Book Project

After Decision: The Domestic Political Consequences of Presidential Foreign Policy

The manuscript investigates the domestic repercussions of presidential foreign policy choice and, in particular, explains when and why national politics towards foreign policy exhibit polarization or comparative consensus. Its primary argument is that domestic political conditions are largely a consequence of the connection between a foreign policy's substance and the president's party affiliation. The project systematically examines congressional activity, media coverage, and public opinion towards over one hundred major foreign policies across post-World War II history using a wide array of data, and conducts multiple case studies drawing upon unpublished archival materials. The work sheds new light on presidential (dis)advantages, the origins of partisan polarization, and democratic representation in U.S. foreign affairs.

The book is based on my dissertation, which was recognized with the 2026 Duke political science department's best dissertation award.

Revise and Resubmit

Invoking the Commander-in-Chief

Abstract: Congressional opinion leadership on foreign affairs drives influential theories of international relations and American politics. How do legislators design the foreign policy opinions they express? This article explains when legislators invoke the president in their foreign policy position-taking, and clarifies its consequences in public opinion. Contrary to a conventional wisdom that presidential naming is an out-party strategy, the paper argues that partisan incentives hinge on expressed stance. Analyses of over 60,000 archived legislator press releases and speeches about 101 U.S. foreign policies spanning 1945-2022 find that co-partisans increasingly cue the president when they express support, while out-partisans increasingly name when they express opposition. A survey experiment on a CES sample shows how naming shapes the public, and 35 interviews illustrate how congressional policymakers understand these incentives. Findings modify an orthodox view, and shed light on the mechanism of congressional influence and sources of opinion polarization in American foreign relations.

Status: R&R at Journal of Politics.

American Guilt and Support for Foreign Aid

(with Trent Ollerenshaw)

Abstract: This paper introduces American Guilt—a politically consequential feeling of national responsibility for global inequality—and specifies its connection to foreign aid support. Drawing on literatures spanning redistributive preferences and social psychology, we argue that three beliefs undergird guilt: perceptions of American wealth, U.S. culpability, and (absence of) reparative behaviors. Using three novel surveys and replications, we show why some Americans experience guilt and demonstrate that guilt is an exceptionally powerful predictor of foreign aid preferences. We propose an experiment to establish guilt as a causal driver of foreign aid support. Our findings bridge classical accounts of foreign policy opinion conceiving of an emotional public with a newer consensus emphasizing public reason, help resolve gaps between elite-cue theory predictions and observed attitudes, and define a bottom-up opinion determinant that plausibly extends to other foreign policy domains and national contexts.

Status: R&R at Journal of Politics.

Published Papers

Observable Bounds of Rationality and Credibility in International Relations

(with Trent Ollerenshaw and So Jin Lee)

Abstract: In crisis bargaining scenarios, resolved states send costly signals to demonstrate a willingness to fight. Yet public signals of resolve are issued by specific leaders, who operate with cognitive limitations in challenging decision environments. Drawing upon theories of behavioral economics, we develop a series of observable indicators plausibly connected to leader ability and difficulty of decision environment that we expect shape perceived signaler credibility. Effects, we argue, are due to perceived variation in the signaler’s uncertainty over the future costs at stake. We find that almost all indicators shape threat credibility, and find suggestive support for the proposed mechanism. By bridging behavioral economics and foundational scholarship on costly signaling in IR in novel ways, this report shows how individual and environmental decision restrictions set the bounds of observable leader rationality, and in turn shape credibility in IR.

Status: Published at Journal of Politics. Paper available here. PDF available here.

The Democratic Patience

Abstract: This article theoretically clarifies and presents the first large-N empirical support for a centuries-old intuition: that democracies are slow to use violent military force. It argues that democratic and nondemocratic state leaders managing interstate crises experience tradeoffs over when to respond, and that democratic institutions incentivize democrats that consider violent military force to delay. The article presents a simplified account of leader choice during crisis and highlights two mechanisms rooted in external and internal politics that may drive delay. Analyses of nearly 950 states experiencing crisis provide support for expectations. Democracy is associated with a roughly 40% lower likelihood of responding to a crisis at any given point in time, conditional on responding with violence. Two illustrative case studies probe the plausibility of the proposed mechanisms. The article illuminates the processes leaders engage as they consider abandoning negotiating tables at home and abroad for the battlefield.

