The future of foreign policy
Hehir, J. Bryan
J. Bryan Hehir THE FUTURE OF FOREIGN POLICY THE ODD COUPLE: BILL & JESSF he elections of 1994 had one overwhelming result and multiple explanations about the roots of the Republican victory....
...Undoubtedly a specific agenda will get spelled out, but that process will likely bring to the surface some pluralism in Republican ranks...
...For the president to break even in the struggle ahead will require enormous energy and dexterity...
...post-election statements is total and radical...
...Moreover, part of the formula for success on foreign policy is to restrict the president's public exposure to major issues...
...Since the summer, to the surprise of many, foreign policy has been the president's strong suit...
...But a Washington Post editorial, commenting on Christopher's speech, provided the appropriate balance: "There is a continuity to national interest, but foreign policy is set partly on the thermostat of domestic politics...
...The role of Senator Arthur Vandenberg in the 1940s or Senator William Fulbright in the 1960s has been approached only by Sam Nunn (D-Ga...
...No such voice has yet been heard in this administration's first two years...
...The U.S...
...and Jim Leach (R-Iowa) in the House will be satisfied to let Helms represent the Republican voice in foreign policy is not yet clear...
...How the administration plans to handle the foreign-policy debate substantively and tactically is not yet clear...
...On substance, Helms and Robert Dole (R-Kans...
...In the 1990s the Congress has maintained a low profile on foreign policy...
...policy to narrowly defined national security goals...
...The differences with the Clinton administration will, of course, be much greater...
...more likely, it is yet another sign that post-cold war Americans define their most threatening problems in domestic terms (even if some of them are rooted in international issues like trade or immigration policy...
...Senator Helms's role in foreign policy debate has been notable for its obstructionist tactics rather than its strategic vision...
...The election guaranteed that much...
...support for UN peacekeeping will continue only if Clinton can stave off a clearly predictable challenge to his policy from the Republican leadership...
...Nevertheless, if foreign policy did not influence the election it will inevitably be affected by the results of the Republican victory...
...It is standard fare to acknowledge the primacy of the presidency on foreign policy in the American constitutional system...
...On tactics, Helms's style of stifling policies through parliamentary devices will require constant engagement from the White House...
...But on the right there are different visions among senior Republicans of what is in the U.S...
...It also was crucial to the development of a renewed emphasis on human rights, and a decisive role for the United States in South Africa and the Philippines...
...Broader engagement in multilateral diplomacy and U.S...
...More noticeable has been the lack of key congressional leaders with a defined foreign-policy perspective...
...Whether Senators Lugar and John Warner (R-Va...
...Without addressing substance and tactics vigorously, Clinton will lose control of the foreign policy agenda...
...foreign policy and that of Jesse Helms (R-N.C...
...Without some consistent articulation of the administration's broad policy goals and its interpretation of the world, the president will lose the foreign-policy battle substantively and tactically...
...Christopher clearly does not fit this description...
...But these particular successes are not sufficient for the challenge ahead...
...Anthony Lake has been addressing such a framework in a coordinated series of speeches, but to be the second voice will demand much more visibility of him in the policy process...
...The "Contract with America" and initial statements of Republican leaders want less U.S...
...What perspective might Congress now produce under Republican leadership...
...policy on a regular basis...
...The major congressional committees, Foreign Relations and Foreign Affairs, have been marginal actors in the foreign-policy process...
...At the level of principles and issues, only general predictions are possible...
...The president will necessarily focus on the domestic front...
...The problem posed by a still very unpredictable world and by a Republican Congress requires some changes in the Clinton policy process...
...role in the Middle East, Haiti, and North Korea silenced much of the criticism that accompanied the formulation of each of these policies...
...the Congress is inherently a responsive partner whose most potent instruments are the ultimate power to declare war and the power of the purse...
...Testing the meaning of this move to the right requires a comment on the role of Congress in the foreign policy process, the composition of Republican leadership on foreign policy, and the likely response of the Clinton administration to a Republican Congress...
...Initiative always rests with the executive...
...engagement in and support for the United Nations, no U.S...
...The policies are the result, in my view, of a more assertive role from the White House, a better coordinated policy at the Department of Defense, and the specific contribution of Christopher in the Middle East...
...The highpoint of congressional engagement in the foreign policy of the 1990s was the debate in both Houses about the Gulf War...
...Lugar's leadership of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in the 1980s produced a centrist foreign policy that had both Republican and Democratic support...
...here the Republican challenge as embodied in Newt Gingrich's (R-Ga...
...This does not mean the country is satisfied with the Clinton policy...
...Since that quite substantive and significant debate, the concerns of the Congress have been overwhelmingly domestic (NAFTA being as 7 WORLD WATCH much domestic as foreign policy...
...Secretary of State Warren Christopher immediately sought to reassure allies and others that continuity in foreign policy would survive decisive change in domestic politics...
...A restricted presidential role requires a "second voice" in the administration, someone who can articulate the framework, promises, and objectives of U.S...
...Vice-President Al Gore responds on an ad hoc basis to issues but not in systematic fashion...
...interest...
...The country has moved to the right, and as a result its international outlook moves to the right, too, in some degree yet to be told...
...troops under UN command, and higher defense spending, although there is little specificity about programs, policies, and weapons systems...
...Quite apart from the November elections, therefore, a troubling characteristic of recent policy debate has been the absence of a distinctive congressional perspective...
...The topic hardly surfaced during the campaign, and no analyst attributed the decisive Democratic defeat to foreign-policy issues...
...want to restrict U.S...
...In brief, the Washington Post is clearly correct that politics has moved right in the United States and policy can't be far behind...
...The step from campaigning to governing should highlight the difference between a Richard Lugar' s (RInd...
...or Congressmen Ben Gilman (RN.Y...
...Sorting through the commentators, it was possible to draw one clear conclusion: the election was not about foreign policy...
Vol. 121 • December 1994 • No. 21
