Question: Has the content and conduct of foreign policy changed in an era of increased globalization?

Globalization can be described as the process in which the world has become more integrated among people, companies and governments of nations around the world, thanks to significant advancements in technology, trade and investment allowing for “an intensification of cross-border interactions and interdependence between countries” (Baylis and Smith, 2016). Foreign policy can be described as the behavior and actions of one state or actor that is directed towards another state or actor within the international system (Breach, 2012).  This essay will analyze if globalization has changed the content of foreign policy and the way in which it is conducted by countries and diplomats from around the world, by looking at how relationships between individual states have changed over time as a result of globalization, and how the impact of non-state actors has changed the way foreign policy is conducted, arguing that globalization has allowed for a change in attitudes overall towards foreign policy,   whilst also analyzing the potential negative impacts this may have had.

The first way to analyze whether the content and conduct of foreign policy has changed in an era of increased globalization is to assess how diplomatic relations between states have changed over time. The best way to look at this is to assess how the United States went from being isolationist to an internationalist nation, becoming very much a part of a globalized world. In the past, many nations have taken an isolationist approach to diplomatic relations. Isolationism is the idea that government takes no role in the affairs of other nations, this was especially prominent in the United States throughout the colonial period (Longley, 2018). However, in recent decades the United States has been forced to take an outward looking approach towards foreign policy, particularly due to its involvement in wars across the world, as did other countries – they built alliances to help support one another and particularly throughout the Cold War when the United States was trying to contain the spread of communism from the Soviet Union, they looked to their new European allies for assistance. As a result of the increased tensions between nations, new institutions were set up to prevent further atrocities from occurring in the future. The European Community was set up to prevent war from occurring again in Europe, NATO was founded between key western allies so that in the event of any attack on a nation they could better cooperate, and 1945 saw the founding of the United Nations, which many major nations including the United States played a key role in setting up. The founding of these institutions bought nations together and as a result created the interconnected globalized world we now know today.