Why American Foreign Policy Fails Unsafe at Home and Despised Abroad

When the U.S. confronts today's world, it does so without any recognizably coherent policy approach. Foreign policy is constructed within a marketplace of ideas, resulting in confusing and sometimes contradictory directives on how best to deal with the world around us. Part of this is due to a changed global environment. The three biggest changes are the end of the Cold War, the rise of globalization, and increased partisanship within the U.S. government. However, it is also because of the unique marketplace of ideas within the U.S. that sets various actors against one another in deciding who or what influence foreign policy decisions. This book explores this change in U.S. foreign policy, examine the roles that the six primary actors (the President, the Congress, the bureaucracy, non-governmental organizations, the media and the public) play in policy decisions, and assess the potential for improvement within this system.

Dennis Jett is the Dean of the International Center at the University of Florida. A former career diplomat, he served as Ambassador to Peru and Mozambique, on the National Security Council and in Argentina, Israel, Malawi and Liberia. He has a Ph.D. in international relations and his dissertation entitled “Why Peacekeeping Fails” has been published in 2000. He has been interviewed on Jim Lehrer News Hour, CNN, NPR and other national news programs and has written over 70 opinion pieces for major newspapers. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.