Chapter 7: Public Opinion at Home and Abroad

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Chapter Summary

As a societal factor, public opinion serves as both a powerful influence and a constraint in shaping U.S. foreign policy. Americans are generally considered unknowledgeable about the particulars of international affairs and foreign policy, but they are "pretty prudent" in the sense that they are attentive and form opinions easily regarding global situations. Much of a policy maker's time is spent manipulating and gauging public opinion, creating a unique cycle in analyzing U.S. foreign policy attitudes.

Exploring public opinion regarding U.S. foreign policy is challenging because it varies depending on issue, time period, and the type of person voicing the opinion. The public can be divided into three main groups based on its attention to and impact on foreign policy: the mass public, attentive public, and foreign-policy elite. The imbalance of the groups' levels of influence and involvement is at the heart of the paradox of the inverse relationship of public opinion and U.S. foreign policy. Further compounding this paradox is the continuous debate over whether government officials should represent the foreign policy wishes of the public or use their experience and expertise to make foreign-policy decisions.

The traditional view of American public opinion argues that public opinion is volatile, incoherent, and irrelevant to the foreign-policy process. Challenges to this consensus emphasize the division between viewpoints of the mass public and elites. This chapter also investigates the deeper held values and beliefs, as opposed to pure knowledge of facts, that make up public opinion regarding foreign policy and international politics. This chapter moves from theoretic to practical implications of public opinion. Included are discussions of a rally effect on presidential approval following the September 11 terrorist attacks that gave way to declining public support for intervention in Iraq.