Feedback Effects in Foreign Policy: A Framework for Analysis

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its dominant position in the international system the potential for unintentional negative feedbacks is particularly high (e.g. Layne 1993, Waltz 1994). 20 There and back again III: Policies of others and foreign policy While the preceding sub-sections have looked at how the broad structural environment of a state may interact with this state's foreign policy, we will now turn to an aspect of the international environment that is of a less general nature. Policies of other states obviously affect what a state can and will do in the international system, but they do not necessarily form macro-structures like the international distribution of power or international institutions. Nonetheless they have been subject to some theoretical attention and reviewing this research will help us understand how the policies of other states may become involved in a process of foreign policy feedbacks. There are, in particular, two strands of research that are of importance here. The most elaborate rationalist account of the effects of other states' policies comes from game theory (Kahler 1998); while interactionist approaches present us with a constructivist reading of these effects (Wendt 1992). To begin with, game theory points out that the preferences and policies of interaction partners form certain micro-structures (situations) which affect the policy paths that are chosen by the actors. The most popular example, of course, is the Prisoners' Dilemma in which the constellation of preferences leads both interaction partners to choose policies which create a suboptimal interaction result for both of them. If the games are repeated changes in one actor's policies affect the calculation and ultimately the policies of the other actor. This is most obvious when the actors play tit-for-tat (Axelrod 1984), in which both cooperative and uncooperative moves are answered by like moves from the interaction partner. Tit-for-tat can then evolve into an instance of an (intentional) positive feedback loop in which cooperation is reproduced and reinforced over time. Game theory thus conceives of others' policies primarily as constraints on one's own choices. They do not alter actors' preferences over ultimate outcomes but influence the policies they choose to achieve these outcomes. This conforms with the basic thrust of many empirically-minded foreign policy analyses, which represent foreign policies as responses to the actions of others without further reflection on theory, e.g. negotiations between the U.S. and North Korea, which may be recounted simply as a chain of actions and reactions by the two parties.
21 Interactionist approaches, which are mostly inspired by the sociological approach of symbolic interactionism (Mead 1962, Blumer 1969), have a somewhat different take on the issue. They highlight not so much the constraining effect that others' policies might have on the ability of actors to achieve their given goals. Rather they point out that (social) actors and their goals only come into being in the interaction with others. According to them there is a constitutive aspect to interactions and this implies that the policies of others contribute to this constitutive process. It is especially the interpretation of each others' actions that creates a mutual understanding of whether actors belong to the same group (Risse-Kappen 1995). This process also has a regulative dimension because it helps to establish what is appropriate in any given group and situation and what is not. Both approaches, game theory and interactionism, inherently posit the existence of feedback effects. If B's policies influence those of A, then A's policies will of course also affect B's. The recursive dynamic that can result has already been illustrated above with the tit-fortat game which can result either in self-reinforcing positive or negative feedbacks. If one refrains from an overly strong reliance on substantive rationality, one can see the contingent character of feedback effects even in this case: Actors have strong incentives to stick to the titfor-tat strategy, yet they are not compelled to do so. Actors may drop out of the game and respond to a cooperative move by non-cooperation. Although this is unlikely (it will be costly for them in the long run), it is not impossible and whether they do it will be contingent on the concrete circumstances. In the interactionist interpretation contingency even becomes a central focus. It is usually pointed out that the movement from the first interaction to established patterns of interaction has a high degree of openness (Wendt 1992). Once established, however, the feedbacks tend to reinforce the established path and make it difficult to deviate from it. Over time, institutions may develop, which come with their own feedback loops as we have seen above.
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Page 3 and 4: idges the fields of IR and FPA; and
Page 5 and 6: 5 Bridging the gap: between abstrac
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Page 9 and 10: 9 3 Feedback effects: some general
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Page 13 and 14: 13 Figure 2: Foreign policy and thr
Page 15 and 16: 15 There is a suspicious lack of FP
Page 17 and 18: 17 What is important now for the an
Page 19: 19 or autonomy, or influence in the
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Page 25 and 26: 25 While all these approaches are v
Page 27 and 28: processes and the effects of restri
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Page 33 and 34: 33 partners (Pakistan, Saudi Arabia
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