Suchergebnisse

This paper examines the relationship between the domestic and foreign policy beliefs of American opinion leaders, using data drawn from nationwide surveys in 1984, 1988 and 1992. Responses to fourteen items appearing in each of the surveys are used to identify four domestic policy types: liberals, populists, conservatives, and libertarians. An additional 14 items are used to classify respondents into four foreign policy types: hardliners, internationalists, isolationists and accommodationists. There is a high correlation between the domestic and foreign policy types. Further analyses examine the responses of the four domestic policy types to several international issues: future threats, US interests and roles, foreign policy goals, and approaches to peace. Background variables associated with the domestic and foreign policy beliefs indicate that the cross-cutting cleavages created by domestic and international issues during the two decades after World War II are giving way to overlapping divisions that have powerful partisan and ideological foundations.

The relationship between our leaders' beliefs about domestic and foreign policy issues has generated a lively controversy. Much of the existing literature indicates that there is a very limited correlation between them. This article is based on data derived from a 1984 survey in which 2,515 American leaders filled out and returned a lengthy mail questionnaire. Respondents are classified according to their positions on both foreign policy scales (hard liners, internationalists, isolationists, accommodationists) and domestic policy scales (economic liberals, social liberals, economic conservatives, social conservatives). The data reveal a strong and consistent relationship between domestic and foreign policy beliefs. Analyses of the leaders' background attributes indicate that ideology, party, and occupation are strongly correlated with both sets of beliefs, whereas education, age, military service, travel experience, and gender are weakly related to beliefs. The conclusion raises some questions about the implications of the findings.