DOMESTIC STRUCTURE AND FOREIGN POLICY

by Henry A. Kissinger

I. <u>The Role of Domestic Structure</u>

In the traditional conception, international affairs is
conducted by political units treated almost as personalities. The
domestic structure is taken as given; the study of international affairs
begins where domestic policy ends.

But this approach is appropriate only to stable periods. At
other times the impact of the domestic structure is far more pervasive.
A policy dilemma arises because the pros and cons of a given course
seem evenly balanced. The definition of what constitutes a problem
and what criteria are relevant in "solving" it, reflect to a considerable
extent the domestic notions of what is just, the pressures produced by
the decision-making process, and the experience which forms the
leaders in their rise to eminence. During stable periods this is
obscured because the various states generally have similar conceptions
of the "rules of the game." If the domestic structures are based on
commensurable notions of what is just, a consensus about permissible
aims and methods of foreign policy develops. If domestic structures are
reasonably stable, temptations to use an adventurous foreign policy to
achieve domestic cohesion are at a minimum. In these conditions,

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leaders will generally apply the same criteria and hold similar views
about what constitutes a "reasonable" demand. This does not guarantee
agreement, but it provides the condition for a meaningful dialogue, that
is, it sets the stage for traditional diplomacy.

When the domestic structures are based on fundamentally
different conceptions of what is just, the conduct of international
affairs grows more complex. Then it becomes difficult even to define
the nature of disagreement because what seems most obvious to one
side appears most problematic to the other. Statesmen can still meet,
but their ability to persuade has been reduced for they no longer speak
the same language.

This can occur even when no universal claims are made.
Incompatible domestic structures can passively generate a gulf, simply
because of the difficulty of achieving a consensus about the nature of
"reasonable" aims and methods. But when one or more states claim
universal applicability for their particular structure, schisms grow
deep indeed. In that event, the domestic structure becomes not only an
obstacle to understanding but one of the principal issues in international
affairs. Its requirements condition the conception of alternatives; its
survival seems involved in every dispute. The symbolic aspect of foreign
policy begins to overshadow the substantive component. It becomes
difficult to consider a dispute "on its merits" because the disagreement
seems finally to turn not on a specific issue but on a set of values as

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expressed in domestic arrangements. The consequences of such a
state of affairs was explained by Edmund Burke during the French
Revolution:

I never thought we could make peace with the system;
because it was not for the sake of an object we pursued
in rivalry with each other, but with the system itself
that we were at war. As I understood the matter, we
were at war not with its conduct but with its existence;
convinced that its existence and its hostility were the
same.

Of course, the domestic structure is not irrelevant
in any historical period. At a minimum, it determines the amount
of the total social effort which can be devoted to foreign policy.
The wars of the kings who governed by divine right were limited because
feudal rulers, bound by customary law, could not levy income taxes
or conscript their subjects. The French Revolution which based its
policy on a doctrine of popular will, mobilized resources on a truly
national scale for the first time. This was one of the principal
reasons for the startling successes of French arms against a hostile
Europe which possessed greater over-all power. The ideological regimes
of the twentieth century have utilized a still larger share
of the national effort. This has enabled them to hold their own against
an environment possessing far superior resources.

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[Y]

Aside from the allocation of resources, the domestic structure crucially affects the way the actions of other states are interpreted. To some extent, of course, every society finds itself in an environment not of its own making and has some of the main lines of its foreign policy imposed on it. Indeed, the pressure of the environment can grow so strong that it permits only one interpretation of its significance; Prussia in the eighteenth century and Israel in the contemporary period may have found themselves in this position.

But for the majority of states the margin of decision has been greater. The actual choice has been determined to a considerable degree by their interpretation of the environment and by their leaders' conception of alternatives. Napoleon rejected peace offers beyond the dreams of the kings who had ruled France by "divine right" because he was convinced that *any* settlement which demonstrated the limitations of his power was tantamount to his downfall. That Russia seeks to surround itself with a belt of friendly states in Eastern Europe is a product of geography and history. That it is attempting to do so by imposing a domestic structure based on a particular ideology is a result of conceptions supplied by its own domestic structure.

