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International Security Notes

International Security (Yale University)

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International Security

Lecture 1: What is security?

 Arnold Wolfers
o Former Yale prof. who was one of the first to tackle “what is security?”
o “Security points to some degree of protection of values previously acquired.”
 Normative (moral/ethical question answering what we should do)
o What should we value?
 Positive/empirical (factual)
o What unifies those who study international security?
o What do states, in fact, value? What threatens those values? How do states prioritize
among multiple values and threats?
 David Baldwin’s 3 Theories
o Tries to abstractly link together all aspects of the question
o Prime Value Approach
 Security as a question for survival; survival is the condition for the enjoyment of
all other values
 Not useful for approaching “what security is” because we value more than
survival
 We make tradeoffs between survival and other things we value
 i.e. if survival was most important (prime), then why do we drive?
o Core Value Approach
 There is no prime value, but some values are core and others peripheral
o Marginal Value Approach
 Diminishing marginal utility, but each additional increment of a good is valued
less than the previous
 Who/what is [meant to be] secured?
o The state
 Autonomous from society; treat it like an institution
o Some other collective entity
 i.e. Proletariat (Lenin), the nation (Huntington), the faithful (Qutb)
o Individuals
o Ideas/Doctrines Espoused
 i.e. a constitution
 Values and Threats: Capabilities (Mearsheimer)
o Assumes
 Anarchy (not chaos)
 All states have inherent offensive capabilities. All can attack if they want.
 No certainty about other states’ intentions
 Survival (of the state) is the primary goal of the state
 States are rational actors.
o Mearsheimer: Assume all others are hostile, so look at offensive capabilities to
determine which states are actually threatening.
 Values and Threats: Ontological Security (Mitzen)
o States, like individuals, value stability of expectations (i.e. an identity that drives their
behavior, in the words of Kocher).
o Consistent with physically threatening behavior (i.e. dueling)

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o States are not primarily rational actors. Rather, they are habitual.
o Can subsume multiple types of threats, more general than survival
 Values and Threats: Culture (Huntington)
o US has an Anglo-Saxon linguistic and cultural identity.
o Previous immigration reinforced this identity.
o Current immigration threatens to undermine this identity.
 Values and Threats: Domestic/Transnational Interest Groups
o Whose interests get protected
o Capitalist class (Lenin)
o Military/feudal elites (Schumpeter)
o The Israel Lobby (Mearsheimer and Walt)

Lecture 2: (Grand) Theories of International Politics

 What are they good for?
o Accounting for macro-scale patterns over long periods of time
 Alliances
 Wars
 Long periods of peace
o Mostly oriented toward behavior of great powers
 What greater powers do affect the smaller states
o Constitute “schools of thought” that organize intellectual endeavor
 Allows for basic assumptions about certain groups
 Levels of Analysis or “Images”
o How an author explains via examples of each’s characteristics
o Individuals/Human Nature (First Image)
 i.e. History of great men (Caesar, Napoleon, etc.)
 Typically associated with diplomatic history rather than IR
o States (Second Image)
 i.e. Regime type (Democracy/Authoritarianism)
 Most current scholarship
o Systems (Third Image)
 i.e. Polarity (multi-, bi-, uni-)
 Realism (Antecedents)
o Early Realists
 Thucydides (Peloponnesian War)
 Machiavelli (wars of Italian city states)
 Hobbes (English Civil War)
o Separation of normative from empirical/positive
 How they behave divorced from how they ought to behave
 Unpopular alongside the European Christian tradition
o Emphasis on the role of power and interest of the actors (not ideas) in shaping politics
 Realism (20th C. Polemics)
o Important to place them in historical context and their contemporaries
o Response to failure of interwar (between WWI and II) institutions and outbreak of WWII
 E.H. Carr (The Twenty Years Crisis) – states should have backed up diplomacy w/
force
 Hans Morgenthau (Politics Among Nations)

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o Critique of aggressive Cold War doctrine

