Research | mysite

My research spans four major areas (see the section entitled "Publications" for a full listing of all published books, articles, and book chapters) :

(1) Foreign Policy Analysis and Decision-Making

RESEARCH AREAS

Theory and application of decision-making models, ranging from classic rational actor, bureaucratic politics, and organizational process models to psychologically based models of perception and misperception and groupthink. I especially focus on how the process of democratization affects the roles of state actors (e.g., parliaments) and non-state actors (e.g., political parties) in foreign policy decision-making in African countries. I served as the co-editor with a Kenyan colleague, Korwa G. Adar, of a book devoted to East Africa, Globalization and Emerging Trends in African Foreign Policy: A Comparative Perspective of Eastern Africa (2007). I am currently writing a book, Beyond the “Big Man”: Impact of Democratic Transition and Consolidation on the Formulation and Implementation of African Foreign Policies.

(2) United States and European Foreign Policies toward Africa

Formulation and implementation of United States and European foreign policies toward Africa during the cold war (1947-89) and post-cold war (1990-present) eras, with a focus on the competing roles of the President, the national security bureaucracies, and the U.S. Congress. My first book on this topic was United States Foreign Policy toward Africa: Incrementalism, Crisis and Change (1994). I also served as the editor of a book, Exporting Democracy: Rhetoric vs. Reality (2002), that offers a comparative analysis of U.S. democracy promotion activities with those of other northern industrialized democracies.

(3) African Politics and International Relations

I am an African studies specialist who explores political-military and socio-economic trends throughout all 54 countries of the African continent, including the evolution of African nationalism, political protests and revolutions, and democratic transition and consolidation. I am the editor of Understanding Contemporary Africa (6th edition, 2020), which is the most adopted interdisciplinary textbook on Africa. I am also the author of African Politics and Society: A Mosaic in Transformation (2004).

(4) Intervention in World Politics

Effectiveness of various tools of intervention in global affairs, ranging from diplomacy, economic and military aid, and economic sanctions to covert intervention, paramilitary intervention, and direct military intervention. I especially focus on the evolution of United States interventionist practices in all regions of the world, from the American Revolution of 1776 to the present. I am currently working on a co-edited book with Michael Schumacher and Peter Sanchez, Intervention Abroad: United States Foreign Policy toward the Global South. This volume will extend the arguments set out in two earlier books that I edited: Intervention in the 1990s: U.S. Foreign Policy in the Third World (1992) and Intervention in the 1980s: U.S. Foreign Policy in the Third World (1989).