What are the external determinants of the Foreign Policy of a State?

What are the external determinants of the Foreign Policy of a State? (2023, 20 Marks)

James N. Rosenau’s “Pre-theories and Theories of Foreign Policy” (1966) sorted the sources of foreign policy into five clusters (idiosyncratic, role, governmental, societal and systemic) and argued that their weight varies with a state’s size, economy and openness. The systemic cluster is the external environment: a government chooses its goals, but the environment decides which goals are attainable and at what price.

1. Structure of the international system

  • Kenneth N. Waltz (Theory of International Politics, 1979): under anarchy the distribution of capabilities shapes and shoves states; structure does not command, but it penalises those who ignore it.
  • Polarity sets the menu. Bipolarity made uncommitted states valuable (India, Egypt, Yugoslavia); unipolarity after 1991 removed the second patron; today’s diffusion of power, which Amitav Acharya calls a multiplex world (The End of American World Order, 2014), lets states partner with rivals simultaneously.
  • Great-power relations are a separate variable: the Sino-Soviet split opened space for third states; a great-power rapprochement closes it.

2. Position in the power hierarchy

  • Great powers act globally and often unilaterally; John J. Mearsheimer explains why they maximise relative power.
  • Middle powers (Australia, Canada, South Korea) prefer coalitions, mediation and niche diplomacy.
  • Small states trade autonomy for protection, bandwagon, or play patrons against each other.
  • Stephen M. Walt’s balance of threat: states balance against proximate, offensively capable and hostile power, not power as such.

3. Alliances, institutions and norms

  • Commitments foreclose options. Glenn H. Snyder’s alliance security dilemma (1984) weighs fear of entrapment against fear of abandonment. Finland (2023) and Sweden (2024) ended long neutrality for NATO after the invasion of Ukraine.
  • Institutions and international law constrain through reputation; constructivists such as Alexander Wendt add that norms (sovereignty, the nuclear taboo) constitute interests rather than merely regulate them.

4. Geography, geopolitics and geo-economics

  • Alfred Thayer Mahan (sea power), Halford J. Mackinder (Heartland, 1904) and Nicholas J. Spykman (Rimland) show how location fixes neighbours, routes and vulnerabilities; landlocked states depend on transit neighbours.
  • Edward N. Luttwak’s geo-economics (1990) describes rivalry conducted through commerce. Tariffs, sanctions, export controls and corridors (Belt and Road Initiative, IMEC) are now determinants in their own right: US tariffs on India reached 50% in August 2025 before an interim understanding cut them to 18% in February 2026.
  • Resource dependence: when Iran restricted Hormuz passage from March 2026, Asian importers had to reroute; India, which had drawn about 45% of its crude through the strait, leaned on its 41-plus suppliers.

5. Global economy and interdependence

Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye’s complex interdependence (1977) raises the cost of conflict, while Henry Farrell and Abraham L. Newman’s weaponised interdependence (2019) shows how networks (SWIFT, chips, rare earths) become levers of coercion.

6. Security threats, technology and transnational forces

  • Hostile neighbours, terrorism and WMD proliferation drive doctrine and alliances. New START expired on 5 February 2026, leaving no treaty limit on US and Russian strategic arsenals.
  • Technology (drones, cyber, AI) redistributes advantage, and dependence binds a state to its suppliers.
  • Transnational actors: MNCs, markets, diasporas, NGOs and terrorist networks.
  • Global commons and Ulrich Beck’s risk society: climate change and pandemics demand cooperation, yet a US memorandum of January 2026 withdrew from the UNFCCC and IPCC.

Weighing them

External factors dominate for small states; domestic politics weighs more for a superpower. Neoclassical realism (Gideon Rose, 1998) holds that systemic pressure is filtered through leaders’ perceptions and state capacity, and constructivists add that geography and power become determinants only through interpretation.

Conclusion

External determinants set the range of feasible choices and their costs, not the choice itself. They are interrelated and shift with the system: multipolarity, tariffs, chokepoint shocks and weaponised networks have made the environment more fluid, rewarding states that hedge and diversify rather than bind themselves to one patron.