Something to fight for
When Criticism is Ineffective: The Case of Historical Trauma and Unsupportive Allies
Gilad Hirschberger et al.
European Journal of Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Three studies examined the effect of historical trauma reminders and criticism from international allies on attitudes toward current conflicts. In Study 1, Israeli participants (N = 116) were primed with the Holocaust, and read either that US President Obama supports Israel's right to defend itself and attack Iran, or that he opposes such action. Then, support for preemptive violence was assessed. Study 2 (N = 133) replicated this design, comparing inclusive and exclusive framings of the Holocaust. Study 3 (N = 478), examined the effect of Holocaust reminders and criticism from the EU on attitudes toward militant policies against Palestinians. All three studies found that Holocaust primes juxtaposed with international criticism increased support for aggression, especially under exclusive framings of the Holocaust. Study 3, however, found this effect only among left-wing participants. These findings indicate that when historical trauma is salient, international criticism may be ineffective and may even backfire.
The US foreign policy establishment and grand strategy: How American elites obstruct strategic adjustment
Christopher Layne
International Politics, May 2017, Pages 260–275
Abstract:
In this article, I demonstrate that there are compelling reasons why the USA should reconsider its current grand strategy — variously described as primacy or deep engagement — and, instead, adopt a less activist strategy such as offshore balancing, or restraint. The most salient reason for the USA to make a change of direction is that its current strategy has set the USA on a collision course with China. Nevertheless, the American foreign policy establishment is resistant to strategic adjustment. In this article, I offer a two-pronged explanation for this resistance. First, the American foreign policy establishment imposes a broadly uniform world view on those who comprise it. In this sense, the foreign policy establishment’s very existence is a barrier to strategic adjustment. Second, the foreign policy establishment’s preferences invariably prevail because it exercises discourse dominance, which allows it to frame issues, and to set the bounds of discussion by signaling to a wider audience what policy positions are legitimate, and, perhaps even more important, which are not. In this article, I begin by discussing how the American foreign policy establishment’s members are recruited, and focus on its links to America’s corporate and financial elite. Then, I lay out the key elements of the foreign policy establishment’s world views. I show how the foreign policy establishment uses discourse dominance to ensure that US grand strategy reflects its core beliefs about America’s international political role. Finally, I demonstrate that with respect to China, the foreign policy establishment’s world view, and the discursive practices it employs, make it unlikely that the USA will be able peacefully to accommodate China’s rise.
Battlefield Casualties and Ballot Box Defeat: Did the Bush-Obama Wars Cost Clinton the White House?
Douglas Kriner & Francis Shen
Boston University Working Paper, June 2017
Abstract:
America has been at war continuously for over 15 years, but few Americans seem to notice. This is because the vast majority of citizens have no direct connection to those soldiers fighting, dying, and returning wounded from combat. Increasingly, a divide is emerging between communities whose young people are dying to defend the country, and those communities whose young people are not. In this paper we empirically explore whether this divide — the casualty gap — contributed to Donald Trump’s surprise victory in November 2016. The data analysis presented in this working paper finds that indeed, in the 2016 election Trump was speaking to this forgotten part of America. Even controlling in a statistical model for many other alternative explanations, we find that there is a significant and meaningful relationship between a community’s rate of military sacrifice and its support for Trump. Our statistical model suggests that if three states key to Trump’s victory – Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin – had suffered even a modestly lower casualty rate, all three could have flipped from red to blue and sent Hillary Clinton to the White House. There are many implications of our findings, but none as important as what this means for Trump’s foreign policy. If Trump wants to win again in 2020, his electoral fate may well rest on the administration’s approach to the human costs of war. Trump should remain highly sensitive to American combat casualties, lest he become yet another politician who overlooks the invisible inequality of military sacrifice. More broadly, the findings suggest that politicians from both parties would do well to more directly recognize and address the needs of those communities whose young women and men are making the ultimate sacrifice for the country.
Insurgent Learning
Francesco Trebbi et al.
