Abstract
Recent episodes of foreign meddling in elections in the U.S., France, and the U.K. have led observers asking whether democracies could uphold their electoral sovereignty in the 21st Century. Free and fair elections are the cornerstone of democratic regimes, and such encroachment on a people' sovereignty and self-determination would be expected to trigger a strong response from the affected states. Yet, what we have witnessed ranges from unspecified threats and diplomatic sanctions to total inaction. How can we explain this response? In other words, why democracies fail to counterbalance against the threat of foreign interference into their electoral processes? In a previous paper, I argued that neoclassical realism's position in the agency-structure debate makes it particularly apt at tackling cyber-enabled foreign election interference (CYFI) research problems. In this new paper, I test this theory with primary empirical evidence. Focusing on election interference episodes of 2016-2017, I conducted dozens of elite semi-structured interviews with direct participants in the foreign policy and national security policy-making process of their respective governments. I adopt a methodological synergy design. On the one hand, I probe the internal validity of the theory with a causal narrative. I combine it with an internal comparison as the primary method to generate evidence from causal process observations. On the other hand, I probe external validity with cross-case analysis in the form of a multistage Millian method, generating evidence akin to dataset observations. I find that foreign policy response to CYFI is a consequence of a balancing by decision-makers between the structural stimuli of components of power and a combination of intervening variables relating to threat perception and public opinion constraints. I then discuss the important policy implications of these findings, highlighting the need for a whole-of-society approach to tackling foreign interference.