本文從批判性地緣政治 ( critical geopolitics ) 的角度，藉由波士尼亞戰爭 ( 1992-1995 年 )此一案例，探討後冷戰時期美國的外交政策。深受國際關係後實證主義 ( post-positivism) 的影響，批判性地緣政治旨在問題化(problematize) 地緣政治的思想，主張地緣政治的基本元素，例如主權、領土、疆界、民族國家等，其意義不是既定的，而是社會實踐的結果。外交政策的功能之一，即是藉由賦予特定「他者」一個地緣政治的意義，建構或合理化國家的政策還頃。據此以觀，美國由不肯/不能出兵波士尼亞，到最後積極介入和平協議的簽訂，或可詮釋為是原先政府或政治菁英對於波士尼亞的主流建構—歷史仇恨與種族衝突—逐漸受到另一套「大屠殺」論述挑戰 (但非取代) 的緣故。最後，本文將指出，雖然這樣的研究途徑似乎確認了「西方」的權力能力，從而強化了現實主義的論述，但二者之間所開展出來的、對國際關你的理解與研究，卻是大不相同的。

This paper uses the approach of critical geopolitics to study the US foreign policy in the post-Cold War era, with the Bosnian war (1992-1995) being the empirical case. Influenced by the stream of post-positivism in International Relations (IR), critical geopolitics aims at problematizing traditional geopolitical thinking, holding that the meaning of concepts such as sovereignty, territory, boundary, nation-state, and so on, is not given and fixed, but is a construct of social practices. One function of foreign policy is thus to give an “Other” a specific geopolitical meaning, thereby constructing or rationalizing possible policy options. Upon this basis, the process of which the US government eventually intervened actively in Bosnia might be interpreted as a shift in discourse in the sense that the dominant discourse of ancient hatred and ethnic conflict had gradually been challenged (although not replaced) by another discourse of holocaust. While such research approach may seem to confirm the power of the West in determining facts and actions needed, and therefore reinforce the claim of realism, there remain significant differences in research orientation, theory-building, and implications between the two.