Collective Choice Processes: A Qualitative and Quantitative Analysis of Foreign Policy Decision-Making

Gallhofer and Saris examine the collective choice processes in different decision-making units leading to World Wars I and II as well as the Cuban Missile Crisis, colonial wars, and to major foreign policy decisions of a European government after World War II. In the unit relating to the European government, they find strong evidence for consensual decision-making. But when disagreements occurred among the participants, alternative procedures were employed, such as postponements in order to search for additional information, shifts from argumentation to find a compromise, and change from consensus to majority decision-making. How quickly these shifts were made depended on the group norms. This book provides a theoretical framework to understand how different foreign-policy decision-making units or groups arrive at a collective choice. The qualitative and quantitative studies presented here are based on written records and deal with the choice process of four different decision-making units in situations that pertain to important foreign policy decisions. Germany's decision-making process under Hitler to initiate World War II exemplifies a group with a leader who is insensitive to advice, making the decisions himself and using the group only for acclamation. Kennedy's decision-making during the Cuban Missile Crisis is very different, as it shows a leader sensitive to advice where the group has the task of presenting different options and their consequences. The Austro-Hungarian cabinet's decision to initiate World War I exemplifies a homogeneous group with a dissenter, although it arrived at a collective decision quite quickly using persuasion, compromise, and some coercion. The bulk of the study deals with a heterogeneous unit in a great variety of decision situations, because most Western European governments are of this type. Where there is extreme conflict and time pressure, consensual decision-making is abandoned and a majority choice is hammered out. As the first systematic documented study of collective decision-making, as it pertains to different decision units, this book will be of considerable importance to scholars and researchers investigating the decision-making process in government and international affairs.

Table of Contents:
Introduction A Qualitative Study of Collective Decision-Making Processes Theoretical Frameworks for Group Decision-Making in the Context of National Government Theoretical Framework Used in This Book Methodology Germany's Decision to Initiate World War II The World at the Brink of a Nuclear War: The U.S.' Decision to Avoid a Nuclear War, October 1962 The Austro-Hungarian Cabinet Decision to Initiate World War I The Dutch Cabinet Decision to Take Military Action in Indonesia, Autumn 1948: Consensual Decision-Making in a Heterogeneous Group The Dutch Cabinet Decision to Carry Out Military Action in Indonesia, December 1948: A Cabinet on the Brink of Tendering Its Resignation The Practice of Collective Choice A Quantitative Study of Collective Decision-Making by a Heterogeneous Group The Study of Decision-Making Processes The Decision-Making Process Results Preference Aggregation Rules References Subject Index Name Index Index

About the Author :
IRMTRAUD N. GALLHOFER is Senior Researcher at the Sociometric Research Foundation of Amstelveen. WILLEM E. SARIS is Professor of Statistics and Methods at the University of Amsterdam. In addition to numerous papers and articles, they coauthored Foreign Policy Decision-Making: A Qualitative and Quantitative Analysis of Political Argumentation (Praeger, 1996).

Review :
"This work is a pioneering one, which opens up qualitative and quantitative lines of inquiry likely to enable us in the future to identify the ways in which collective decision-making develops once the relationships between the members of the decision-making body are known."-J. Blondel Visiting Professor, University of Siena ?Together these two books give an excellent survey of an innovative approach to text analysis of documentary data on givernment decision-making. Their competent methodology involves a creative adaptation of state-of-the-art methods of text and content analysis in political communications research. Their concepts and techniques enable the combination of qualitative case studies with quantitative analysis, and the study of the lines of individual argumentation as well as those of the collective discourse.?-Acta Politica "Together these two books give an excellent survey of an innovative approach to text analysis of documentary data on givernment decision-making. Their competent methodology involves a creative adaptation of state-of-the-art methods of text and content analysis in political communications research. Their concepts and techniques enable the combination of qualitative case studies with quantitative analysis, and the study of the lines of individual argumentation as well as those of the collective discourse."-Acta Politica