 Kenneth Waltz (Theory of Int’l. Politics)
o Restraining American power post-Cold War
 Mearsheimer (Tragedy of Great Power Politics)
 Unfavorable views of recent interventions
 Shared Assumptions of Realism
o States are the actors that matter in IP.
 Not trans-/inter- national institutions
o The state system is profoundly shaped by anarchy (absence of a common authority).
o States compete for power.
o All alliances are temporary (self-help).
 At the end of the day, states can only rely on themselves.
 Convergences of interests are temporary.
 Temporary doesn’t have to mean short.
 Realism (Varieties)
o Classical
 Fundamental characteristics of human nature
 Desire for domination
 Morgenthau, Niebuhr
o Structural/Defensive
 Balance of power
 Protect what a state has
 Waltz, Walt, Snyder, Jervis, Van Evra
o Offensive
 Mearsheimer, Layne, Zakaria
 States have aggressive intentions.
 Balancing power/protecting self is inefficient. States won’t coordinate to
prevent aggression (?; may be misunderstood)
 Liberalism (Basic Premises/Unifying Features)
o Progressivism: The international system can be made more peaceful, fair, and rule-
governed than it has been in the past.
 Evidence in the post-WWII world
o Realists focus on permanence of current state of affairs.
o Progress does not require a perfectible human nature.
 The state can still change (as an institution).
o Progress in international politics depends on configuring interests so that peace is more
beneficial than war.
 What Liberalism Shares with Realism
o Anarchy as the basic condition of the international system
o States as the fundamental units
o States are self-interested.
 Three Major Variants of Liberalism
o Commercial Peace: commerce among nations promotes peace and cooperation
 Angell, Gartzke
o Democratic Peace: democratic states are less warlike and more cooperative (with
OTHER democratic states)
 Immanuel Kant, Russett, Doyle

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o Neoliberal Institutionalism: well-designed institutions can facilitate cooperation and

mitigate conflict
 Arguably most influential
 Keohane, Nye, Moravcsik, Ikenberry
 Constructivism (Basic Premises/Unifying Features)
o Is it a third school?
 Not exactly… the strength of the other two collapsed, so there may be zero.
 But the constructivists have the strongest unity among members
o States and other human institutions are socially constructed.
 Critique of reification or fetishism
 Individuals forget that institutions were created and treat them as if they are
natural/permanent.
 Think about the conditions that sustain these institutions instead.
o Interests are a function of identities/ideas.
o All social constructs can be changed; there is no fundamental human nature.

Lecture 3: Power, Military Power, and the “Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA)”
 What is power?
o Robert Dahl, (arguably) Yale’s most famous political scientist
 “A has power over B if A can get B to do something B would not otherwise do.”
o Alternatively, we have theories of how or why states exercise power over other states.
 Military Power
o “Conventional” military power: stand-up fight between 2+ armies that attempt to defeat
each other on the battlefield
 Focus of this lecture
o Coercion: using punishment (or threat of it) to influence state behavior
 Not addressed in the course
o Insurgency: use of force in a contest to control civilian population
 Conventional Military Power
o Importance to IR theory: “balance of power” treated as objective, observable, and
public information
o Mearsheimer believes that literal military assets are proof of conventional military
power (i.e. tanks, planes, infantry divisions, etc.)
 Latent power (size of economy) is needed to purchase these things.
 Admits that more than power matters when the fighting actually begins
 Alternatives to Conventional Military Power
o Types of forces (“Primacy of land power”)
o Nationalism (unity, motivation, resolve)
o Technology (RMA)
o Skill (leadership)
o Doctrine
 i.e. Biddle’s Modern System: Threshold to successfully fight requires a specific
kind of organization and getting over the threshold translates to more military
power
o Regime type
 Geoffrey Blainey’s Conjecture/Critique
o Opposes Mearsheimer’s belief that balance of power pre-war is visibly clear

