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Alliances are promises of cooperation, but allies typically have to bargain over what policy should be adopted when a given contingency arises. Whether this bargaining leads to collaborative outcomes and what form cooperation by allies takes have important implications for the effectiveness of an alliance. Neorealism and neoliberal institutionalism, the author argues, do not provide adequate explanations for this problem because they mischaracterize, or fail to come to grips with, the bargaining process at work. To redress such shortcomings, the author turns to game theory, providing a general model of intra-alliance bargaining. The model's insights are then used to interpret the historical record on U.S. Bosnia policy from 1991 until the fall of 1995. The author shows how domestic and international considerations affected the preferences and beliefs of the Bush and Clinton administrations. These led, as suggested by the model, to the U.S. tendency to avoid bargaining hard with the NATO allies and to pursue compromise strategies with them in the Bosnian crisis.

This study examines the determinants of intra-alliance cooperation by focusing on a single case study: the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) attempts to deal with Persian Gulf security since 1979. It chronicles the evolution of NATO policy towards Southwest Asia, identifying examples of cooperative and noncooperative behavior. The essay then develops four hypotheses about intra-alliance behavior and uses them to examine the case study. The External Threat hypothesis suggests that alliance cohesion rises and falls with external threats to collective security. The Alliance Security Dilemma hypothesis proposes that cohesion is a function of the coercive potential of the alliance leader and its ability to exact cooperative behavior from its weaker partners. The Collective Action hypothesis suggests that alliance behavior is fundamentally a public goods problem. The Domestic Politics hypothesis asserts that alliance behavior is determined primarily by political and economic factors at the domestic level.The essay points to the overriding importance of American coercion in producingpoliticalcooperation within NATO on the out-of-area problem. It shows, however, that theeconomiccomponents of alliance behavior are relatively insensitive to bargaining pressure and threat perceptions, and that European defense expenditures are determined largely by domestic factors. The article therefore illuminates the need to distinguish carefully between the political and economic components of alliance management. It suggests, however, that the different dynamics driving cooperation and discord are not a function of the issue-area per se, but of the scope and locus of its decision-making arena. While some issue-areas are largely the domain of foreign policy elites and lend themselves to oligarchic forms of decision making, others have a far more immediate impact on domestic politics and are therefore more influenced by pluralist factors.

Chronicles the evolution of NATO policy towards Southwest Asia, identifying examples of cooperative and noncooperative behavior. Develops four hypotheses about intra-alliance behaviour. Points to the overriding importance of American coercion in producing political cooperation within NATO on the out-of-area problem. Illuminates the need to distinguish carefully between the political and economic components of alliance management. Suggests, however, that the different dynamics driving cooperation and discord are not a function of the issue-area per se, but of the scope and locus of its decision making arena. (Abstract amended)

Attempts to deal with security in the region since 1979.

In view of the collapse of Communist governments in much of Eastern Europe and related developments since 1989, forward-deployed U.S. forces will probably be reduced substantially in the coming decade. Other components of U.S. military power will, however, remain significant in alliance relations: general-purpose conventional forces, nuclear deterrence forces, global surveillance and communications capabilities, and military research and development. Burden sharing and decision making will become more challenging alliance problems in an increasingly multipolar and fluid international context. Five factors deserve particular attention, especially with regard to the future of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization: the conduct and aftermath of the Persian Gulf war; German political and security choices; West European political and economic integration; the internal evolution of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe; and intra-Western political differences. During a time of unpredictable flux in international politics, the most prudent course for the United States is to retain the alliance ties established and maintained at great cost in the past and to adapt them to new requirements.