The Shift Of U.S. Foreign Policy Toward Venezuela And Bolivia In The Post-September11Era

Foreign policy is commonly and widely defined as a plan of action adopted by onenation in regards to its diplomatic dealings with other countries. General objectives areestablished as a systematic way to deal with issues that may arise with other countries.The development of foreign policy is influenced by domestic considerations, the policiesor behavior of other states, or plans to advance specific geopolitical designs. LeopoldVon Ranke emphasized the primacy of geography and external threats in shaping foreignpolicy, but later writers such as Page and Shapiro emphasized domestic factors.Foreign Policy changes of states have been an interesting and intriguing issueconcerning the causes and consequences of the actors initiating these shifts. The majorityof scholars in the discipline of International Relations agree that a foreign policy shift isdriven by strategic interests, specifically national interests most commonly related tosecurity welfare. Such concerns along with events that threaten to change the dynamicsof power (influence and control), access, safety and security of a country, strongly andinevitably push a state to consider altering its foreign policy. Similar to many nations, theUnited States of America is well known for formulating and determining its nationalinterest based on what their short and long term goals are. In war and peaceful times, theU.S. strategically places itself in a position that will enable it to establish an internationalorder which purely fulfills its interests, specifically in regions such as South America,Europe or in states such as Venezuela, Bolivia, Brazil, England and Japan that played orare still playing a transcendent role for American goals.American national interests have been the predominant factor directing its gravitationtoward new targets and goals. Due to its unmatched power within the internationalcommunity, along with its national interests, the U.S took advantage and propelled itselfto shape the world according to an “American” panorama. During Second World War,Vietnam War and the Cold War, based on its own priorities, America establishedmethods of dealing with the problems and consequences that some countries were facingdue to the wars. This was not done as an act of aid or kindness, but simply to acquire andexecute its national interest. Using its powerful armament including military and economic welfare, America successfully established an international order that would becommitted to it and simultaneously also obtained intimate access and a level of controlwithin the region in order to satisfy the goals planned by its government.Due to its accomplishments America was living in a golden age that was sustained forseveral years, even during war times and constant political threats that it was facing in itsstrategic regions which in the end did not undermine or transform its political agenda inthose countries. Furthermore, economic ties with several countries were established,strengthening the international system created and managed by American power. Vitalinterests of several countries were put on risk in the exchange of American goods whichserved as an inducement to increase and strengthen the relationship between the superpower and the developing countries that needed American support for its developingprocess.Several mechanisms were used to accomplish the task to reconstruct new zones,such as providing foreign aid, loans and economic packages. Through these mechanisms,American influence and control slowly spread to regions and countries, safeguarding itssupreme eminence and also its responsibility to lead a balanced international order.Assuming this great task and in order to accomplish its personal objectives, the need of“power”, over the international system became the basis of how America handled foreignaffairs and formulated foreign policy with other nations.Two important states for U.S. economic interests are Venezuela and Bolivia, notonly for their geographical and strategic position, but also for their rich andunquantifiable natural resources. These resources provide not only great industrialopportunity but also economic longevity and thus financial prosperity. For example,Venezuela possesses an unlimited supply of oil which serves as the fuel of the world, andthus is a place of liquid gold. Bolivia also with its few oil reserves and tin, refined metalsand agricultural products were also gaining a huge space on U.S. exchange of productsand trade agreements.Since the establishment of formal relations between the U.S. with Venezuela in1835and Bolivia in1848, trade agreements between them were constantly increasing. In fact,the relations between these countries had developed such a level of mutual understandingand benefit that for a long time America possessed important influence both in Venezuela and Bolivia. This influence existed not only in economic and political affairs, but also onsocial stages as the U.S. had demonstrated through the implementation of the MonroeDoctrine, the Washington Consensus and social organizations. Nonetheless severalchallenges were made a priority over the strong linkage between the super power and itstrading partners. Numerous problems and difficulties started to blur this importantrelationship. During the Second World War and the Cold War, international threatsdamaged just a few links between them; however more powerful and difficultcomplications were arising on American soil. Domestic problems concerning its politicalsystem were drawing a successive pattern of difficulties. The disagreements betweenCongress and the President concerning the management of the U.S. relations with othercountries, started to interfere and threaten economic ties with important trade and securitypartners.Despite the many negotiations made by the President and Congress to bring greenlight to American economic interests with Venezuela and Bolivia, these negotiations inthe end did not bring forth successful results. This domestic inconvenience generatedonly a little trouble for its relations with Venezuela and Bolivia, the worst consequenceswere still yet to come. However, the dawn of September11,2001changed all of thatwhen the terrorist group Al-Qaeda hijacked four U.S domestic aircrafts and crashed oneinto the Pentagon, and two into both of the World Trade Centers. The final plane washeaded for the White House but crashed before arrival. These attacks made it clear notjust to the U.S but also the world that America “the great” was vulnerable and in a sense“weak.”Shortly after this horrific event, the U.S. foreign policy with Venezuela and Boliviastarted to change, but why and to what extent did American foreign policy change? Wasthe occurrence of the September11attacks a key factor concerning this shift of foreignpolicy? Or is there a domestic