Upcoming Talks
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Institutional Ties and Party Competition in Foreign Policy: UK Responses to Protests in Hong Kong and Belarus
Date: September 25, 2026
Time: 9:30 pm Hong Kong Time ; 8:30 am Central Time; 9:30 am Eastern Time; 6:30 am Pacific Time
Speaker: Theodore Charm, University of Texas in Austin
Discussant: Jackie Wong, American University of Sharjah
Registration Required
In parliamentary democracies, governments typically prioritize non-coercive measures in foreign policy, whereas oppositions push for coercive policies. However, this pattern is not universally applicable. Under what conditions would governments and oppositions converge and diverge in foreign policy discourse? This paper argues that the government-opposition distinction is conditional on the institutional ties between the state and the foreign territory in question. Strong institutional ties generate high policy capacity for governments, motivating them to advocate non-coercive policies. Otherwise, governments would align with oppositions to support punitive measures. Employing computational text analysis on the UK parliamentary speeches addressing the protests in Hong Kong and Belarus, this paper finds that regarding Hong Kong, the Conservative government tended to emphasize the UK’s historical responsibility to legitimize the BNO visa scheme. Concerning Belarus, both Conservatives and oppositions advocated sanctions against the Lukashenka regime. These findings highlight institutional linkages as a critical factor for foreign policy.
Speaker
Theodore Charm graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a Ph.D. in Government. His research interests include contentious politics, politics of East Asia, and computational text analysis. His work has appeared in Journal of Asian and African Studies, Party Politics, and Political Research Quarterly, among others.
Discussant
Jackie S.H. Wong is an Assistant Professor at the American University of Sharjah in the UAE. His research focuses on computational social science and international security. His work has appeared in International Security, Political Science Research and Methods, and the Journal of Conflict Resolution.
More to Come
To Be Announced.