The domestic structure is decisive finally in the elaboration of positive goals. The most difficult, indeed tragic, aspect of foreign policy is how to deal with the problem of conjecture. When the scope for action is greatest, knowledge on which to base such action is

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small or ambiguous. When knowledge becomes available, the ability
to affect events is usually at a minimum. In 1936, no one could know
whether Hitler was a misunderstood nationalist or a maniac. By the
time certainty was achieved, it had to be paid for with millions of
lives.

The conjectural element of foreign policy--the need to gear
actions that cannot be proved true when it is made--is never more
crucial than in a revolutionary period. Then, the old is obviously
disintegrating while the shape of its replacement if highly uncertain.
Everything depends, therefore, on some conception of the future. But
varying domestic structures can easily produce different assessments
of the significance of existing trends and, more importantly,
clashing criteria for resolving these differences or for shaping the
future. This is the dilemma of our time.

Problems are novel; their scale is vast; their nature is often
abstract and always psychological. In the past, international relations
were confined to a limited geographic area. The various continents

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pursued their relations essentially in isolation from each other.
Until the eighteenth century, other continents impinged on Europe
only sporadically and for relatively brief periods. And when Europe
extended its sway over much of the world, foreign policy became
limited to the Western Powers with the single exception of Japan.
The international system of the nineteenth century was to all
practical purposes identical with the concert of Europe.

The period after World War II marks the first era of truly
global foreign policy. Each major state is capable of producing
consequences in every part of the globe by a direct application of
its power or because ideas can be transmitted almost instantaneously
or because ideological rivalry gives vast symbolic significance even
to issues which are minor in geopolitical terms. The mere act of
adjusting perspectives to so huge a scale would produce major dislocations.
This problem is compounded by the emergence of so many new states.
Since 1945, the number of participants in the international system
has nearly doubled. In previous periods the addition of even one
or two new states tended to lead to decades of instability until a
new equilibrium was established and accepted. The emergence of scores
of new states has magnified this difficulty many times over.

These upheavals would be challenge enough but they are
overshadowed by the risks posed by modern technology. Peace is
maintained through the threat of mutual destruction based on weapons
for which there exists no operational experience. Deterrence--the

[Y]

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policy of preventing an action by confronting the opponent with
risks he is unwilling to run--depends in the first instance on
psychological criteria. What the potential aggressor believes is
more crucial than what is objectively true. Deterrence occurs
above all in the minds of men.

To achieve an international consensus on the significance
of these developments would be a major task even if domestic structures
were comparable. It becomes especially difficult when domestic
structures differ widely and when universal claims are made on
behalf of them. A systematic assessment of the impact of domestic
structure on the conduct of international affairs would have to treat
such factors as historical tradition, social values, and
the economic system. But this would far transcend the scope of
an article. For the purposes of this discussion we will confine
ourselves to sketching the impact of two factors only: administrative
structure and the formative experience of leadership
groups.

## II. The Impact of the Administrative Structure

In the contemporary period, the very nature of the governmental
structure introduces an element of rigidity which operates more or
less independently of the convictions of statesmen or the ideology
which they represent. Issues are too complex and relevant fact too
manifold to be dealt with on the basis of personal intuition. An
institutionalization of decision-making is an inevitable by-product

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of the risks of international affairs in the nuclear age. Moreover,
almost every modern state is dedicated to some theory of "planning"
--the attempt to structure the future by understanding and, if
necessary, manipulating the environment. Planning involves a quest
for predictability and, above all for "objectivity." There is a
deliberate effort to reduce the relevant element of a problem to
a standard of average performance. The vast bureaucratic mechanisms
that emerge develop a momentum and a vested interest of their own.
As they grow more complex, their internal standards of operation
are not necessarily commensurable. There is a trend toward autarky
using
or toward / foreign policy as a means to increase domestic control.
A paradoxical consequence may be that increased control over the
domestic environment is purchased at the price of loss of flexibility
in international affairs.

