1st Edition

US Democracy Promotion after the Cold War Stability, Basic Premises, and Policy toward Egypt

By Annika Elena Poppe Copyright 2020
    304 Pages 15 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    304 Pages 15 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    This book explores the often assumed but so far not examined proposition that a particular U.S. culture influences U.S. foreign policy behavior or, more concretely, that widely shared basic assumptions embraced by members of the U.S. administration have a notable impact on foreign policy-making.

    Publicly professed beliefs regarding America’s role in the world and about democracy’s universal appeal – despite much contestation – go to the heart of U.S. national identity. Employing extensive foreign policy text analysis as well as using the case study of U.S.-Egyptian bilateral relations during the Clinton, Bush junior, and Obama administrations, it shows that basic assumptions matter in U.S. democracy promotion in general, and the book operationalizes them in detail as well as employs qualitative content analysis to assess their validity and variation.

    The research presented lies at the intersection of International Relations, U.S. foreign policy, regional studies, and democracy promotion. The specific focus on the domestic ‘cultural’ angle for the study of foreign policy and this dimension’s operationalization makes it a creative crossover study and a unique contribution to these overlapping fields.

    Introduction

      1. Why policy change seemed compelling
      2. Identity and culture as an inhibitor to change
      3. U.S. democracy promotion in Egypt as the litmus test
      4. The U.S. foreign policy elite as the key actor
      5. Key contributions and chapter outline

    1. U.S. democracy promotion: determinants, debates, and the diagnosis of continuity in the post-Cold War era
      1. Concepts of democracy and democracy promotion
      2. From democratic euphoria to digesting the authoritarian backlash
      3. The diagnosis of continuity in the strategic-operational sphere of U.S. democracy promotion
        1. The Clinton administration: enlargement of the community of market democracies
        2. The Bush administration: a Freedom Agenda for the world
        3. The Obama administration: adapting democracy promotion in times of adversity

      4. The Clinton, Bush, and Obama administrations in comparative perspective

    2. National identity, political culture, and the democracy promotion world view: theoretical framework and methodological approach
      1. The theoretical approach
        1. General suppositions within the broader theoretical strands
        2. The basic premises within the framework of national identity and political culture
        3. On the conceptual relationship between interests and values
        4. Language and political practice
        5. How and why culture promotes stability
        6. Expectations

      2. The methodological approach
        1. The suitability of employing content analysis for this study
        2. Basic tenets and criteria of content analysis
        3. Development of category scheme and text sample
        4. The content analysis for the U.S.-Egypt case study

    3. Approximating the basic premises of U.S. democracy promotion after the Cold War
      1. U.S. democracy promotion and its relevance for national identity formation
      2. The basic premises of U.S. democracy promotion in the literature
        1. Premise 1: democracy is a universal(ly aspired to) value
        2. Premise 2: external actors can and should support democratization
        3. Premise 3: democratization is a struggle between identifiable ‘good ‘and ‘bad’
        4. Premise 4: democratization requires no preconditions and is a relatively smooth process
        5. Premise 5: all good things go together

      3. The basic premises of U.S. democracy promotion: the bigger picture
        1. The basic premises in the challenge ground

    4. The basic premises of U.S. democracy promotion: major changes in form, minor changes in content
      1. Results of the qualitative-quantitative content analysis
        1. Premise 1: democracy is a universal(ly aspired to) value
        2. Premise 2: external actors can and should support democratization
        3. Premise 3: democratization is a struggle between identifiable ‘good ‘and ‘bad’
        4. Premise 4: democratization requires no preconditions and is a relatively smooth process
        5. Premise 5: all good things go together

      2. General observations
      3. Presidency-specific observations
        1. The Clinton presidency
        2. The Bush presidency
        3. The Obama presidency

      4. Discussion and interpretation: the post-Cold War U.S. democracy promotion world view
      5. Observations in and of the U.S. democracy promotion practitioner community

    5. Premises in the challenge ground: U.S. policy towards Egypt (I)
      1. A brief history of the U.S.-Egyptian relationship
      2. The Clinton administration: strong on Mubarak support, quiet on the democracy front
      3. The Bush administration: from democracy promotion excitement to retreat

    6. Premises in the challenge ground: U.S. policy towards Egypt (II)
      1. The Obama administration: navigating difficult waters and returning to safe havens
        1. Business as usual – the Obama administration before the Egyptian uprisings
        2. Surprised and underprepared – the United States during the eighteen days of upheaval
        3. Scrambling to walk the tight rope - the post-‘revolutionary’ period

      2. Conclusion: U.S. democracy promotion in the case of Egypt

    7. Conclusion
      1. The course of this study and major findings
      2. The U.S. democracy promotion world view: a stable core and an adaptable periphery
      3. Whence the stability? Empirical and theoretical considerations
      4. The case of Egypt in a broader research perspective and the interest-value divide
      5. The question of discursive hegemony, other factors for stability, and research implications
      6. Outlook: is there potential for change on the horizon?

    8. Epilogue: Democracy promotion under the Trump administration
      1. Enter the Trump administration – an assessment of the first two years
      2. Whither to, democracy promotion in (post-)Trump America?

    9. Bibliography
    10. Appendix
      1. Table 3: Results of content analysis of U.S. official statements in relative numbers
      2. Table 4: Results of content analysis of U.S. official statements in absolute numbers

    Biography

    Annika Elena Poppe is project director and senior researcher at the Peace Research Institute Frankfurt (PRIF). Her research focuses on international democracy promotion, U.S. foreign policy, and the global phenomenon of shrinking civic spaces. She is coordinator of the German research network ‘External Democracy Promotion’ (EDP), member of the International Consortium on Closing Civic Spaces (iCon) hosted by CSIS, and has worked as a consultant for the German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ) in 2016–2017.

    "This broad-gauged account of U.S. democracy promotion seeks to explain why significant continuity has characterized the policies of widely divergent U.S. presidents, from Bill Clinton to Donald Trump. Locating her answer in a probing dissection of the underlying worldview of U.S. diplomats and aid practitioners, the author eschews well-worn critiques and instead offers analytic richness and insight. An in-depth study of the crucial case of U.S. policy toward Egypt provides useful empirical grounding." - Thomas Carothers, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington DC

    "Poppe's book offers deep insights into fundamental drivers of the stability of US democracy promotion. Scholars interested in international relations will profit from her innovative approach that combines the study of political culture and foreign policy orientation and thus makes this book a creative crossover study. Policy makers seeking for allies in democracy promotion will be relieved to learn that 'there is much more iceberg underneath than above the waterline.' " - Julia Leininger, German Development Institute, Bonn

    "The main strength of the book consists in adding an interesting and compelling argument to the constructivist approach to foreign policy-making and democracy promotion studies. Democracy promotion studies, in contrast to Democratization studies, have been on the back foot for a few years now. Due to the rather mitigated outcome of the Arab Spring and the recent lack of interest from the current US administration in the matter, some observers have declared that there was not much to be said anymore concerning democracy promotion. This is not the case - as shown by this study, which contributes to the field in an original and rigorous way." - Jeff Bridoux, Aberystwyth University,Wales

    "With the prospects for democracy promotion by the United States appearing dim currently, this book is an extremely timely and important contribution to the literature. Annika Elena Poppe makes a strong argument as to the enduring stability and influence of the assumptions and world view behind U.S. democracy promotion, even in unlikely challenging cases such as Egypt. Her key finding of a stable core and an adaptable periphery to this outlook in Washington will be invaluable in understanding how this strand of U.S. foreign policy fares during the Trump administration and beyond." - Nicolas Bouchet, German Marshall Fund of the United States, Berlin