American presidents have had a penchant for enunciating foreign policy "doctrines" or claiming as their own the label of "doctrine" that others have given a particular policy statement they had made. (1) Lesser officials have also had the term "doctrine" applied to their statements, such as the Weinberger or Powell Doctrines. The military have produced many doctrines, including service doctrines and joint doctrines. There are also functional doctrines, such as doctrines for counterinsurgency and maneuver warfare. Similarly, the term "strategic doctrine" has been associated, often but not exclusively, with nuclear weapons. One basic feature of these doctrines is a statement of how the U.S. government, either as a collective entity or as one of its component parts, intends to employ its power. These statements can be limited to a few sentences, or can encompass hundreds of pages. Not only do doctrines shape policy by asserting intent, whether it be the intent of a senior official or of an institution, they can also act to constrain behavior, depending on how the intent is communicated and enforced.

In contrast to other government doctrines, presidential doctrines, with their discursive association with the chief executive, occupy a special place, not merely as a result of the power of the presidency in foreign policymaking, but also in terms of understanding how doctrine at the level of national strategy is devised, disseminated, comprehended, and implemented. They are also important examples of the perceived value of galvanizing statements in a president's foreign policy rhetoric. But should the issuance or identification of a doctrine be perceived as the actual presidential intent and a coherent vision for the bureaucracy to follow, or as a statement intended purely for public or foreign consumption? The answer to this question can be found in the form of the doctrine itself. Whereas bureaucracies typically consider doctrine to consist of detailed guidance, or even as an "intellectual toolbox," the simplistic and sometimes moralizing terminology characteristic of presidential doctrines implies a statement intended for a public audience. Nevertheless, even if the issuing of a doctrine is mainly for public consumption, it will almost certainly have implications for the bureaucracy. Regardless of the content of a presidential doctrine, the very fact that an issue has been highlighted in the president's discourse serves to alert the bureaucracy to a presidential priority, though how the bureaucracy chooses to respond may vary substantially from the original intent.

Once the doctrine has been announced, the relevant bureaucracies have a twofold task to accomplish: first, to interpret the doctrine's meaning and determine how it applies to them; second, to assess available resources and assign responsibility for implementation. Interpreting the doctrine requires not only a clarification of presidential intent, but also reducing or eliminating conflicts with existing guidance and priorities; in short, determining where and under what circumstances the doctrine applies. Directly related to this is how the doctrine can be implemented, and who implements it. In other words, what are the means to be employed, do they exist, and...