The purpose of bureaucracy is to devise a standard operating
procedure which can cope effectively with most problems. A bureaucracy
is efficient if the matters which it handles routinely are, in fact,
the most frequent and if its procedures are relevant to their solution.
If those criteria are met, the energies of the top leadership are
freed to deal creatively with the unexpected occurrence or with the
need for innovation. Bureaucracy becomes an obstacle when what it
defines as routine does not address the most significant range of
issues or when its prescribed mode of action proves irrelevant to
the problem.

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When this occurs, the bureaucracy absorbs the energies of top executives in reconciling what is expected with what happens; the analysis of where one is overwhelms the consideration of where one should be going. Serving the machine becomes a more absorbing occupation than defining its purpose. Success consists in moving the administrative machine to the point of decision leaving relatively little energy for analyzing the merit of this decision. The quest for "objectivity"--while desirable theoretically--involves the danger that means and ends are confused, that an average standard of performance is exalted as the only valid one. Attention tends to be diverted from the act of choice--which is the ultimate test of statesmanship--to the accumulation of facts. Decisions can be avoided until a crisis brooks no further delay, until the events themselves have removed the element of ambiguity.

Something like this seems to be characteristic of modern bureaucratic states whatever their ideology. In societies with a pragmatic tradition, such as the United States, there develops a greater concern with an analysis of where one is than where one is going. What passes for planning is frequently the projection of the familiar into the future. In societies based on ideology, doctrine is institutionalized and exegesis takes the place of innovation. Creativity must make so many concessions to orthodoxy that it may exhaust itself in doctrinal adaptations. In short, the accumulation of knowledge of the bureaucracy and the impersonality of its method of arriving at decisions can be achieved at a high price. Decision-making can grow

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so complex that the process of producing a bureaucratic consensus may
overshadow the purpose of the effort.

While all thoughtful administrators would grant in the abstract
that these dangers exist, they find it difficult to act on their
knowledge. Lip service is paid to planning; indeed planning staffs
proliferate. However, they suffer from two debilities. The "operating"
elements may not take the planning effort seriously. Plans become
esoteric exercises which are accepted largely because they imply no

At the same time,
practical consequence. They are a sop to administrative theory. As
planning staffs have a high incentive to try to be "useful," there is
a bias against novel conceptions which are difficult to adapt to an
administrative mold. Yet true innovation is bound to run counter to
prevailing standards. The dilemma of modern bureaucracy is that while
every creative act is lonely, not every lonely act is creative. Formal
criteria are little help in solving this problem because the unique
cannot be expressed "objectively."

The rigidity in the policies of the technologically advanced
societies is in no small part due to the complexity of decision-making.
Crucial problems may--and frequently do--go unrecognized for a long
time. But once the decision-making aparatus has disgorged a policy, it
becomes very difficult to change it. The alternative to the *status quo*
is the prospect of repeating the whole anguishing process of arriving
at decisions. This explains to some extent the curious phenomenon that
decisions taken with enormous doubt and perhaps with a close division

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become practically sacrosanct once adopted. The whole administrative
machinery swings behind their implementations as if activity could still
all doubts.

Moreover, the reputation, indeed the political survival, of
most leaders depends on their ability to realize their goals, however
these may have been arrived at. Whether these goals are desirable is
relatively less crucial. The time span by which administrative success
is measured is considerably shorter than that by which historical
achievement is determined. In heavily bureaucratized societies all
pressures emphasize the first of these accomplishments.

Then, too, the staffs on which modern executives come to depend
develop a momentum of their own. What started out as an aid to
decision-makers often turns into a practically autonomous organization
whose internal problems structure and sometimes compound the issues
which it was originally designed to solve. The decision-maker will
always be aware of the morale of his staff. Though he has the authority,
he cannot overrule it too frequently without impairing its efficiency;
and he may, in any event, lack the knowledge to do so. Placating the
staff then becomes a major preoccupation of the executive. A form of
administrative democracy results, in which a decision often reflects
an attainable consensus rather than substantive conviction (or at least
the two imperceptibly merge). The internal requirements of the bureaucracy
may come to predominate over the purposes which it was intended to serve.
This is probably even more true in highly institutionalized Communist
states--such as the U.S.S.R.--than in the United States.

