Guan Wang

DISSERTATION

• My dissertation, “Divided We Stand: Partisan Control and U.S. Foreign Policy,” explores how U.S. foreign policy differs under unified versus divided government. My central argument is that U.S. foreign policy garners less attention from politicians and is accorded less agenda space under unified government compared to divided government. This disparity holds important implications in three main areas: the progression of foreign policy bills through legislative processes, the decision to impose unilateral versus multilateral sanctions, and U.S.-China relations. Under unified government, the majority party often seizes this opportunity to focus on issues that will bolster their prospects in the next election. Typically, these issues are domestic in nature. Given the limited attention span of politicians and the constraints of institutional agenda, the consideration of foreign policy issues tends to be postponed. By contrast, under divided government, domestic issues negotiations frequently face gridlock. Foreign policy issues, which are more likely to see bipartisan consensus, receive more attention and greater agenda space. Empirically, I analyzed the entire corpus of foreign policy bills in Congress and all sanctions imposed by the U.S. over the last two decades. I also incorporated a wide array of official documents concerning U.S.-China relations. My dissertation was honored with the Conley H. Dillon Award by the University of Maryland for its original contribution to the study of U.S. government. The chapter on the U.S. Congress has been expanded into a standalone research article and is currently under review.