https://at-ceu.studyguide.timeedit.net/modules/INTR5109?type=COREThis course focuses on how states engage with other states and other actors on the international stage, with a special focus on the challenges posed by the contemporary trend toward US hegemonic decline. In doing so, we engage with perennial questions of foreign policy analysis. Why are some states more aggressive than others? How important is leader personality in the waging of war and construction of peace? Why do some states enact free trade policies whereas others engage in beggar-thy-neighbor behaviors? Do individual leaders play a crucial role in the foreign affairs of the state or do political institutions, culture or political institutions override contingent events and personality or skills of the leader? These are the perennial questions that face state executives the world over. This course re-examines these questions in the context of the contemporary condition of US hegemonic decline, which has corresponded with a sharp turn toward "transactional" foreign policy under President Donald Trump. Although US primacy has been eroding at least since the 1990s, the past two decades has seen China pulling even with the US economically, while the continuing relevance of post-WWII institutions have come under fire by BRICS as well as countries of the Global South. What does any of this mean for the crafting and execution of state foreign policy today? What new crises can contemporary states expect in a post-American international system. To answer both perennial and contemporary questions, we begin at the beginning, reviewing the state of the art foreign policy analysis (FPA) scholarship on how political leaders craft foreign policy and grand strategy. In doing so, the course follows a traditional 'levels of analysis' structure, beginning with the systemic or structural level, where we examine constraints on foreign policy-making such as balance of power considerations and alliance structures as well as international regimes, humanitarian norms, transnational movements and diaspora organizations. We then move to the state level to investigate the influence of domestic factors such as regime type, government veto players, bureaucratic and organizational politics, sub-state interest groups, as well as cultural factors such as national values and role identities. Finally, we move to individual-level factors that influence foreign policy decision-making, including cognitive maps, leadership traits, psychological factors, perceptions, and beliefs. The goals of the course are fourfold. First, it aims to familiarize students with the principal approaches to foreign policy as a field that is derived, but still distinct, from international relations. Second, it gives students the tools to conduct empirical analysis on, and to better understand, the actions of individual states. Third, it teaches students the basics of how to formulate a foreign policy position, negotiate a good deal for their country, and fourth, how to research, write and deliver a foreign policy brief and defend it publicly. In doing so, students must give attention to both the costs and political viability of their policy proposals. In general, we ask how foreign policy decision-making is likely to change as US unipolarity gives way to an uncertain multipolar world. This course focuses on why decision-makers as representatives of states choose a particular foreign policy over others. Mainstream IR theory, especially neorealism, maintains that systemic constraints push state behavior (the output of the box, i.e. foreign policy) towards homogeneity. If all states act similarly, then there is no need to open the proverbial 'black box' of the state. Foreign Policy Analysis (FPA) on the other hand suggests that human decision-making in international politics is not best approximated by the above abstraction of the unitary states: the box needs to be opened to understand the policy making process, why particular policies were chosen, which actors were involved, what influenced their choice and what the alternatives were.The course departs from theoretical approaches that address the aforementioned systemic constraints, moving towards those that focus on the state, the level of substate entities like bureaucracies, all the way down to the level of individual decisionmakers and elite decision-making groups. In general, any given foreign policy decision is a function of systemic and domestic incentives and constraints, and ideational preferences. The course will examine the primary sources of incentives, constraints, and preferences on foreign policy decision-making in general and with respect to specific questions such as military interventions, public diplomacy, aid policies, or the use of economic sanctions. Meanwhile, since FPA does not have a distinct level of analysis but rather focuses on the continuous interaction between actors and their environment, the course will highlight how the domestic and the international interact and shape each other.The course is by no means an exhaustive overview of FPA theory. It merely seeks to offer students a sound basis for the critical understanding and application of theoretical-analytical frameworks as there can be no analysis without a guiding, theoretical hand. To accentuate the importance of theoretical thinking in the analysis of foreign, the course will offer a comparative application of previously discussed theoretical frameworks on the same empirics (the 2003 Iraq War), and an in-class simulation game the topic of which will be voted for by the class in the first week.