When the administrative machine grows very elaborate, the
various levels of the decision-making process are separated by chasms
which are obscured from the outside world by the complexity of the
apparatus. Research often becomes a means to buy time and to assuage
consciences. Studying a problem can turn into an escape from coming
to grips with it. In the process, the gap between the technical
competence of research staffs and what hard pressed political leaders
are capable of absorbing widens constantly. This heightens the insecurity
of the executive and may thus compound either rigidity or arbitrariness
or both. In many fields--strategy being a prime example--decision-makers
may find it difficult to give as many hours to a problem as the expert
has had years to study it. The ultimate decision often depends less
on knowledge than on the ability to brief the top administrator--to
present the facts in a way that can be absorbed rapidly. The effectiveness
of briefing, however, puts a premium on theatrical qualities. Not
everything that sounds plausible is correct and many things which are
correct may not sound plausible when they are first presented and
a second hearing is rare. The stage aspect of briefing
may leave the decision-maker with a gnawing feeling of having been
taken--even, and perhaps especially, when he does not know quite how.

Sophistication may thus encourage paralysis or a crude
popularization which defeats its own purpose. The excessively theoretical
approach of many research staffs overlooks the problem of the strain
of decision-making in times of crisis. What is relevant for policy

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also depends not only on academic truth but on what can be implemented under stress. The technical staffs are frequently operating in a framework of theoretical standards while in fact their usefulness depends on essentially psychological criteria. To be politically meaningful, their proposals must involve answers to the following types of questions: Does the executive understand the proposal? Does he believe in it? Does he accept it as a guide to action or as an excuse for doing nothing? But if this kind of concern is given too much weight, the requirements of salesmanship will defeat substance.

The pragmatism of executives thus clashes with the theoretical bent of research or planning staffs. Executives as a rule take cognizance of a problem only when it emerges as an administrative issue. They thus unwittingly encourage bureaucratic contests as the only means of generating decisions. Or the various elements of the bureaucracy make a series of non-aggression pacts with each other and thus reduce the decision-maker to a benevolent constitutional monarch. As the special role of the executive increasingly becomes to choose between proposals generated administratively, decision-makers turn into arbiters rather than leaders. Whether they wait until a problem emerges as an administrative issue or until a crisis has demonstrated the irrelevance of the standard operating procedure, the modern decision-makers often find themselves swamped by events.

Faced with an administrative machine which is both elaborate and fragmented, the executive is forced into essentially lateral means of control. Many of his public pronouncements though ostensibly directed

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to outsiders perform a perhaps more important role in laying down
guidelines for the bureaucracy. The chief significance of a foreign
policy speech by the President may thus be that it settles an internal
debate in Washington (a public statement is more useful for this purpose
than an administrative memorandum because it is harder to reverse).
At the same time, the bureaucracy' awareness of this method of
control tempts it to undercut its debates by using pronouncements by
the decision-makers as charters for special purposes. The executive
thus finds himself confronted by proposals for public declarations which
may be innocuous in themselves but which can be used by some agency
or department to launch a study or program which will strict his
freedom of decision later on.

All of this drives the executive in the direction of extra-bureaucratic
means of decision. The practice of relying on special emissaries or
personal envoys is an example; their status outside the bureaucracy
frees them from some of its restraints. International agreements are
sometimes possible only by ignoring safeguards against capricious action.
It is a paradoxical aspect of modern bureaucracies that their quest for
objectivity and calculability often leads to impasses which can be overcome
only by essentially arbitrary decisions.

Such a mode of operation would involve a great risk of stagnation
even in "normal" times. It becomes especially dangerous in a revolutionary

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period. For then, the problems which are most obtrusive may be
least relevant. The issues which are most significant may not be
suitable for administrative formulation and even when formulated may
not lend themselves to bureaucratic consensus. When the issue is how
to transform the existing framework, routine can become an additional
obstacle to both comprehension and action.

