Subsequently, by illustrating cases of foreign policy
decision-making in the U.S. during the Cold War era, Halperin (1974) introduced the
politics within a government as the concept of bureaucratic politics. Garry Clifford
(1990: 168) argues that by focusing on bureaucratic politics, which emphasizes
individual values and the tugging and hauling of key players we are able to
understand who wins and why. Akin to public choice theories in public administration
(Down, 1967; Niskanen, 1971), bureaucratic politics is an important factor to explain
the policy decision-making process.