NBER Working Paper, June 2017
Abstract:
We study a model of insurgent learning during a counterinsurgency campaign. We test empirical implications of the model using newly declassified microdata documenting improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in Afghanistan from 2006 to 2014. This period was characterized by substantial US investments in anti-IED technology and equipment. We find no evidence of decreasing effectiveness of IEDs across time. Qualitative evidence suggests that this is due to innovations in IED devices and tactics. Our results are robust to numerous alternative specifications, and yield insights on a technological revolution in insurgent violence — the proliferation and evolution of IEDs — with implications for scholarship on civil conflict and future investment in tactical countermeasures.
The Mistreatment of My People: Victimization by Proxy and Behavioral Intentions to Commit Violence Among Muslims in Denmark
Milan Obaidi et al.
Political Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Islamist extremism is often explained by the suffering endured by Muslims in Islamic countries as a result of Western-led wars. However, many terrorist attacks have been carried out by European Muslims with no personal experiences of war. Across two studies among Danish Muslims, we tested if what we call “victimization-by-proxy processes” motivate behavioral intentions to commit acts of violence. We used Muslim identification, perceived injustice of Western foreign policies, and group-based anger to predict violent and nonviolent behavioral intentions. More importantly, we compared path models of Danish Muslims from conflict zones with those without direct personal experience of Western-led occupation. We found similar effects among the participants in each category, that is, vicarious psychological responses mimicked those of personally experienced adversity. In fact, participants born in Western Europe were, on average, more strongly identified with Muslims, more likely to perceive Western foreign policy as more unjust, reported greater group-based anger, and were more inclined to help Muslims both by nonviolent and violent means.
Growth, Import Dependence, and War
Roberto Bonfatti & Kevin Hjortshøj O'Rourke
Economic Journal, forthcoming
Abstract:
Theories of war predict that the leader may launch a war on a follower who is catching up, since the follower cannot commit to not use their increased power in the future. But it was Japan who attacked the West in 1941: both leaders and followers start wars. Similarly, many have argued that trade makes war less likely, yet World War I erupted at a time of unprecedented globalization. We develop a model of trade and war that can explain both observations. Dependence on imports can lead followers to attack leaders or resource-rich regions when they are subject to blockade.
Unfair fights: Power asymmetry, nascent nuclear capability, and preventive conflict
Robert Schub
Conflict Management and Peace Science, July 2017, Pages 431-455
Abstract:
Scholars have long recognized that imminent shifts in relative power may motivate declining states to initiate conflict. But what conditions exacerbate the risk posed by these anticipated power shifts? Building upon existing bargaining models of war, I show that larger initial power asymmetries increase the probability of preventive conflict. Theoretical extensions that account for certainty effects and variable costs of war, both of which are linked to initial dyadic power balances, drive this relationship. It follows that looming power transitions in which rising states approach and surpass parity, long considered war-prone scenarios, are not particularly problematic. Instead, the risk of conflict is greatest when preponderant powers confront conventionally weak but rising states. I test the theoretical predictions in the context of anticipated power shifts due to rivals pursuing nuclear weapons. Extensive empirical tests that relax assumptions employed in prior analyses of preventive conflict offer strong support for this contention. These results shed light on the underpinnings of many pressing contemporary interstate security issues.
Why Gene Editors Like CRISPR/Cas May Be a Game-Changer for Neuroweapons
Diane DiEuliis & James Giordano
Health Security, June 2017, Pages 296-302
Abstract:
This year marks the Eighth Review Conference (RevCon) of the Biological Toxins and Weapons Convention (BWC). At the same time, ongoing international efforts to further and more deeply investigate the brain's complex neuronal circuitry are creating unprecedented capabilities to both understand and control neurological processes of thought, emotion, and behavior. These advances have tremendous promise for human health, but the potential for their misuse has also been noted, with most discussions centering on research and development of agents that are addressed by existing BWC and Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) proscriptions. In this article, we discuss the dual-use possibilities fostered by employing emergent biotechnologic techniques and tools — specifically, novel gene editors like clustered regular interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR) — to produce neuroweapons. Based on our analyses, we posit the strong likelihood that development of genetically modified or created neurotropic substances will advance apace with other gene-based therapeutics, and we assert that this represents a novel — and realizable — path to creating potential neuroweapons. In light of this, we propose that it will be important to re-address current categorizations of weaponizable tools and substances, so as to better inform and generate tractable policy to enable improved surveillance and governance of novel neuroweapons.