This problem, serious enough *within* each society, is magnified
in the conduct of international affairs. While the formal machinery of
decision-making in developed countries shows many similarities, the
criteria which influence decisions vary enormously. With each administrative
machine increasingly absorbed in its own internal problems, diplomacy
loses its flexibility. Leaders are extremely aware of the problems of
placating their own bureaucracy; they cannot depart too far from its
prescriptions without raising serious morale problems. Decisions are
reached so painfully that the very anguish of decision-making acts as a
brake on the give-and-take of traditional diplomacy.

This is true even *within* alliances. The complaints of allies
in either of the two great blocs about inadequate consultation go beyond
the specific issues which produce them. Meaningful consultation with
other nations become very difficult when the internal process of
decision-making already has some of the characteristics of compacts
between quasi-sovereign entities. As more and more countries grow
committed to national planning, the trend toward *attack*-and not only in--

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economics--grows. There is an increasing reluctance to hazard a
hard-won domestic consensus in an international forum. This accounts
to some extent for the practice of relying on special emissaries or
personal envoys; their status outside the bureaucracy frees them from
some of its restraints. Just as in domestic decision-making, international
agreements are sometimes possible only by ignoring safeguards against
capricious action. It is a paradoxical aspect of modern bureaucracies
that their quest for objectivity and calculability often leads to impasses
which can be overcome only by essentially arbitrary decisions.

What is true within alliances--that is among nations which
have at least some common objectives--becomes even more acute in relations
between antagonistic states or blocs. The gap created when two large
bureaucracies generate goals largely in isolation from each other and
on the basis of not necessarily commensurable criteria is magnified
considerably by an ideological schism. The degree of ideological fervor
is not decisive; the problem would exist even if the original ideological
commitment has declined on either or both sides. The criteria for
bureaucratic decision-making may continue to be influenced by ideology
even after its elan has dissipated. Bureaucratic structures generate
their own momentum which may more than counterbalance the loss of earlier
fanaticism. In the early stages of a revolutionary movement, ideology
is crucial and the accident of personalities can be decisive. The Reign
of Terror in France was ended by the elimination of a single man,

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Robespierre. The Bolshevik revolution could hardly have taken place
had Lenin not been on the famous train which crossed Germany into Russia.
But once a revolution becomes institutionalized, the administrative
structures which it has spawned develop their own vested interests.
Ideology may grow less significant in creating commitment; it becomes
pervasive in supplying criteria of administrative choice. Ideologies
prevail by being taken for granted. Orthodoxy substitutes for conviction
and produces its own form of rigidity.

In such circumstances, a meaningful dialogue across ideological
dividing lines becomes extraordinarily difficult. The more elaborate
the administrative structure, the less relevant an individual's view
becomes--indeed one of the purposes of bureaucracy is to liberate
decision-making from the accident of personalities. Thus while personal
convictions may be modified it requires a really monumental effort
to alter bureaucratic commitments. And if change occurs, the bureaucracy
prefers to move at its own pace and not be excessively influenced by
statements or pressures of foreigners. For all these reasons, diplomacy
tends to become rigid or to turn into an abstract bargaining process
based on largely formal criteria such as "splitting the difference."
Either course is self-defeating: the former because it negates the very
purpose of diplomacy; the latter because it subordinates purpose to
technique and because it may encourage intransigence. Indeed, the
incentive for intransigence increases if it is known that the difference
will generally be split.

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in which political parties were deprived of responsibility while
ministers were obliged to balance a monarch by divine right against a
Parliament composed of representatives without any prospect of ever
holding office. Consensus could be achieved most easily through fits
of national passion which in turn disquieted all of Germany's neighbors.
Germany's foreign policy grew unstable because its domestic structure
did little to discourage capricious improvisations; it may even have
put a premium on them.

The collapse of the essentially aristocratic conception of
foreign policy of the nineteenth century has made the career experiences
of leaders even more crucial. An aristocracy--if it lives up to its
values--will reject the arbitrariness of absolutist rule; and it will
base itself on a notion of quality which discourages the temptations
of demagoguery inherent in plebiscitarian democracy. Where position is
felt to be a birthright, generosity is possible (though not guaranteed);
flexibility is not inhibited by a commitment to perpetual success.
Where a leader's estimate of himself is not completely dependent on
his standing in an administrative structure, measures can be judged
in terms of a conception of the future rather than of an almost compulsive
desire to avoid even a temporary set-back. When the statesmen belonged
to a community transcending national boundaries, there tended to be
consensus on the criteria of what constituted a reasonable proposal.
This did not prevent conflicts, but it did define their nature and
encouraged dialogue. The bane of aristocratic foreign policy was the

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risk of frivolousness, of a self-confidence unrelated to knowledge,
and of too much emphasis on intuition.