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o Instead believes that balance of (military) power is clear only in the immediate
aftermath of war
o Sources of military power are multiple, only partially observable, and interact in
complex ways
 The RMA (Central Claim)
o Pioneered by Soviets in the 70s, taken over by Americans
o Recent advances (last 30-40 years; alongside IT) are transforming the nature of warfare.
o Most extreme version: More likely to be a gigantic artillery duel (from a distance) fought
with sophisticated munitions, rather than a chess-like game of maneuver and
positioning
 Eliot Cohen
 Elements of RMA
o Increased conventional firepower
 Bigger conventional bombs (that become as powerful as the weakest nuke)
o High-accuracy targeting
 GPS; infrared
o Remote sensing
 Satellite; Drone
 Real-time imaging
o Communications and IT
 People who need information get it immediately.
 Logistics and coordination become easier.
 Implications of RMA
o Cohen: What can be seen can be hit and can be destroyed.
o Dramatic improvement in fire at “stand-off” distances
o Corollary: Permits effective attack on rear area units, especially “command and control”
and logistics
o Devaluation of maneuver relative to fire
 Armor can be destroyed by non-armored forces
 Dug-in infantry in fixed positions can be destroyed
 Highly mobile, lightly armed ground forces are used mainly to call in firepower
from stand-off distances, walk into destroyed positions, and “mop up”
demoralized survivors
 2001 Invasion of Afghanistan
o The poster child of the RMA
o Northern Alliance infantry and cavalry supplemented by US special forces who called in
high-altitude bombers and cruise missiles
 Occupied the destroyed Taliban positions
 Stephen Biddle: The Modern System
o Doctrine: how an army is organized, designed, and trained to fight wars
 More fundamental than technology, in his opinion
o Modern conventional warfare an integration of fire and maneuver
o RMA suggests that technology determines the optimal balance of fire and maneuver
 Likely an increase in fire
o Traditionalists (such as Biddle) believe conventional warfare still depends on integrating
fire and maneuver
 TL;DR Maneuver is not obsolete.

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 Elements of the Modern System

o Agrees with RMA that modern firepower is so intense that the era of marching armies
ended a long time ago
o Cover, Concealment, and Dispersion (C, C, and D) makes survival most likely
 But, CCD makes large-scale maneuver extremely difficult
o Suppression, using own fire to suppress fire, allows for maneuver
o Local combined arms integration is the key
 Difficult organizational problem
 Independent decisions are made very low on the totem pole, but action must be
coordinated with other small groups
 Compounded with the fact that life is simultaneously at stake
 Fire and Maneuver in WWI (The Naïve View)
o Biddle thinks the modern system begins after 1918
o 1914: Fire technology (artillery and machine guns) overwhelm maneuver (which was
only infantry)
 Being out in the open on the battlefield is too dangerous
o 1917: Introduction of the tank makes maneuver possible
 The Modern System in WWI
o Mass artillery could already destroy heavily entrenched positions by 1914
o Offensives failed when large formations couldn’t sustain the advance (due to poor local
integration of fire and maneuver)
 The further ahead you get, the more likely you lost contact with your superiors.
 Thus, front lines get chaotic.
 Opposing counter-attack causes retreat from initial advance.
o First successful offensives on the Western Front after 1914 were Ludendorff’s Spring
Offensives in 1918
 But Germans had no tanks. Stosstruppen (Storm Troopers) had strong local
organization.
 Evaluating the RMA
o Claims of RMA enthusiasts are empirical, but a moving target
 Excuse that revolution may always be close, but nevertheless in the future
o Contemporary wars are the best evidence, despite being highly defective in claim
o No examples of warfare between multiple RMA-capable states
 The RMA and 2006 Lebanon War
o Israel >>> Hezbollah, so it’s hard to determine the true effect of RMA
o Hezbollah infiltrates Israel and attacks a military patrol, killing some and capturing
others
 Simultaneous rocket attacks
o Israel responds with massive airstrikes into Lebanon that were unsuccessful.
o Hezbollah resists the eventual ground invasion.
o No decisive outcome after 33 days
 What kind of war was the 2006 Lebanon War?
o Initial account: Guerrilla war fought by paramilitaries who hid among civilians and
ambushed Israelis.
o Alternative account: Conventional war where Hezbollah defends highly fortified villages
and other strong points against an Israeli advance
 Most civilians fled

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 Massive Israeli firepower advantage not decisive

 Hezbollah successful in CCD and small unit maneuver
 Israel can’t find low-tech Katyusha rocket launchers
 Implications of RMA and the Lebanon War
o Firepower is overrated
o Technologically outclassed opponents, when well trained, can impose attrition dynamics
in conventional battle
o Kocher sides with the traditionalists more.
 Discussion Q’s
o What does the RMA debate tell us about power?
o What would happen with multiple RMA-capable adversaries fighting conventional
battles?
o Could conventional warfare be an important mode of political conflict in the 21 st C.?