Occupational Fatalities and the Labor Supply: Evidence from the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan
Garret Christensen
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, July 2017, Pages 182–195
Abstract:
I find that full information utility maximization models are insufficient to explain the recruiting response to deaths of US soldiers in recent years. Using data of all applicants to the enlisted US military during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, deaths had a small but significant deterrent effect on recruiting in the soldiers’ home counties. The deterrent is larger for deaths from the same county than for deaths from neighboring counties or for out of county but in state deaths. The effect exhibits significant heterogeneity: deaths in Iraq decrease recruiting, while deaths in Afghanistan may increase recruiting, and the deterrent is more negative in less populous and more racially diverse counties; it is smaller or even positive in counties that voted for George W. Bush.
Atomic Leverage: Compellence with Nuclear Latency
Tristan Volpe
Security Studies, Summer 2017, Pages 517-544
Abstract:
Nuclear proliferation is not a binary outcome with uniform consequences, but instead spans a continuum of latent capacity to produce nuclear weapons. At various thresholds of technical development, some countries leverage nuclear latency to practice coercive diplomacy. How and when does nuclear technology provide a challenger with the most effective means to extract concessions in world politics? This article claims that compellence with nuclear latency puts a challenger on the horns of a credibility dilemma between demonstrating resolve and signaling restraint, and identifies a sweet spot for reaching an optimal bargain where the proliferation threat is credible while the assurance costs of revealing intent are low. Historical studies of South Korea, Japan, and North Korea validate this Goldilocks principle and find that it consistently reflects the ability to produce fissile material. Contrary to conventional wisdom about proliferation, nuclear technology generates political effects long before a country acquires nuclear weapons.
Policy bargaining and militarized conflict
Peter Bils & William Spaniel
Journal of Theoretical Politics, forthcoming
Abstract:
Studies of bargaining and war generally focus on two sources of incomplete information: uncertainty over the probability of victory and uncertainty over the costs of fighting. We introduce uncertainty over preferences of a spatial policy and argue for its relevance in crisis bargaining. Under these conditions, standard results from the bargaining model of war break down: peace can be Pareto inefficient and it may be impossible to avoid war. We then extend the model to allow for cheap talk pre-play communication. Whereas incentives to misrepresent normally render cheap talk irrelevant, here communication can cause peace and ensure that agreements are efficient. Moreover, peace can become more likely as (1) the variance in the proposer’s belief about its opponent’s type increases and (2) the costs of war decrease. Our results indicate that one major purpose of diplomacy is simply to communicate preferences and that such communications can be credible.
A Century of Victimhood: Antecedents and Current Impacts of Perceived Suffering in World War I Across Europe
Pierre Bouchat et al.
European Journal of Social Psychology, March 2017, Pages 195–208
Abstract:
The present study addresses antecedents and consequences of collective victimhood in the context of WWI across 15 European nations (N = 2,423 social science students). Using multilevel analysis, we find evidence that collective victimhood is still present a hundred years after the onset of the war and can be predicted by WWI-related objective indicators of victimization at national and family levels. This suggests that collective victimhood is partly grounded in the actual experience of WWI. In addition, we show that sense of collective victimhood positively predicts acknowledgment of the suffering inflicted by one's nation on other countries during WWI. This is consistent with a social representation of WWI as involving a vast massacre in which nations were both victim and perpetrator. Finally, we find that objective indicators of victimization predict pacifism in divergent ways, with an indicator at the national level associated with more pacifist attitudes and an indicator at the family level being associated with less pacifist attitudes. This finding suggests that war-torn societies may have developed social representations favouring peaceful coexistence whereas, at the family level, victimization may still foster retaliatory tendencies.
