All well-established political democratic systems have bureaucratic structures that drive the process of decision-making. Foreign policy decisions are executed in a top-down bureaucracy. Modern leaders depend heavily on advisors, department and agency heads, and their bureaucratic staff for information that is vital to foreign policy decisions (p. 556). Bureaucracies are not powerful unless they are backed by Congress and the president’s support. They seek their legitimacy through the acceptance of their recommendations by both the Congress and the president. In part, their effectiveness arises from whether the small group surrounding the president approves of them.

Small group dynamics approach is more likely to occur in groups that are cohesive aka exhibit a high level of amiability among each other. Group Cohesiveness is an essential element of small group dynamics. It is stronger when there is a sense of loyalty between everyone. For e.g. in the decision to go to Iraq in the first Gulf War, President Bush picked people who he was very close to, like Cheney, Gates and Scowcroft. They worked together since the Ford administration (about 14 years). The second important element is Group Insulation which means the lack of other parties involved in the process of decision-making. There’s little to no outside sources of information or opinion, the inner group gets to decide without intervention from the outside. …show more content…
However, the bureaucratic model is inclusive, while the small group dynamics is not. It only includes people who are in the inner circle, where decisions are made by those who are a part of the inner circle. Whereas, the bureaucratic model encompasses a wider population of organizations and the different organs of the