Suchergebnisse

The concept, crisis escalation, has three distinct but closely-related meanings: change from incipient to full-scale crisis; change from non-violence to violence; and change from no/low violence to severe violence. These are examined through a model of crisis escalation and a group of seven hypotheses derived from the model. Testing of the propositions on crisis escalation with the evidence from 388 international crises and 829 foreign policy crises from the end of 1918 to the end of 1988 reveals strong support for most of the postulated linkages in the crisis escalation model. Moreover, the evidence from ten indepth case studies indicates a widely shared pattern of coping with high stress, despite notable diversity in crisis attributes. This finding challenges conventional wisdom about how states cope with foreign policy crises.

Based on conference paper. What determines whether, once deterrence has failed, full-scale war is the probable outcome?

Analyzes escalation patterns in interstate disputes among nation's with both identical and different levels of weapons technology; based on conference paper. Whether nuclear weapons can be relied upon to impede escalatory dispute behavior by either nuclear or nonnuclear antagonists.

The effect of the possession of nuclear weapons on patterns of international conflict is the subject of an extensive but generally impressionistic body of work. Assumptions in this area determine one's confidence in superpower deterrence and fuel the debate over the proper expenditure of military allocations. This study presents an analysis of escalation patterns in interstate disputes among nations with both identical and different levels of weapons technology. The results demonstrate that the distribution of nuclear capabilities does impact the patterns of escalation in serious international conflicts. The findings are supportive of the thesis of competitive risk taking in disputes between nuclear powers but also indicate that the possession of nuclear weapons has no apparent inhibitory effect on the escalatory propensities of nonnuclear opponents. The principal policy implication of this analysis is that nuclear weapons cannot be relied upon to impede escalatory dispute behavior by either nuclear or nonnuclear antagonists.

Underlying the emerging interest in the role of rivalry processes as antecedents to interstate conflict is the simple idea that conflict within the constraints of rivalry works differently than conflict outside of rivalry. In this article, we inspect the concepts of protracted conflict, as developed within the International Crisis Behavior (ICB) project, and rivalry, and discuss some of their applications to crisis escalation. The protracted conflict and rivalry concepts are not identical, but they do overlap in terms of their emphases on historical context, serious goal incompatibilities, and stakes that might be resolved coercively. Developing an argument for the concept of rivalry possessing fewer limitations than protracted conflict, we proceed to analyze and test the interaction between rivalry and other variables, again making use of an ICB escalation model, when predicting crisis escalation to war. Throughout, our basic question concerns what role interstate rivalry plays in crisis behavior. Are the crises of rivals more lethal than those of non-rivals? If so, can we pinpoint why that is the case? We find that rivalry not only makes escalation more likely, but also significantly interacts with more traditional predictors of conflict, such as capability ratios, the number of actors in a crisis, democracy, and the issues under contention.

Why do some near crises tip over into full-blown crisis and others do not? This paper considers existing scholarship and identifies four key barriers to using quantitative analysis for tipping-point analyses: strategic indeterminacy; the incentives for conflict parties to avoid inefficiencies; the paucity of cases; and the availability of quality data. Due to these challenges, many do not perform well as immediate causes for crisis escalation. We also argue and demonstrate through two quantitative models of crisis escalation that some variables, particularly related to domestic politics, can do well in explaining why some disputes tip into crisis and others do not. As we illustrate with reference to the 1995–1996 Third Taiwan Straits Crisis, qualitative approaches that analyze the processes by which leaders and foreign policy institutions make decisions add needed explanatory power to purely quantitative models of the potential for near crises to tip into crisis.

How do drones affect escalation dynamics? The emerging consensus from scholarship on drones highlights increased conflict initiation when drones allow decisionmakers to avoid the risks of deploying inhabited platforms, but far less attention has been paid to understanding how drones affect conflict escalation. Limited theorization and empirical testing have left debates unresolved. I unpack the underlying mechanisms influencing escalation decisions involving drones by proposing a logic of remote-controlled restraint: drones limit escalation in ways not possible when inhabited assets are used. To test this logic and explore its instrumental and emotional microfoundations, I field "comparative wargames." I immerse national security professionals in crisis scenarios that vary whether a drone or inhabited aircraft is shot down. I validate wargame findings using a survey experiment. The wargames shed light on the microfoundations of escalation, highlight limits of existing theories, and demonstrate the utility of comparative wargaming as an IR research tool.