Deradicalizing Detained Terrorists
David Webber et al.
Political Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Deradicalization of terrorists constitutes a critical component of the global “war on terror.” Unfortunately, little is known about deradicalization programs, and evidence for their effectiveness is derived solely from expert impressions and potentially flawed recidivism rates. We present the first empirical assessment of one such program: the Sri Lankan rehabilitation program for former members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (a terrorist organization that operated in Sri Lanka until their defeat in 2009). We offer evidence that deradicalization efforts that provided beneficiaries with sustained mechanisms for earning personal significance significantly reduced extremism after 1 year (Study 1). We also found that upon release, beneficiaries expressed lower levels of extremism than their counterparts in the community (Study 2). These findings highlight the critical role of personal significance in deradicalization efforts, offer insights into the workings of deradicalization, and suggest practical methods for improving deradicalization programs worldwide.
War or Peace? How the Subjective Perception of Great Power Interdependence Shapes Preemptive Defensive Aggression
Yiming Jing et al.
Frontiers in Psychology, June 2017
Abstract:
Why do great powers with benign intentions end up fighting each other in wars they do not seek? We utilize an incentivized, two-person “Preemptive Strike Game” (PSG) to explore how the subjective perception of great power interdependence shapes defensive aggression against persons from rival great powers. In Study 1, college students from the United States (N = 115), China (N = 106), and Japan (N = 99) made PSG decisions facing each other. This natural experiment revealed that Chinese and Japanese participants (a) made more preemptive attacks against each other and Americans than against their compatriots, and that (b) greater preexisting perceptions of bilateral competition increased intergroup attack rates. In Study 2, adult Americans (N = 127) watched real CNN expert interviews portraying United States–China economic interdependence as more positive or negative. This randomized experiment revealed that the more positive portrayal reduced preemptive American strikes against Chinese (but not Japanese), while the more negative portrayal amplified American anger about China’s rise, increasing preemptive attacks against Chinese. We also found, however, that preemptive strikes were primarily defensive and not offensive. Interventions to reduce defensive aggression and promote great power peace are discussed.
Democracy and the Settlement of International Borders, 1919 to 2001
Douglas Gibler & Andrew Owsiak
Journal of Conflict Resolution, forthcoming
Abstract:
There is increasing evidence that territorial conflict is associated with centralized and nondemocratic regimes. We explore whether this relationship is due to the facility of democratic regimes to settle their international borders. Using Owsiak’s data set on border settlement processes, we find little evidence that democratic regimes are more likely than other types of regimes to settle their borders. In fact, joint democracy rarely precedes the first border agreement or full settlement of the border, and there is almost no qualitative evidence suggesting a link between democracy and border settlement in the rare instances of successful agreements. Democracies are also not more likely to keep their borders settled or even to be more peaceful during settled-border years. Overall, our findings suggest that border settlements lead to peace in the dyad and affirm a clear temporal sequence of border settlement, then peace and democracy for neighboring dyads.
Cultural evolution of military camouflage
Laszlo Talas, Roland Baddeley & Innes Cuthill
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society: Biological Sciences, 5 July 2017
Abstract:
While one has evolved and the other been consciously created, animal and military camouflage are expected to show many similar design principles. Using a unique database of calibrated photographs of camouflage uniform patterns, processed using texture and colour analysis methods from computer vision, we show that the parallels with biology are deeper than design for effective concealment. Using two case studies we show that, like many animal colour patterns, military camouflage can serve multiple functions. Following the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact, countries that became more Western-facing in political terms converged on NATO patterns in camouflage texture and colour. Following the break-up of the former Yugoslavia, the resulting states diverged in design, becoming more similar to neighbouring countries than the ancestral design. None of these insights would have been obtained using extant military approaches to camouflage design, which focus solely on concealment. Moreover, our computational techniques for quantifying pattern offer new tools for comparative biologists studying animal coloration.