Foreign Interest Groups and American Foreign Policy.

外国利益集团和美国外交政策。

• 批准号: 1023967
• 负责人: Jon Pevehouse
• 金额: $ 19万
• 依托单位: University of Wisconsin-Madison
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2010
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2010-08-01 至 2012-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1023967&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Foreign; Interest; Groups; American; Policy.

Lobbying has long been a controversial issue among politicians, academics, and, most importantly, American voters. One particularly contentious aspect of the phenomenon is lobbying by foreign principals: countries, foreign political parties, foreign MNCs, or foreign nationals that lobby Congress, the executive branch, or administrative agencies in an attempt to change US policy to benefit the foreign principal. Despite the controversies, little useful knowledge actually exists about the policy areas or circumstances under which foreign lobbies influence US foreign policy. Extant research is usually based on anecdotal cases and often privileges normative judgment over social science. As a result, very little systematic evidence sheds light on when or how foreign entities lobby American decision-makers. Nor is it known to what end they do so.In seeking to answer these important questions, this research capitalizes on data that is already provided to the Department of Justice (DoJ) as part of the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA). When foreign interest groups hire American lobbyists, they must register their activities with the DoJ and this information is subsequently submitted to Congress in semi-annual reports. To date, however, no analysis of these data has been conducted to understand general trends about when foreign principles lobby the US, how foreign principals lobby the US, and what the "return" on these foreign lobbying efforts comprises. This is surprising given that the law was enacted prior to World War II.The project will first create an accessible database using FARA reports from the past 50 years (only the previous 10 years are currently accessible). The database can be used by scholars, practitioners, and citizens alike to track lobbying efforts by foreign principals from any country. The investigator will integrate the FARA data with data from other databases (specifically, Federal Election Commission [FEC] data and Legislative Disclosure Act [LDA] data) to gain a full picture of international-oriented lobbying. Combining these data sources will also allow an examination of what influence tactics are used by foreign principals: supporting candidates in elections (FEC); direct lobbying of individual decision-makers (LDA); or hiring traditional lobbying firms that engage in any manner of lobbying on behalf of the foreign principal (FARA).Second, the researcher will use the data to answer the questions posed above: who lobbies, over what issues, and to what end? In a pilot study using ten years of FARA reports, initial analysis in one area of U.S. foreign policy, trade tariffs, suggested that more lobbying by countries, in terms of both the amount of money spent and the number of contracts awarded to American lobbyists by foreign principals, decreases US tariff rates towards those countries. This result holds even when accounting for a host of other factors influencing tariff rates. A more comprehensive database of foreign principal lobbying will enable an extension of the pilot study and expand the investigation into numerous other areas such as foreign aid disbursements, human rights ratings and denouncements, and economic sanctions. The new data will permit evaluation of old and new conjectures about foreign lobbies in a careful, systematic fashion, rather than relying on single case studies of lobbies.Staking out new ground, the project is designed to define whether, when, and how international lobbying efforts change American foreign policy in a systematic fashion. The research findings should thus be likely to lead to a more informative debate about the phenomenon. Moreover, the findings should provide guidance to policymakers who wish to revise current rules on lobbying by indicating where lobbying efforts are concentrated and isolating any effects they may have.

长期以来，游说一直是政治家、学者以及最重要的美国选民之间的一个有争议的问题。这一现象的一个特别有争议的方面是外国主体的游说：国家、外国政党、外国跨国公司或外国国民游说国会、行政分支或行政机构，试图改变美国的政策，使外国主体受益。尽管存在争议，但关于外国游说集团影响美国外交政策的政策领域或环境，实际上几乎没有什么有用的知识。现存的研究通常基于轶事案例，并经常优先于社会科学的规范性判断。因此，很少有系统的证据能说明外国实体何时或如何游说美国决策者。为了回答这些重要问题，本研究利用了作为《外国代理人登记法》（FARA）的一部分已经提供给司法部（DoJ）的数据。当外国利益集团雇佣美国游说者时，他们必须向美国司法部登记他们的活动，这些信息随后在半年度报告中提交给国会。然而，迄今为止，还没有对这些数据进行分析，以了解外国原则何时游说美国，外国校长如何游说美国，以及这些外国游说努力的“回报”是什么。该项目将首先使用过去50年的FARA报告创建一个可访问的数据库（目前只有前10年可访问）。该数据库可供学者、从业者和公民使用，以跟踪来自任何国家的外国负责人的游说活动。调查员将把FARA的数据与其他数据库的数据（特别是联邦选举委员会[FEC]数据和立法披露法[LDA]数据）结合起来，以全面了解面向国际的游说活动。结合这些数据来源还可以检查外国校长使用的影响策略：在选举中支持候选人（FEC）;直接游说个人决策者（LDA）;或雇用传统的游说公司代表外国校长进行任何形式的游说（FARA）。第二，研究人员将使用数据来回答上述问题：谁在游说，针对什么问题，为了什么目的？在一项使用10年FARA报告的试点研究中，对美国外交政策的一个领域--贸易关税的初步分析表明，各国进行更多的游说，无论是花费的金额还是外国负责人授予美国游说者的合同数量，都会降低美国对这些国家的关税税率。即使考虑到影响关税率的许多其他因素，这一结果仍然成立。一个更全面的外国主要游说活动数据库将使试点研究得以扩展，并将调查扩大到许多其他领域，如外国援助付款、人权评级和谴责以及经济制裁。新的数据将允许以一种仔细的、系统的方式评估关于外国游说集团的新旧观点，而不是依赖于对游说集团的单一案例研究。该项目开辟了新的领域，旨在确定国际游说活动是否、何时以及如何以系统的方式改变美国的外交政策。因此，研究结果很可能会导致对这一现象进行更有启发性的辩论。此外，研究结果应向希望修改现行游说规则的政策制定者提供指导，指出游说努力集中在哪些地方，并隔离游说可能产生的任何影响。