Lecture 4: Polarity and the Balance of Power

 “Part 1” in Notebook
 Objective: Learning how the int’l system works as a system; how parts affect other parts and
sometimes very quickly
 USSR
o In the path of German ambitions in Eastern Europe
 Hitler very vocal about wanting it for agricultural capabilities
o Rapidly expanding its military capabilities, but not ready to fight Germany in 1939
o Sought to avoid simultaneous European and Siberian conflicts
o Hoped that Western powers would grind each other down in a long war, with USSR
emerging as most powerful
 Example of buck-passing: side with the most-threatening and let other countries
check that power
 Germany
o Expansionist aims in Central and Eastern Europe
o Wanted to fight its enemies one-by-one
 Explains deal-making with USSR
 Concerned about a two front war
o Defeating France and Britain would give it a free hand against the USSR
 Japan
o Neutral at outset of war
o Expansionist aims in NE or SE Asia
o Deterred in north by USSR
o Deterred in south by US (Philippines), Britain (Singapore, Malaya), France (Indochina),
and Netherlands (Indonesia)
 Why did France fall?
o Traditional argument
 France decadent and lacked will to defend self (left—anti govt.—and right wing
—we’re too weak—support
 Dependence on static defense of Maginot Line (invested in fixed defenses that
were supposed to slow/stop German advances)
 Blitzkrieg

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o Immediate cause: Germany attacked at a weakly defended point and split the allied
armies in half
o Ultimate cause: alliance commitments undermined French ability to reinforce in the
Ardennes Forest
 Assumption that Germans would attack through Belgium, like in WWI, so its
best mobile forces were too far north
 France
o Agreed to armistice with Germany; avoided complete occupation and kept empire
o Officially neutral for rest of war
o Defended neutrality against Britain and US
 French fired on British, US in North Africa
o Could not defend Indochina
 Changing balance of power in Asia
 Britain (afterwards)
o Under threat of bombardment, blockade, and invasion
 Germans attempted to establish air supremacy (and failed), thus they gave up
on wanting to invade
o Germans/Italians threatened Egypt, a vital British connection
o Undermined defense of Asian possessions
 Navy had to return to Europe (Atlantic and Mediterranean)
o Increased dependence on US
 Italy
o Formerly neutral; declared war on France and Britain and unsuccessfuly invade Cote
d’Azur, Greece, and lose to Britain in North Africa
o Tied Britain down in a peripheral theater of operations
 US
o “Near panic” in Washington (Reynolds); massive appropriations for re-armament
o Opened Atlantic trade with Britain to attack
o Alone in deterring Japanese expansion in Asia
 Germany
o Eliminated the only other sig. land army from W. Europe (was France)
o Made one-front war (in the short term) possible – in East
o Vastly expanded the German industrial and material base through conquest
 French industry, agriculture
o Overconfidence because of easy victories at relatively low costs
 Japan
o Undermined deterrence in SE Asia
o German invasion of USSR mitigates Russian threat in North
o Threatened Australia, India, limiting British ability to draw on its Empire to fight
Germany
o Brought US into more active Pacific role
o NB: No direct fighting between Japan, USSR until very end
 Had France held on…?
o Italy and Japan stay out?
o Britain, France can mobilize empires for war in Europe?
o US involvement remains economic?
o Threat of USSR forces Germany to agree to drawn peace

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o NB: It didn’t “have to be” a global war.

 Balance of Power? (As a consequence of WWII)
o Deterrence Failure: states’ attempts to balance did not deter Germany or Japan from
launching an expansionist war
o Successful Balancing
 Britain, the US, and the USSR prevent German hegemony in W. Eurasia
 US prevents Japanese hegemony in E. Eurasia
o Endogenous systemic instability: shift from multi-polarity to bipolarity
 A consequence of the war
 Germany, Japan lose “great power” status; Britain and France lose in a relative
sense; Italy goes from debatably not to definitively not
o Soviets technically a buck-passer by declining to help Britain and France balance
Germany
 British pass buck to French at same time (who gets clobbered)
o Given the proclivity to buck pass, balance of power won’t function to create equilibrium