At any event, ours is the age of the expert or the charismatic
leader. The expert has his constituency--those who have a vested interest
in commonly held opinions; elaborating and defining its consensus has after
all made him an expert. Since the expert is often the product of the
administrative dilemmas described earlier, he is usually in a poor position
to transcend them. The charismatic leader, on the other hand, needs a
perpetual revolution to maintain his position. Neither the expert nor
the charismatic leader operates in an environment which puts a premium
on long-range conceptions or on generosity or on subordinating the leader's
ego to purposes which transcend his own career.

Leadership groups are formed by at least three factors: their
experiences during their rise to eminence; the structure in which they
must operate; the values of their society. Three contemporary types will
be discussed here: (a) the bureaucratic-pragmatic type, (b) the ideological
type, and (c) the revolutionary=charismatic type.

Bureaucratic-pragmatic leadership: the main example of this
type of leadership is the American elite--though the leadership groups
of other Western countries increasingly approximate the American pattern.
Shaped by a society without fundamental social schisms (at least until the
race problem became visible) and the product of an environment in which
most recognized problems have proved soluble, its approach to policy
is *ad hoc*, pragmatic, and somewhat mechanical.

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Because pragmatism is based on the conviction that the context of events produces a solution, there is a tendency to await developments. The belief is prevalent that every problem will yield if attacked with sufficient energy. It is inconceivable, therefore, that delay might result in irretrievable disaster; at worst it is thought to require a redoubled effort later on. Problems are segmented into constituent elements, each of which is dealt with by experts in the special difficulty it involves. There is little emphasis or concern for their interrelationship. Technical issues enjoy more careful attention, and receive more sophisticated treatment, than political ones. Though the importance of intangibles is affirmed in theory, it is difficult to obtain a consensus on which factors are significant and even harder to find a meaningful mode for dealing with them. Things are done because one knows how to do them and not because one ought to do them. The criteria for dealing with trends which are conjectural are less well developed than those for immediate crisis. Pragmatism, at least in its generally accepted form, is more concerned with method than with judgment; or rather it seeks to reduce judgment to methodology and value to knowledge.

This is reinforced by the special qualities of the professions --law and business--which furnish the core of the leadership groups in America. Lawyers--at least in the Anglo-Saxon tradition--prefer to deal with actual rather than hypothetical cases; they have little confidence in the possibility of stating a future issue abstractly. But planning by its very nature is hypothetical. Its

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success depends precisely on the ability to transcend the existing
framework. Lawyers may be prepared to undertake this task; but they
will do well in it only to the extent that they are able to overcome
the special qualities encouraged by their profession. What comes
naturally to lawyers in the Anglo-Saxon tradition is the sophisticated
analysis of a series of *ad hoc* issues which emerge as problems through
adversary proceedings. In so far as lawyers draw on the experience
which forms them, they have a bias toward awaiting development and toward
operating within the definition of the problem as formulated by its chief
spokesmen.

This has several consequences. It compounds the already powerful
tendencies within American society to identify foreign policy with the
solution of immediate issues. It produces great refinement of issues
as they arise, but it also encourages the administrative dilemmas described
earlier. Issues are dealt with only as the pressure of events imposes
the need for resolving them. Then, each of the contending factions
within the bureaucracy has a maximum incentive to state its case in
its most extreme form because the ultimate outcome depends, to a
considerable extent, on a bargaining process. The premium placed on
advocacy turns decision-making into a series of adjustments among special
interests--a process more suited to domestic than to foreign policy.
This procedure tends to neglect planning because the future has no
administrative constituency and is, therefore, without representation
in the adversary proceedings. Problems tend to be slighted until some