Political economy of foreign policy change: understanding the change in the Mozambican foreign policy during the 80s

This study aims to understand the process of foreign policy change that occurred m Mozambique during the mid 80s. Most of the few studies of foreign policy devoted to developing countries have based their explanation of developing countries foreign policy on static analysis and the primacy of the psychological approach. However, the case of Mozambique suggests us that decision for foreign policy change was conditioned by a combination of domestic and external factors. In fact, although the leader was insulated vis-a-vis the society, the external and domestic environments made him to take decisions that were contrary to his basic views and convictions. The second aspect under scrutiny in this work is the relation between domestic and foreign policy change. Contrary to many studies, this work dismisses the view of foreign policy change as the result of changes in domestic policy by showing that major changes occurred in Mozambican foreign policy without previous changes in domestic policy and those changes in foreign policy acted as a trigger for changes in domestic policy