Foreign Policies and Foreign Policy-Making in Coalition Governments

Abstract

The foreign policies of coalition governments are often expected to differ from those of single-party governments. A small but important strand of scholarship has investigated the causal mechanisms through which such differences may come about, and it has suggested various characteristics in the foreign policies of coalition governments. It is argued, for example, that coalitions take more extreme foreign policy decisions than single-party governments, because of the influence of ideologically extreme junior coalition partners, the desire to divert attention from domestic weakness or the diffusion of responsibility in coalitions. At the same time, the literature does in the most part not distinguish between different types and configurations of coalition governments and does therefore not attend to variations in the making of foreign policy between coalition governments. The panel’s two-fold objective is to examine variation both in the foreign policies and the foreign policy-making of coalition governments in different national contexts. To this purpose, the panel calls for both comparative papers and case studies on single coalition governments. By bringing together scholars on the foreign policies of different European, and possibly also non-European, coalition governments, the panel contributes to the comparative study of foreign policy decision-making.

Title	Details
Explaining Different Roles of Junior Partners in the Foreign Policy Making of Coalition Governments	View Paper Details
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