensions (militant internationalism and cooperative internationalism) are crossed to create four types: hard-liners (support MI, oppose CI), internationalists (support both MI and CI), isolationists (oppose both MI and CI), and accommodationists (oppose MI, support CI). After developing scales for MI and CI, the scheme is tested with data from nationwide surveys of opinion leaders undertaken in 1976 (N = 2,282), 1980 (N = 2,502), and 1984 (N = 2,515). The MI/CI scheme is tested--and strongly supported--by examining the pattern of responses by hard-liners, internationalists, isolationists, and accommodationists to a broad range of questions from the three surveys of opinion leaders. The background attributes and other political attitudes associated with the four types are then examined. Correlations are strong for ideology and party; moderate for occupation; and weak for gender, age, education, travel, and military service. The conclusion raises some questions about the isolationist category and speculates about the broader implications of the findings.
American Elite Views of Relations with the Soviet Union
This study examined American elite views of relations with the Soviet Union, and investigated the relative effects of respondents' views and certain kinds of evidence on policy responses to a hypothetical crisis in the Persian Gulf. Four orthogonal factors were found to describe current elite views: (1) support for detente, (2) support for deterrence, (3) assumptions of rationality and accuracy, and (4) rejection of a cold war perspective. Four kinds of evidence were manipulated in a hypothetical crisis scenario: (a) Soviet intentions, (b) the local conventional military balance, (c) the nuclear balance, and (d) the degree of U.S. interest in the region. All belief factors and all four kinds of evidence were found to influence the policy responses in meaningful ways. However, for all policy items, the belief factors accounted for a greater proportion of the variance. These results provide qualified support for the idea that policy responses directed toward managing an adversary are significantly “theory driven.”