Wednesday, November 4, 20154:30 PM
6275 Bunche Hall
Los Angeles, CA 90095
Co-sponsored by the UCLA Center for Middle East Development
About the book
Why do hawkish leaders change course to pursue dovish policies? In Why Hawks Become Doves, Guy Ziv argues that conventional international relations theory is inadequate for explaining these momentous foreign policy shifts, because it underestimates the importance of leaders and their personalities. Applying insights from cognitive psychology, Ziv argues that decision-makers’ cognitive structure—specifically, their levels of cognitive openness and complexity—is a critical causal variable in determining their propensity to revise their beliefs and pursue new policies. To illustrate his point, he examines Israeli statesman Shimon Peres. Beginning his political career as a tough-minded security hawk, Peres emerged as one of the Middle East’s foremost champions of Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking. Drawing on a vast range of sources, including interviews with Peres and dozens of other political elites, archival research, biographies, and memoirs, Ziv finds that Peres’s highly open and complex cognitive structure facilitated a quicker and more profound dovish shift on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict than his less cognitively open and complex rivals.
Discussant: Dr. Uri Maoz, Adjunct Assistant Professor, UCLA Department of Psychology and Visiting Researcher in Neuroscience, CalTech
About the author
Guy Ziv is an assistant professor at American University’s School of International Service (SIS), where he teaches courses on U.S. foreign policy, the Middle East, and international negotiations. He is the author of the Why Hawks Become Doves: Shimon Peres and Foreign Policy Change in Israel, recently published by SUNY Press in hardcover, paperback, and e-reader versions. He also is Founder and Director of the Israel National Security Project (INSP), a repository of statements by Israeli security experts concerning the strategic imperative of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. His current research focuses on foreign policy decision-making, the influence of think tanks on U.S. foreign policy, and the role of political elites in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Ziv has a background in policy, having worked on Capitol Hill and for non-profit organizations that promote Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking. His articles have been published in peer-reviewed academic journals, blogs, and newspapers, including The Baltimore Sun, CNN.com, Haaretz, The Hill, The Jerusalem Post, Newsday, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and USA Today. He also has appeared as a commentator on a variety of cable news outlets including Al Jazeera America, BBC, CNN, and CTV News.
"...The comparisons of Peres, Rabin, Begin and Shamir are extraordinary, and effectively demonstrate the advantages of a leader who has a talent for adapting to altered conditions and listening to differing perspectives....an absorbing page-turner and stimulating eye-opener" - Steven Spiegel, UCLA Professor of Political Science, co-author of The Peace Puzzle: America's Quest for Arab-Israeli Peace, 1989-2011
Sponsor(s): Younes and Soraya Nazarian Center for Israel Studies, Center for Middle East Development