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This chapter explains that operational code analysis offers a cognitive perspective for analysing foreign policy decision-makers. It defines operational codes as the decision-makers' political beliefs, which are used to explain foreign policy decisions and actions. Operational code analysis puts individual decision-makers front and centre and adopts a cognitive perspective, addressing the influence of leaders' political beliefs. The chapter then discusses the origins, evolution, and empirical applications of the operational code analysis approach, and references the pertinent methodological questions relating to the most suitable source material for inferring the operational codes of decision-makers. Finally, the chapter notes that current research assumes a causal correlation between beliefs and foreign policy decisions.

This chapter looks into the Poliheuristic Theory of Decision-Making. This theory seeks to explain both the processes and the outcomes of foreign policy. The chapter then explains the theory's two-stage analytical framework and its subsequent shortcomings and empirical analysis. Poliheuristic Theory integrates insights from both cognitive and rationalist perspectives on foreign policy decision-making. A number of articles that have used Poliheuristic Theory in non-Western settings have deliberately used non-Western contexts to explore and expand the theory's context-sensitivity, applicability, and explanatory scope. The chapter cites that further research is needed concerning the applicability of Poliheuristic Theory to group decision-making, which correlates to the aggregation challenge cognizant to political dynamics in a group setting.

This chapter discusses the study of analogies and metaphors as cognitive heuristics in foreign policy decision-making. It examines how analogical reasoning can help decision-makers reduce the complexity of foreign policy problems. The use of analogies and metaphors involves two subsequent cognitive processes wherein decision-makers activate analogies or metaphors from long-term memory while also mapping their knowledge on the activated analogies or metaphors onto the foreign policy decision. The chapter provides an overview of analogies and metaphors in Foreign Policy Analysis (FPA). It also considers possible future research on analogies and metaphors in foreign policy and foreign policy decision-making.

This chapter provides an overview of the bureaucratic politics approach when it operates in line with foreign policy. The chapter considers an approach which looks at governments and their operations within foreign policy as the outcome of political bargaining between different government bureaucracies. The bureaucratic politics approach uses the concept of action channels to identify the bureaucratic actors who participate in government foreign policymaking. The chapter explains how different bureaucratic actors in the same government may advocate different foreign policy positions which can cause conflict in the decision-making process. The chapter finally presents the basic assumptions and key arguments of the bureaucratic politics approach while showing how it can be used in empirical Foreign Policy Analysis (FPA) research.

This chapter explores the key concepts of Prospect Theory, which is a descriptive theory to explain foreign policy decision-making under risk. It acknowledges the theory as currently the most influential behavioural theory of choice in the social sciences. Prospect Theory emphasizes the importance and impact of the decision-making environment on decision-makers. The chapter also details the basic assumptions, application, and criticisms of Prospect Theory. It describes the numerous starting points for future research offered by Prospect Theory, such as elites being fundamentally less averse to taking risks than individuals who do not hold top positions in politics and business.