No abstract

No abstract

This article examines the characteristics of individual members of

“Congressional foreign policy entrepreneurs” are those legislators who initiate their own foreign policy agendas. These individuals seek to frame policy discussions and mobilize public and interest group interest; to direct congressional agendas toward specific foreign policy issues; to structure and influence the formulation of foreign policies by the executive branch; to revise, refocus, or reformulate foreign policies; to generate alternative and replacement foreign policies; and to fill policy vacuums with their own preferred foreign policies. This paper examines the evolution and impact of such entrepreneurs across the periods of the Cold War Consensus (1946–1967), the Cold War Dissensus (1968–1989), and the Post‐Cold War (1990–2000). The paper first provides an overview of the concept of foreign policy entrepreneurs. It then turns to case studies of entrepreneurial initiatives from three prolific entrepreneurs whose careers span the post‐World War II era: Senators Jacob Javits, Edward Kennedy, and Christopher Dodd. Together, the overview and cases shed light on the different avenues and activities that entrepreneurs use to address their preferred issues and the impact entrepreneurs have on policy, as well as highlight changes in both over time.

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

The conventional narrative surrounding the post-9/11 "War on Terror" tends to characterize the US Congress as a mostly inactive and compliant bystander, bowing to an aggressive assertion of unilateral presidential authority and power by the Bush administration. However, clarifying the conceptual framework used to examine legislative-executive interactions and congressional foreign policy behavior to account for varying patterns of interaction and varying avenues of influence yields an alternative explanation. While there is some truth to the conventional wisdom about a Congress rallying to support the president in time of war, applying the refined conceptual framework brings a more complex story into sharper focus. Viewed through this alternative lens, we see that members of Congress, and the institution as a whole, played a more discriminating and substantial-yet still predictable-role consistent with the context of the situation and the broad historical forces and patterns that combine to shape congressional foreign policy behavior and influence. Once the context and forces shaping congressional behavior and legislative-executive interactions are understood, congressional engagement (or lack thereof) in the War on Terror from 2001 to 2009 emerges as a relatively predictable sequence of initial compliance, (rallying) giving way first to competition and then to confrontation. ). While there is some truth to this characterization of Congress, a closer examination of the 2001-2009 period reveals a more complex story. Members of Congress (MCs), and the institution as a whole, played a more complicated, yet predictable, role consistent with the context of the situation and the array of factors and forces that combine to shape variations in congressional foreign policy behavior and influence. Once the context and forces shaping congressional behavior and legislative-executive interactions are clarified and connected in an explanatory framework, the nature of congressioInternational Studies Perspectives (2014) 15, 186-208.