ABSTRACT

The media and analysts of foreign policy seem to almost forget about decisions once they have been reached, and have tended to assume that implementation will automatically follow, and that the process of implementation will occur in the way decision makers had intended. In the field of Foreign Policy, implementation is especially important because much of foreign policy action is reactive and is based on an interpretation of the intentions behind other decisions. Within the field of Policy Making numerous models of implementation exist, backed up with an extensive literature. The chapter looks at three of the models seem sufficient: top-down approach, bottom-top approach and policy-action approach. The policy-action approach can be applied to the question of the implementation of Europe's new security order, it is necessary to establish the model's ontological perspective of: implementation, policy decision and criteria for judging success or failure.