explanation linked with this event that can be configuredas the main cause for this shift? How can a domestic source generate a certain kind ofinfluence to affect U.S. relations with Venezuela and Bolivia? Other important questionsare is it better to explain this change from realist or liberalist perspective? Or sincedomestic politics is involved is it better to be analyzed from a constructivist perspective?Via a qualitative method that will be developed within the four chapters of this research, several answers to all these questions concerning the shift of U.S. foreign policy will beanswered.There is no doubt that the September11attacks drastically changed U.S. policyovernight. America′s concern went from promoting their personal interests to focusing itsattention on “its core values and its citizens” as George W. Bush pointed in the NationalSecurity Strategy2001. Clear evidence of this was shown by the creation of thepre-emptive strike policy which allowed the U.S to attack another country first if it feltthreatened. Such new policy′s represented a significant transformation in Americaforeign mainstay. In other words, the shift in its attitude was transformed from an“objective sense” to a “subjective sense”, where the protection and interests of itscitizen’s were reinforced and thus initiated America′s acquired foreign policy shift andits new foreign policy objectives since2001.In analyzing the shift of foreign policy, the realist framework focused on the changeof “states strategic interests” and the liberalist framework followed arguing the change of“international institutions interests.” In this regard, under a realist perspective, the U.S.changed its policies with Venezuela and Bolivia, because the main needs in thesecountries “business and trade” were not bringing the desired results and more valuableinterests started to take American attention far away from these countries. On the otherhand, a liberalist explanation argues that the interests of international institutions havechanged. They do not deal with countries that way they used to fifty years ago. Now,economic, political and security international institutions started to promote a newframework based on the necessities of the21stcentury, the necessities of globalizationand economic expansion. This means that countries with liberalized economic systems inline with U.S. goals are gaining more attention.Following these two tendencies, a constructivist analysis is filling several failuresthat are not theoretically explaining by realist or liberalist perspectives. Althoughdomestic or international considerations do count for the justifications of numerous cases,when looking at foreign policy change from an “objective explanation sense”, it is provenby several studies that a very important domestic source concerning “the society-level”was missing from the analysis of most realist and liberalist researchers. Due to the increase of “a subjective sense”,“Public Opinion” became a powerfulsocial mechanism. As witnessed in many communications and social platforms,sentiments of anger, retaliations and the sense of threat were rounding many Americansminds after these attacks. Thus, instead of foreign policies being determined only byofficials and experts, the citizens were finally contributing and playing a key role indetermining foreign policy. Public opinion has been a fascinating and challenging issuewhere many scholars have been arguing about its role influencing state policies. Manyresearchers have been proving that certainly, public opinion is a powerful and importantdriving force affecting more foreign policies than domestic policies. Hence, ThomasRisse-Kappen points that the domestic political system of one country is very importantto analyze if the public can or not exert a relevant influence on states policies. Hecatalogues the U.S. a society-dominant system, which allows the influence of externaldomestic forces into its political apparatus, bringing at the end this preference into a reallife.Public opinion which is different from elite groups is emerging as an “additionalforce” in determining the U.S. government role in its functions and over the state.September11marked a critical point to this social force, increasing its presence andinfluence over states policies. This is the “subjective sense” moving in the modern era ofAmerican interests. Based on this new framework; the U.S. government is now linkingthis “subjective sense” with security interests. Therefore the insecurity felt by manyAmericans since2001is the motor and motive of foreign policy objectives and goals.Citizen security, livelihood and family make up the “subjective sense” that the U.S.government is spreading in its “new foreign policy.” This process will be argued using a“Social Constructivist Approach” regarding foreign policy shifts. Through this approachit will be shown that the process of linking public opinion to states policies is responsiblefor America′s contemporary construction of foreign policy and consequently its shifts.Public preferences are taking into account more than ever and this social force is drivingstate policies in the21stcentury, defining priorities toward some issues and neglectingother matters.This new shift on the U.S. policy is creating problems that in the near future couldaffect its interests. Economic and an objective sense of security were the main concerns of its foreign policy in the past, but that drastically changed since2001. At the present,security interests are positioning at the top of the priority list of America objectives, butnow more “a subjective sense.” As a result, two important trade partners, Venezuela andBolivia fell down on America′s priority list, and along with them all the agreements andpolicies made toward these countries were practically “abandoned”. This includes thereduction of the U.S. foreign aid as well as military and economic collaborations.Through a constructivist assumption it will be demonstrated that a public opinion asPage and Shapiro said, always influences U.S. foreign policy, however after September11and with the occurrence of the terrorist attacks, their influence became more notorious,stronger and America′s security interest is now derived from and reinforced with “asubjective sense”. It is this new “subjective sense” of U.S. foreign policy that is leadingits goals and tasks with new targets and abandoning old aims. The “SocialConstructivist Approach” is filling the gap where realists and liberalist perspectives havebeen confronting difficulties explaining actions taken by social actors. This assumptionaccounts to contribute in the literature of the discipline of International Relations, wherea “subjective sense” is gaining more and more interest in the analysis and the study ofnew tendencies, to discover new meanings and interpretations about specific casesconcerning and linking domestic issues and world affairs.