Peter Trubowitz, Defining the National Interest: Conflict and Change in American Foreign Policy, Chicago: University Chicago Press, 1998

At a time when many students of international relations have become occupied with the study of ideas, norms and culture, it is refreshing to come across an unabashedly materialist account of American foreign policy. Peter Trubowitzís brilliant and eye-opening book on the sources of past and present debates over U.S. foreign policy displays the potential power of explanatory models rooted in the political economy of policy formulation.

Trubowitz examines domestic debates over trade, defense spending and foreign expansion across three periods of critical change in American foreign policy: the 1890s, the 1930s and the 1980s. Trubowitzís central point is that there is no singular national interest when it comes to foreign policy. Different policy choices produce varying distributions of costs and benefits across identifiable subsets of the American population. Any given policy decision will weaken the relative power of some Americans while strengthening the positions of others. These distributive effects are not limited to international economic policies, but extend to broader security issues as well.

This point has been forcefully made by a number of authors, including Peter Gourevitch, Jeffry Frieden, Thomas Ferguson and Ronald Rogowski, who have examined the conflicting foreign policy preferences of different classes or business sectors in American society. Trubowitz builds upon this literature in the political economy of foreign policy.

What Trubowitz adds is an emphasis on the regional dynamics of debates over U.S. foreign policy. This focus on regionalism is justified on two grounds. First, different regions of the country reflect considerable economic specialization, each playing a distinctive role in the national and international economies. Regional differences show up in varying degrees of dependence upon international trade, different mixes of industries and distinct ties with particular parts of the broader world economy. Due to uneven growth, changing patterns of demand, industrial migration and government policy, these regional characteristics change over time. As a result, policy preferences and inter-regional coalitions change as well, leading to periodic realignments in the domestic forces that shape U.S. foreign policy. In pursuing this line of argument, Trubowitz fruitfully draws upon a large literature in economic geography that has been mostly neglected by political scientists.

Second, previous studies have emphasized functional distinctions (e.g., capital vs. labor, industry vs. finance, or mobile vs. immobile capital) in describing the distributive consequences of various foreign policy choices. Yet, as Trubowitz rightly underlines, political representation in the United States is organized along territorial, not functional, lines. Bargaining across varying functional cleavages is often resolved and aggregated at the regional level before these interests are expressed politically through congressional representatives.

Briefly, Trubowitz analyzes changing regional interests and coalitions across three historical periods. The principle cleavages in the 1890s pitted the industrial North against the agrarian South. Northern industries favored the "bargaining tariff," naval expansion and imperialist policies as a means for prying open the markets and raw materials of Latin America and Asia. The South, heavily dependent upon agricultural exports and the import of manufactured goods, favored free trade. Moreover, Southern interests would be hurt by the tensions produced in a naval arms race with Great Britain, the Southís principal customer for cotton exports. Southerners largely opposed imperialism since developing countries had little interest in importing the timber, cotton and foodstuffs produced by the South. The West acted as the swing region in this contest. Less involved in the international economy than either the North or the South, Westerners bargained away their foreign policy votes in return for support on other issues. The North proved in a better position to offer such rewards than the South.

The 1930s witnessed a great debate between internationalists and nationalists. The North and the South now united around efforts to restore the world trading system and to resist German and Japanese imperialism. The West, whose farms and industries produced mainly for domestic markets, adopted an isolationist posture. This inclination was strengthened by the Westís relatively small share of defense production. The ultimate triumph of the new North-South coalition brought the New Deal at home and Cold War internationalism abroad after World War II.

The 1980s produced a third variant. Now the South and the West rallied around Ronald Reaganís rapid defense buildup and assertive internationalism while the "rustbelt" states of the declining industrial Northeast favored selective trade protection, international retrenchment and a renewed focus on economic and social investments at home.

Trubowitz is hardly the first observer to note periodic patterns of deep domestic division over U.S. foreign policy. Most accounts interpret foreign policy debates in terms of either ideas or institutions. Some emphasize the philosophical clash between realists and idealists. Others stress the institutional nature of domestic cleavages, pointing to the Constitutionís uncertain division of powers and responsibilities between the president and the congress.

Trubowitz shows that such interpretations miss the mark by failing to root arguments over ideas and institutions in the underlying clash of material interests. The outcomes of such debates have significant distributional consequences at home. Indeed, Trubowitz demonstrates striking regional differences in the propensity of congressional representatives to adopt realist or idealist arguments and to favor or oppose centralization of foreign policy authority. He also convincingly connects these rhetorical stances to particular regional economic needs and interests.

This is not to say that this fine book is without flaws. Trubowitz considerably understates the independent role and distinctive power of the presidency in the making of U.S. foreign policy. He also downplays the degree to which U.S. behavior is often a response to the strategies of other states. Yet these shortcomings are less serious than they might at first appear. Indeed, Trubowitzís work provides a welcome corrective to realist accounts that routinely exaggerate executive branch autonomy and the centrality of strategic interaction while neglecting societal interests and the process of preference formation. Moreover, Trubowitz is more interested in explaining the nature and sources of political cleavages over U.S. foreign policy than in providing a full account of ultimate policy choice.

Trubowitzís decision to rely heavily upon House voting data while paying far less attention to the Senate is a bit puzzling. The Constitution vests the Senate with more responsibility than the House in matters of foreign policy. Also, states, as larger units, ought to come closer to reflecting the full complexity of regional economic dynamics than smaller and more specialized congressional districts. In the Senate, moreover, large states are underrepresented, forcing their Senators to seek out alliances with those representing smaller states. In the House, on the other hand, the ample size of delegations from large states such as California and New York lessens the need for bargaining with smaller neighbors. Regional alliances should be firmer in the Senate than in the House.

Trubowitzís tripartite division of the U.S. into Northern, Southern and Western blocs is somewhat arbitrary and problematic. His theoretical framework does not allow for possible changes in the number, size, composition or coherence of economic regions. The potential for intra-regional conflict is downplayed. Trubowitzís Western region, for instance, encompasses the Great Plains, the Mountain States and the Pacific Rim, each characterizing by distinctive economic bases. Yet whatever conceptual problems this issue might pose, Trubowitz shows more sensitivity to such intra-regional differences in his historical narrative.

This is a fascinating study in the regional political economy of U.S. foreign policy. Future scholars should follow the path trailblazed by Peter Trubowitzís rewarding book.

Reviewed by David Skidmore, Associate Professor of Political Science at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa.