The Evolution of Operational Code Analysis

A review of the article titled The Evolution of Operational Code Analysis by  Stephen G. Walker

Stephen Walker’s article on “The Evolution of Operational Code Analysis” aims at documenting the journey operational code analysis has taken starting with the classical works of Nathan Leites to the input of Alexander George and Ole Holsti as well as other scholars who followed thereafter (Walker, 1990, pp. 403).

Walker opines that it is Leites who elevated operational code construct into the realms of political psychology with his thesis on The Operational code of the Politburo (1951) and A study of Bolshevism (1953) although he borrowed the term “operational code” from Merton. The term was initially a reference to how an individual acquires values or worldviews and its associated responses which are then shared with others within a specific organization. Leites extended this by bringing in pyschocultural analysis of the fundamental motivations and how these varied depending on personalities (Walker, 1990).

According to Walker, Alexander George’s review of Leites’ works questioned why the analysis of elite belief system had not been accorded to other leadership groups beyond Bolshevism. Having acknowledged the complexity of previous studies, George zeroed down on “operational code” aspect of Leites’ endeavors. George hence split operational code into philosophical beliefs which is more about assumptions of a given actor in diagnosing a situation and instrumental beliefs which lean towards political action or response.  However, George warned that whereas beliefs can influence decision-making, they may not necessarily determine an individual’s choice of action. He then brings up two techniques to gauge the impact of beliefs upon decisions that is congruence procedure and process tracing.

The author adds that the need to refine methodology pushed Ole Holsti to come up with a three-step strategy that produced six political belief systems based on George’s philosophical and instrumental questions. The result of this effort was a typology of belief systems with the master beliefs being harmonious or conflictual intersecting with the sources of conflict such as human nature, attributes of states and international system. Everything still came down to the individual and cognitive consistency. Since this did not close the debate on reliability and validity, a room was left for other scholars to dig dipper into content analysis leading to several operational code case studies of United States decision makers. Some of these scholars included Stuart and Starr who looked at the rhetoric of Dulles, Kennedy and Kissinger as well as Walker and Falkowski who researched into the crisis bargaining tactics of key United States individuals and their operational code. Stephen Walker concludes by stating that cognitive, affective and developmental studies of political leaders have had an immense impact on operational code analysis research.

A critical Perspective

Stephen Walker in this article simply documents how literature on operational code has evolved over the years hence it will be quite a stretch to critique him unless one is focusing on what was not captured or analyzing how the flow should have been. Nevertheless, there are a few things that need to be pointed out in the text after a thorough reading.

It is commendable that Alexander George called for Leites’ works to go beyond Bolshevism in looking at the belief system of the elites but most of the case studies highlighted afterwards focus on American Presidents and their key advisors. This may still not be representative enough considering the fact that even for such a narrow qualitative analysis, Kennedy’s beliefs were found to be complicated.

George again states that beliefs can influence decision making but may fail to have an impact as to which course of action a decision maker takes since other factors can come into play. What is not clear is what those other factors are. May be this falls on Stephen Walker if there was something to note down in that aspect.

The evolution of operational code focused a lot on cognitive consistency and the individual as a unit of analysis. What needs to be asked is where is the place of emotions whether excitement or just stress in decision making? How about errors or insubordination in the standard operating procedures that could force decision makers to eventually act contrary to their beliefs?  Do these fall under other factors? On the other hand, in as much as operational code maintains the individual as a unit of analysis, Ole Holsti’s typology is a reminder that states and the international system are very important in analysis.

In conclusion, the article is informative as far as how the operational code thinking has evolved although there is an opportunity to expand the scope and refine the methodology to be more representative of different parts of the world and their decision makers.

 

References

Walker, S.G. (1990). The Evolution of Operational Code Analysis. Political Psychology, Vol. 11, No. 2 (Jun., 1990), pp. 403-418. International Society of Political Psychology.