The Polythink Syndrome

Why do presidents and their advisors often make sub-optimal decisions on military intervention, escalation, de-escalation, and termination of conflicts? The leading concept of group dynamics, groupthink, offers one explanation: policy-making groups make sub-optimal decisions due to their desire for conformity and uniformity over dissent, leading to a failure to consider other relevant possibilities. But presidential advisory groups are often fragmented and divisive. This book therefore scrutinizes polythink, a group decision-making dynamic whereby different members in a decision-making unit espouse a plurality of opinions and divergent policy prescriptions, resulting in a disjointed decision-making process or even decision paralysis. The book analyzes eleven national security decisions, including the national security policy designed prior to the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the decisions to enter into and withdraw from Afghanistan and Iraq, the 2007 "surge" decision, the crisis over the Iranian nuclear program, the UN Security Council decision on the Syrian Civil War, the faltering Kerry Peace Process in the Middle East, and the U.S. decision on military operations against ISIS. Based on the analysis of these case studies, the authors address implications of the polythink phenomenon, including prescriptions for avoiding and/or overcoming it, and develop strategies and tools for what they call Productive Polythink. The authors also show the applicability of polythink to business, industry, and everyday decisions.

The emergence of artificial intelligence has created a vast amount of advancements within various professional sectors and has transformed the way organizations conduct themselves. The implementation of intelligent systems has assisted with developing traditional processes including decision making, risk management, and security. An area that requires significant attention and research is how these companies are becoming accustomed to computer intelligence and applying this technology to their everyday practices. Transdisciplinary Perspectives on Risk Management and Cyber Intelligence is a pivotal reference source that provides vital research on the application of intelligent systems within various professional sectors as well as the exploration of theories and empirical findings. While highlighting topics such as decision making, cognitive science, and knowledge management, this publication explores the management of risk and uncertainty using training exercises, as well as the development of managerial intelligence competency. This book is ideally designed for practitioners, educators, researchers, policymakers, managers, developers, analysts, politicians, and students seeking current research on modern approaches to the analysis and performance of cyber intelligence.

The first textbook to present a framework of the Behavioral Political Science paradigm for understanding political decision-making.

From the pages of the Oxford Review comes over 250 of the most practical & useful research findings for leaders, managers, professionals in human resources, learning & development, organisational development, coaching & consultancy. Did you know for example: Researchers have tracked and worked out exactly what stages of development almost every organisation and business go through (or are stuck in)? This means we can predict with where your organisation is & where it should be heading, making change a lot easier. Researchers have worked out exactly what the five types of organisational conflict are and how to manage conflict successfully in organisations? Research published this year has found out exactly how to succeed in getting competing and conflicting groups to cooperate? It worked with conflicting Arab and Israeli groups and it is now working in organisations. Packed with the very latest facinating and useful research for every company and organisation.

The disintegration and questioning of global governance structures and a re-orientation toward national politics combined with the spread of technological innovations such as big data, social media, and phenomena like fake news, populism, or questions of global health policies make it necessary for the introduction of new methods of inquiry and the adaptation of established methods in Foreign Policy Analysis (FPA). This accessible handbook offers concise chapters from expert international contributors covering a diverse range of new and established FPA methods. Embracing methodological pluralism and a belief in the value of an open discussion about methods’ assumptions and diverging positions, it provides new, state-of-the-art research approaches, as well as introductions to a range of established methods. Each chapter follows the same approach, introducing the method and its development, discussing strengths, requirements, limitations, and potential pitfalls while illustrating the method’s application using examples from empirical research. Embracing methodological pluralism and problem-oriented research that engages with real-world questions, the authors examine quantitative and qualitative traditions, rationalist and interpretivist perspectives, as well as different substantive backgrounds. The book will be of interest to a wide range of scholars and students in global politics, foreign policy, and methods-related classes across the social sciences.

Understanding Foreign Policy Decision Making presents a psychological approach to foreign policy decision making. This approach focuses on the decision process, dynamics, and outcome. The book includes a wealth of extended real-world case studies and examples that are woven into the text. The cases and examples, which are written in an accessible style, include decisions made by leaders of the United States, Israel, New Zealand, Cuba, Iceland, United Kingdom, and others. In addition to coverage of the rational model of decision making, levels of analysis of foreign policy decision making, and types of decisions, the book includes extensive material on alternatives to the rational choice model, the marketing and framing of decisions, cognitive biases, and domestic, cultural, and international influences on decision making in international affairs. Existing textbooks do not present such an approach to foreign policy decision making, international relations, American foreign policy, and comparative foreign policy.

Ethics is at the heart of leadership. Leaders must make every effort to make ethical decisions and foster ethical behavior among followers. The Seventh Edition of Meeting the Ethical Challenges of Leadership: Casting Light or Shadow explores the ethical demands of leadership and the dark side of leadership. Bestselling author Craig E. Johnson takes an interdisciplinary approach, drawing from many fields of research to help readers make ethical decisions, lead with integrity, and create an ethical culture. Packed with dozens of real-world case studies, examples, self-assessments, and applications, this fully-updated new edition is designed to increase students’ ethical competence and leadership abilities. Included with this title: The password-protected Instructor Resource Site (formally known as SAGE Edge) offers access to all text-specific resources, including a test bank and editable, chapter-specific PowerPoint® slides.

The second edition of this introductory textbook on foreign policy analysis focuses on the key explanatory factors that underlie the foreign policies of states and other actors to show how theory can illuminate practice. Genuinely international in scope and drawing on a wide range of examples, it provides an accessible introduction to the key elements of foreign policy analysis to explain, predict and evaluate what states and other collective actors want, how they make decisions, and key determinants of state security, diplomatic, and economic foreign policies. Providing a broad set of theoretical tools for analysing foreign policy, and including increased coverage of methodology, this new edition provides students with the skills to undertake their own foreign policy analysis.