American Exceptionalism and the Institutional Foundations of Economic Sanctions = The Case of the Massachusetts Burma Law

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This paper explores possible links between American exceptionalism as a set of institutional characteristics and the frequent use of economic sanctions by the United States, using the case of the Massachusetts Burma Law. From an institutionalist perspective, I argue that America’s recurrent use of moral issues in addressing foreign relations is an outcome of the institutional universe that allows political entrepreneurs to set an agenda and push for it in a strategically efficient way. If one were to explain why Americans keep making domestic laws targeting foreign countries with poor human rights records, the dimension of American exceptionalism cannot be easily omitted in modeling causal relationship. This paper has no intention to deny the causal role of ideas in entirety; rather it seeks to clarify under what circumstances American exceptionalism as a belief system helps shape the policy contours of major political actors. As a fully independent role of ideas is not easy to measure in empirical tests, I here suggest some institutional characteristics that lead career-maximizing politicians to design foreign policy initiatives popular among the local constituency.