Design and Emergence in the Making of American Grand Strategy

• Main Author: Popescu, Ionut
• Other Authors: Feaver, Peter
• Published: 2013
• Subjects: Political Science; Public policy; International relations; Bush Doctrine; Cold War; Foreign Policy; Grand Strategy; National Security; Strategic Planning
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10161/8073

<p>The main research question of this thesis is how do grand strategies form. Grand strategy is defined as a state's coherent and consistent pattern of behavior over a long period of time in search of an overarching goal. The political science literature usually explains the formation of grand strategies by using a planning (or design) model. In this dissertation, I use primary sources, interviews with former government officials, and historical scholarship to show that the formation of grand strategy is better understood using a model of emergent learning imported from the business world. My two case studies examine the formation of American grand strategy during the Cold War and the post-Cold War eras. The dissertation concludes that in both these strategic eras the dominating grand strategies were formed primarily by emergent learning rather than flowing from advanced designs.</p> === Dissertation