Ideas & Interests in International Actions

As we examine the differences between ideas and interests, I tend to agree with Goldstein and Keohane’s thoughts in “Ideas and Foreign Policy: An Analytical Framework”. If we choose to explain the outcome of events in the international arena based solely on ideas or solely on interests we would present an incomplete picture. Individual actions as well as international actor actions require both the observation of the ideas, or the beliefs socialized into them as well as observation of the interests, or the preferences and appropriation of their social environment.

In fact, I think even using both ideas and interests does not fully explain actions. What about a person’s disposition at the moment when they are making a decision. Being in a bad mood at the time might produce a different action than in a good mood; that is not an internal belief nor is it affected by your environment, so how do we account for that? Also, how can we fully explain a state or another large international actor’s behavior based solely on ideas and interest? A state has many different groups of people: different ethnicities, different religions, etc. So how can we encompass what a state or international group such as the United Nations or NATO or the EU’s interest or ideas are? And if we base it on the majority of the group’s population we are faced with another problem: what if the representatives making decisions on behalf of a state don’t fall into the “majority” how can we explain their actions if they do not “make sense” based on what we know about the state’s ideas and interests?

Another good point brought up in the “Review of Key Concepts” is how can you determine an actor’s interests or beliefs (ideas)? We can note people’s actions, but these are only external manifestations of their internal beliefs and reactions to other external/environmental factors. How can we really determine what those interests or ideas are?