versa,” and that many moral universals can exist at the same time for the same person.40 She likewise effectively cites the work of political psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg, whose two major claims are used to justify her own central assertion that all political decisions can be reasonably defined as either licit or illicit. Kohlberg’s research reveals that moral behaviour stems from a particular moral worldview, and that the broad moral categorisations of social order, justice, political duties and rights are partially self-constructed within this unique moral universe.41
VVHowever, wherein Boyd-Judson draws extensively from Rational Choice Theory, her assumptions are ironically contradicted by the predominant findings of political psychology. According to professors Jonathan Renshon and Stanely A. Renshon: “Behavioural decision research has demonstrated that individuals have a very difficult time making trade-offs.”42 Thus, diplomatic actors often make decisions based on personal and subjective preferences, and create “post-hoc rationalisations” for their choices.43 Boyd-Judson’s supposition of international relations as “strategic and moral in nature and logic”43 is an academic misperception of the high-pressure realities of high-level decision-making. Renshon and Renshon accurately note that: “Compressed time, high stakes, enormous uncertainty about other actors’ motives, beliefs and calculations clearly make arriving at high-quality decisions difficult.”45 Far removed from the ideas of Rational Choice Theory, state actors rely on “their basic worldviews, operational codes, heuristic preferences, leadership strategies, and psychological proclivities…all subjective...”46 In Foreign Policy: From Conception to Diplomatic Practice, former Ambassador
8840. Boyd-Judson, Strategic Moral Diplomacy: Understanding the Enemy’s Moral Universe, p. 19.
8841. Ibid., p. 21.
8842. Jonathan Renshon and Stanley A. Renshon, “The Theory and Practice of Foreign Policy Decision Making,” in Political Psychology, 2008, Vol. 29, No. 4, p. 517.
8843. Ibid.
8844. Boyd-Judson, Strategic Moral Diplomacy: Understanding the Enemy’s Moral Universe, p. 23.
8845. Renshon and Renshon, “The Theory and Practice of Foreign Policy Decision Making,” p. 514.
8846. Ibid.
8847.
43