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Moral Theory and Policy Science: A New Look at the Gap Between Foreign and Domestic Affairs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 September 2012

Abstract

This article examines the present bifurcation of policy-making into domestic and foreign components, and urges a theoretical effort aimed at unifying national policy by integrating its various components. Beyond such an urging, the article aims to show that the act of making policy invariably involves decisions about events that take place both within and outside of a nation. This is not a claim for the superiority of any one segment of policy making. What is important or trivial is determined within a means-ends continuum. In breaking down artificial barriers inherited from nationalist models, it is possible to institutionalize a policy process that takes into account “shrinkage” of the world that is a direct consequence of new information technologies, and at the same time, incorporates the wisdom of classical ethical theories on the nature of power.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs 1992

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References

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