Institutional Change And The U.s. International Economic Policy

The fundamental question of the dissertation is why the institutional characteristics and changes can exert great influence in the US international economic policy choices, and how the concrete influence occurs? The dissertation focuses on the institutional logic, emphasizes the identification of the state and society, and how the institutional relations and interactive styles between them influence the US international economic policies.In details, the dissertation pays attention to that how the US international economic policies are influenced by the institutional changes on three levels. They are state-society relation, which is macro-institution; executive-legislative-middle branches relations, which are middle-level institutions; and the decision making system in a single branch, which are micro-institutions. Among them, the macro-institutional structure, which frames others, is the most crucial and substantial institutional relations.The dissertation argues that the changes of American domestic institutional structure (state-society relation), which is reflected as the adjustment of inter-branches relations and the micro-decision making system, shape the sequences and manners in which international system, state, and domestic society exert influence in US international economic policy making. The changing institutional relations determine how the societal interests and preferences as well as systemic pressures and stimulus act on the state, which stands in the middle of them, thus it exerts influence on that what policy tools US government use to change the economic relations between the nation and world. The state stands in the system in which states interact with each other, and also the state operate in the sphere of society.State is the representative of national public interests; however, society is compromised by countless private actors, which act on their own interests. Societal interests are reflected as the aggregation of private interests. As the societal structure is naturally unbalanced, societal interests are generally reflected as special interests rather than public interests. Therefore, the power competition of state and society on international economic policy making reflected as the competition of public and private interests. As more and more American national interests are realized by governments' policies and actions in international system, the state-society relation determines the government's capacity to defend public interests in international system.The dissertation argues that under the institutional structure of strong state and weak society, in other words, strong president and weak congress, US federal government will make international economic policy rationally according to the general interests in international system, and try to strike a balance between economic interests and security interests, international interests and domestic interests. Otherwise, under the institutional structure of week state and strong society, in other words, week president and strong congress, the federal government's international economic policy will easily cater to special interests, and become the victim of domestic political process.The dissertation devotes to revive the tradition of comparative politics (domestic politics) in IR studies. Through the examination of domestic institutional factors which restrict and stimulate the state's foreign policy choices, the dissertation try to bring the domestic politics back in, then to challenge some research methods and assumptions held by neo-realism. Addition to that, the dissertation also tries to surpass the purely domestic-oriented approach by paying much attention to that how the pressures and stimulus of international system act on the government policy making through changing institutions. This approach reflects my effort to bridge the traditional gap between International Relations and Comparative Politics. I try to construct a institutional change theory to promote the dialogue and marriage of International Political Economy and Comparative Political Economy. It integrate the two subfields International Relations and Domestic Politics together, and then strength the explanations to foreign economic policies and international economic interaction.