A Realist Analysis On "A Foreign Policy For The Middle Class" Of The Biden Administration

The Biden administration,which came to power in January,2021,proposed “A Foreign Policy for the Middle Class” as its campaigning slogan and governing guidance.This policy is designed in the context of multiple challenges the U.S.is confronting both at home and abroad,including domestic economic recession,the Covid-19 pandemic crisis,global trade competition and the decline of U.S.power and influence around the globe.Never the middle class was directly put in the U.S.foreign policy agenda,thus when the Biden administration brought out a middle-class foreign policy,the academic and political fields showed great curiosity and interest in this.Till present,scholars from the academic circle and political field have conducted a few researches on this policy.Yet,there is no research that covers a systemic analysis from the causes,implementation,essence and influences of this policy with the theory of realism.Thus,this thesis tries to conduct a systemic analysis on the middle-class foreign policy by applying different methods to explore three major questions.The first focuses on discussing the reasons of the promotion of this policy by applying the method—three levels of analysis,which covers the individual level,the domestic level and the international level.The second is to look at the implementation of the middle-class foreign policy based on a document analysis method.In this part,the author intends to discuss the details of foreign policies and parts of domestic policies based on abundant primary sources such as executive orders signed by President Biden,policy documents from the White House and speeches of major leaders of the Biden administration.The third is to discuss the influences and essence of this policy by drawing on the structural realism.Based on analyses of the above aspects,the author finds that the middle-class foreign policy of the Biden administration is a hegemonic policy in essence.The ultimate goal of the Biden administration is to preserve the U.S.hegemonic capacity and prevent power competition from other countries.Under the framing of the middle-class foreign policy,the U.S.relations with China may be worsened and competition and cooperation will coexist among the U.S.relations with Europe.