Complex Interactions: Why President Clinton De-Linked Human Rights Conditions from the Criteria for China's Most Favored Nation Status

Abstract

In 1992, presidential hopeful William Jefferson Clinton, in what Warren Christopher called the toughest foreign policy rhetoric of the campaign, criticized then President Bush for failing to tie China's Most Favored Nation (MFN) status to its human rights record. In 1994, despite its poor progress in human rights issues, President Clinton announced his intention to support continuation of China's MFN status. This paper examines this sea change in the Clinton presidency. It studies why this potential superpower rival was awarded MFN status despite legitimate concerns and President Clinton's best intentions to the contrary. It also critiques the Governmental Politics model with respect to this decision and finally, proposes a new decision process model to evaluate economic, political and contextual influences on government decisions.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 01, 2000
Accession Number
ADA431700

Entities

People

  • Edward L. Bolton

Organizations

  • National War College

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Counter WMD
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes
  • Space

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Aerospace Industry
  • Agreements
  • Commerce
  • Congress
  • Foreign Policy
  • Foreign Relations
  • Governments
  • Human Rights
  • International Organizations
  • Law
  • Markets
  • National Politics
  • National Security
  • Security
  • Treaties
  • United States
  • War Colleges

Fields of Study

  • Political science

Readers

  • Asian Economic Studies
  • Military History of the United States in the 20th Century.
  • Team-Based Human-Centered Cognitive Task Decision Making and Information Performance.