Selective realism on steroids – power politics à la Donald Trump Cover Image

Wybiórczy realizm na sterydach…. Power politics à la Donald Trump
Selective realism on steroids – power politics à la Donald Trump

Author(s): Tomasz Pugacewicz
Subject(s): Politics, Social Sciences, Law, Constitution, Jurisprudence, Geography, Regional studies, Geopolitics
Published by: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Scholar Sp. z o.o.
Keywords: foreign policy; US; strategic documents; governmental institutions; defence budget

Summary/Abstract: The aim of the paper is to determine whether Donald Trump’s foreign policyemploys a power politics perspective. The proposed hypothesis states that theprimary goal of President Trump’s foreign policy is a great powers competition.The paper is divided into three parts. Firstly, research design is presented. Secondly,empirical analysis of four selected issues is conducted: (1) Donald Trump’s politicalbeliefs; (2) released US strategic documents; (3) institutional change in the field offoreign policy making; and (4) the shape of defence budget. In the final part, thehypothesis is confirmed at the level of President Trump’s political beliefs (fully) andthe US strategic documents (partly), however, at the level of institutional change andthe defence budget shape it is hard to find unambiguous conclusions. As a result, thepower politics approach declared by the US President – considered by some expertsas realism on steroids – is, in fact, implemented only selectively. The research strategyused is a case study. The method of data acquisition is qualitative text analysis.

  • Issue Year: 2019
  • Issue No: 24
  • Page Range: 333-352
  • Page Count: 20
  • Language: Polish