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Abstract
Previous research on the sources of foreign policy convergence has focused exclusively on changes at either the dyadic level, between sender and receiver countries, or monadic level of these states. Although such approaches are helpful to understand how states affect foreign policy change in other countries, they generally overlook the third source of foreign policy convergence, that is, the indirect impact of significant events in neighbouring countries. I investigate whether and how leadership visits—a major diplomatic phenomenon—affect foreign policy convergence within and beyond host countries. Specifically, I argue that leadership visits directly facilitate foreign policy convergence in host countries and indirectly produce favourable diffusion effects in their neighbourhood. I develop an original dataset that tracks the visits of high-level officials between China and its foreign counterparts from 1978 to 2014. The results from spatial panel models support my proposed direct and indirect effects whereby Chinese leadership visits are positively associated with foreign policy alignments with China in both host countries and their neighbours.

Existing research has shown that negotiated peace agreements are less likely to sustain an enduring peace in the aftermath of civil wars. A large proportion of research concentrates on the effects of either agreement design or agreement implementation on the likelihood of civil war resumption. Generally, existing studies fail to integrate design and implementation as separate parts of an interdependent process. Studies also tend to ignore the implication of preceding agreement design on subsequent implementation. This research develops an integrative framework that engages both the agreement design and implementation stages in the civil war peace process. It also examines the effects of third-party mediation on the durability of peace agreement in the aftermath of civil wars through its in uence on the quality of agreement design and implementation. The presence of third-party mediation helps to resolve future uncertainty and fear resulting from the \commitment problem" between war combatants, and thus makes peace agreements more durable. By using compiled data from the UCDP Peace Agreement Dataset, the Civil War Mediation (CWM) dataset, and the Power-Sharing Event Dataset (PSED), this research employs a Cox Proportional Hazards model to test the implication of design and implementation on the durability of postwar peace. The results suggest that the effect of mediation on peace durability is conditional upon the stages of the peace process. Peace agreements designed and implemented by mediators are more likely to sustain lasting peace. The results also indicate that not all implementation of power-sharing pacts, as promised in the design stage, can produce pacifying effects given the fact that implementing certain types of power-sharing pacts disrupts peace processes.

Challenging influential perspectives that downplay the role of shared rebel constituencies, we argue that they represent important causes of rebel alliances. Yet, we theorize distinct effects for different types of constituency. While compatible political aspirations push both organizations with a common ideological constituency and those with a common ethnic constituency to ally, for co-ethnic organizations this cooperation-inducing effect is offset by a cooperation-suppressing effect due to their higher risk of inter-rebel war. Leveraging a novel dataset of alliances in multiparty civil wars (1946–2015), we find support for our theoretical expectations. Shared ideological constituencies have a larger and more robust positive effect on the probability of alliances than shared ethnic constituencies. Furthermore, we find that co-ethnic rebel organizations tend to establish informal alliances only, while organizations sharing an ideological constituency are drawn to formal alliances.

AbstractHow do periods of conflict and peace shape women's empowerment around the world? While existing studies have demonstrated that gender inequalities contribute to the propensity for armed conflict, we consider how the anticipation and realization of armed conflict shape women's opportunities for influence in society. Some scholars have pointed to the role that militarization and threat play in entrenching male dominance, while others have argued that periods of warfare can upend existing gender hierarchical orders. We posit mechanisms by which the preparation for and experiences during war affect change in women's empowerment. We develop and test observable implications using cross-national data from 1900 to 2015. We find that, at least in the short and medium term, warfare can disrupt social institutions and lead to an increase in women's empowerment via mechanisms related to role shifts across society and political shifts catalyzed by war. Reforming institutions and mainstreaming gender during peace processes stand to have important legacies for gender power relations in postconflict societies, though much more may be needed for more permanent change.

Up to three miles below the ocean surface, deep-sea hydro-Thermal vents are home to a community of extraordinary mol- lusks. In an environment without light, under intense pressure and volcanic heat, many gastropods and bivalves living directly on the vent chimneys show adaptations that have driven important scientific breakthroughs. For example, the famous "scaly- foot" gastropod, ChrysonuiUon squamifentm, has hard scales on its foot with a crystalline iron coating that has inspired novel defensive armor designs. This iconic species has only been reported from three sites in the Indian Ocean, each site hundreds of miles apart and only around half the size of a football field. Two of these three sites are already designated under international exploration licenses for deep-sea mining, to extract rare minerals from the vent chimneys. Economic and political pressures to exploit the seabed are advancing much faster than scientific exploration, putting these vent ecosystems and their molluscan residents at risk.