Survey data confirm the common-sense supposition that most people do not arrive at opinions on issues by independent analysis. Instead, they borrow opinions from people whose judgment they trust. Ordinarily, the shapers of opinion on issues of international relations are a small minority within the minority, composed of government officials, politicians, and businessmen and professional men with some government experience, connections in high places, many entry and exit stamps on their passports, and the habit of reading periodicals such as the New York Times and The Economist - in short, an "establishment."May uses the concept of a "foreign policy public" to focus on the fact that American public attention to foreign affairs has tended to be sporadic, depending on the appearance of various crises, and also driven by often parochial concerns. Without the presence of a large number of Cuban exiles in Florida int he 1960s, a state rich in Electoral College votes in Presidential elections, Cuba would not have been generally perceived as the problem it has been seen to be in the US. A particular group in a politically powerful state cared a lot, while most other Americans didn't care that much, giving the interested group outsized influence on the issue.
There's nothing particularly exceptional about that observation. We see the same things with domestic issues. It's just that foreign policy is generally discussed in a more mystified way, in the context of Patiotism and National Defense and the like.
The size and composition of the foreign policy public may be in part a function of conditions within this establishment. The late 1940's and early 1950's, for example, could have seen much more wide-spread public debate and division over entangling alliances, foreign commitments, and the basing of forces abroad. Very little occurred. A plausible explanation is that the establishment was more or less of one mind. With little or no leadership, no significant public opposition could take form. By contrast, Vietnam divided the establishment. Senators on the Foreign Relations Committee, former government insiders such as George Ball and Robert Kennedy, correspondents covering Southeast Asia, and scholars such as Hans Morgenthau and George Kahin led protest within the establishment. This in turn legitimized opinion leadership by others who probably could not have commanded a following against a nearly unanimous establishment.(my emphasis)And May writes of the composition of the foreign policy Establishment:
One can assume that it will continue to consist of current and former insiders who are well educated, well read, well traveled, and relatively well-to-do; but this assumption is of little use for prediction. These characteristics are shared by a million or more Americans, including ex-Senator William Knowland and Dr. Daniel Ells-berg. In the 1933-43 decade, the proportion of businessmen and bankers in the establishment probably diminished. The Depression clouded their reputations. By the end of the decade, lawyers, journalists, and intellectuals, especially European refugees, formed a relatively large part of the leadership group. From World War H into the 1960's the establishment contained an extraordinary number of people with backgrounds in the military services or the service departments. Insofar as there was a visible hierarchy, the top places were occupied by Marshall, other war-time generals, and men who had worked with Henry Stimson, notably John J. McCloy and Robert A. Lovett. A significant part of the establishment's new blood came later from defense-oriented corporations and research organizations. (my emphasis)Tags: ernest may, us foreign policy
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