Status: Published at Journal of Peace Research. Paper available here. PDF available here.

Barack Obama and the Politics of Military Force, 2009-2012

Abstract: How did domestic politics shape President Barack Obama's use of military force during his first term? This article expands and improves upon existing assessments by coupling insights from political science theory with novel evidence from original interviews with administration officials. It systematically analyzes Obama and his administration across three theoretically important dimensions: belief structure, the White House national security advisory apparatus, and decision making in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya. It finds that, along each dimension, President Obama appears to display high democratic responsiveness. Findings shed new light on how the administration understood and weighed domestic political considerations and translated these into security policy outcomes.

Status: Published at Presidential Studies Quarterly. Paper available here. PDF available here.

The Velvet Revolution's Best Supporting Actors: Shirley Temple Black and U.S. Embassy Prague, 1989

Abstract: What were the contours of U.S. diplomacy to Czechoslovakia in the lead-up to and during its Velvet Revolution of 1989? How did the U.S. Embassy in Prague, in collaboration with the George H.W. Bush White House and the State Department, calibrate diplomatic strategy and tactics? Drawing principally upon newly available primary materials (including recently declassified telegrams, Czechoslovak archival documents, unpublished memoirs, and original interviews), this article explains and evaluates Embassy conduct during the period from August to November 1989. While unpacking intra- and inter-agency disagreements, it shows how individual Embassy officers—including the former child star turned ambassador, Shirley Temple Black—analyzed political developments, assisted Czechoslovak dissidents, and pursued extensive engagement with the Communist Czechoslovak government. The article provides the first scholarly, granular account of U.S. diplomacy in Czechoslovakia on the eve of democratization, and contributes to the historiography of U.S. foreign policy at the end of the Cold War.

Status: Published at Journal of Cold War Studies (accepted 2019). Paper available here. PDF available here. Reviewed in H-Diplo|Robert Jervis International Security Studies Forum here.

Review Essay

Searching for Democratic Constraint in Donald Trump's America

Status: Invited contribution for Presidential Studies Quarterly. Essay available here. PDF available here.

Selected Working Papers

The Voice of Congress on War and Diplomacy, 1965-2022

Abstract: This paper explains the origins of congressional messaging on war and diplomacy. It introduces a typology of the modern ‘voice’ of Congress, and argues that the congressional reaction to presidential foreign policy predictably conforms to one of two ideal-types. Vocal congresses follow on-brand foreign policies (which adhere to the presidential party’s ideological tendency) and display high messaging volume, high intra-party consensus, and high inter-party polarization. Equivocal congresses follow off-brand foreign policies and are low across dimensions. The paper probes the typology with novel data including over 40,000 archived press releases and floor speeches issued about a new case-list of nearly 70 uses of force and diplomatic initiatives spanning 1965-2022. It assesses the ‘mechanism’—legislator position-taking—with quantitative analyses and qualitative evidence from 35 original interviews. Findings reveal when democratic advantages abroad may operate and constraints might bind, when public opinion might polarize, and highlight foundations of asymmetric presidential foreign policymaking.

Status: Working paper. Co-winner of the 2025 Best Graduate Student Paper Award from the American Political Science Association, Foreign Policy Section; winner of the 2026 Margaret Hermann Award from the International Studies Association, Foreign Policy Analysis Section.

Congressional Influence in International Crisis

(with Patrick Hulme)

Abstract: This article explains how Congress influences presidential decision-making during international crises. It argues that legislators can manipulate four costs to which presidents are exposed (inaction, belligerence, audience, and fighting) in ways that rearrange executive incentives, and in turn choice, at all crisis stages. It assesses expectations with new qualitative and experimental evidence. Investigations of the Cuban Missile and Syrian Chemical Weapons Crises drawing upon archival materials, novel messaging data, and original interviews show that presidents are sensitive to this capacity as the theory expects. A survey experiment provides causal evidence that congressional position-taking manipulates each cost as anticipated. Findings imply that congressional control over escalation, credibility, and constraint can be flexible and coercive; bridge IR models resting on public evaluations of executive behavior with American politics scholarship assigning Congress a central role in their formation; and reveal high democratic responsiveness in American statecraft that is nevertheless vulnerable to partisan polarization.

Status: Under review.

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