Foreign policy analysis and the international relations of Asia
For too long, scholars of foreign policy analysis (FPA) have ceded ground to structural international relations theories' mantra that it is impossible to explain international comes by using unit level factors. This paper argues that structural IR theories such as neorealism and neoliberalism throw up more puzzles than answers when it comes to explaining post-Cold War Asia's peace and economic dynamism; I contend that FPA variables such as political ideology, threat perceptions, and leadership, bring us closer to understanding those outcomes. This approach brings back the role of agency and choice in a way that suggest that they trump structure, not only in explaining the foreign policies of individual states, but also in explaining international outcomes such as peace and economic dynamism.
