The Failure of Foreign Policy Entrepreneurs in the Trump Administration

29 August 2019, Version 1
This content is an early or alternative research output and has not been peer-reviewed at the time of posting.

Abstract

The relationship a president has with the heads of his departments is a defining characteristic of a presidency. Policy entrepreneurs require presidential support and political capital to increase the chances of policy success. This paper argues that Donald J. Trump has established a contractor presidency that is encumbered by a number of scenarios originally identified in Laffin’s (1996) study of the policy failures of George H.W. Bush’s administration. This investigation begins by first presenting the contractor model as a possible presidential strategy, and then establishes that Trump has embraced the contractor presidency as his approach towards foreign policy. We then identify alternate scenarios for a failed contractor presidency and consider whether these explanations apply to Trump’s version. We find that two of the five scenarios apply to Trump’s unsuccessful foreign policy: lack of support for his appointed officials and the appointment of inexperienced loyalists.

Keywords

contractor presidency
foreign policy
policy entrepreneurs
Donald J. Trump
Jim Mattis
H. R. McMaster
John F. Kelly

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