Lecture 5: Unipolarity and American Grand Strategy

 Upload paper to CV2 and bring a hardcopy to class next Wednesday.
 Unipolarity: international system of sovereign states with one great power
o Not an empire: states are formally independent and formally equal, functionally
equivalent
o Not hegemony: most states maintain at least some freedom of action in foreign affairs
 In unipolarity, the lone great power doesn’t necessarily dictate all policy.
 Montiero: What is a great power?
o A great power is a “major power” AND can project power in at least one global region
outside of its own at a level similar to the most powerful state in the system
 Kocher: So, not Russia or China
o Major powers can fight a successful defensive war against the most powerful states in
the system.
 Kocher: So, yes to states with nuclear weapons or can successfully fight
conventional ground war
 Dimensions of American Dominance
o Largest economy (GDP)
 And per capita (of large states)
o Most tech. advanced economy, military
 Military also most-likely combat ready
o Majority of global defense expenditures
o Larger blue-water navy than all other states combined
 “Deep sea”
o Only state w/ global power projection ability
o Global system of military bases
o Global network of political and military allies
o Prospect of nuclear superiority
 Controversial and disputed point
 Could endanger, rather than advance unipolarity
 Dimensions of American non-Dominance
o Ratio between Chinese GDP (today) to ours is greater than the USSR’s peak against ours

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 So they can compete economically

o Alliances of major powers would have greater latent power than the US
o Other states have a survivable nuclear second-strike capability
 Why should other states fear the US?
o Formal guarantees are unenforceable under anarchy.
o Classical realism: Intentions are unknowable and may change rapidly.
o US is systematically unconstrained
 Weaker states may have felt safer under bi- or multipolarity.
 Do they fear the US?
o Evidence of dissatisfaction with US foreign policy? Yes.
 Pre-Iraq (Mexico, Turkey)
 Lack of action in Syria
o Evidence of classic balancing? Mostly no.
 Internal military buildup (a little) or alliance against a threatening, aggressive
state (agreements made are inconsequential)
o Evidence of “soft” balancing? Mostly no.
 Debate over whether or not the definition distinguishes between much
 Generally understood to apply to minor actions
o Evidence of widespread military, political, and economic cooperation with the US? Yes.
 Everywhere
 Why don’t major powers balance?
o Nuclear weapons ensure the survival of major power states.
o Balancing is very costly; payoff is highly uncertain.
o US is relatively accommodating of other states’ economic growth and varied domestic
political systems.
 Meaning of the Nuclear Revolution
o In non-nuclear world, states could only ensure survival through conventional balancing
o Conventional balancing creates security dilemma (one state’s security is another state’s
threat)
o Nuclear weapons ensure survival without creating offensive threats to other states
 Nuclear weapons are deterrents
 Is unipolarity durable?
o If other, powerful states do not compete, then unipolarity will endure
 Monteiro: other states will compete if the unipole attempts to limit their
economic growth or if the unipole disengages
o If growth differentials between the US and other states at the tech. frontier are not too
large, then unipolarity will endure
 Is unipolarity peaceful?
o Great power v. great power? Not by definition
o Great v. major
 Great likely to overwhelm major
 Many major powers have nukes
 No examples in unipolar era
o Major v. major
 Many major powers have nukes
 Great power could get involved
 No examples in unipolar era

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o Great v. minor
 Minor has no nukes
 Minor has no great power allies
 Iraq 91 and 03, Serbia 98; Afghanistan 2001
o Major v minor
 Minor has no nuke
 Great power may not get involved
 Russia v. Georgia (08) and v. Ukraine (14)
o Minor v. minor
 Neither has nukes
 Great, major powers may not get involved
 Motivation of unipole determines likelihood of each of the other kinds of wars
 Grand Strategy
o State’s overall approach to navigating geopolitics
o Ex. Of Mearsheimer’s “offshore balancing”
o Not theory of int’l politics, but may be implication of such a theory
 Offensive realism dictates optimal strategy for different states. Offshore
balancing is the optimal “grand strategy” under offensive realism for insular
great powers.
 US Grand Strategy under Unipolarity
o Less engagement
 Lower defense costs
 Less US involvement in war and other “bad” (torture, complicity in imperialism,
etc.)
 Higher chance of other states going to war
o More engagement
 Higher defense costs
 More US involvement in war and other “bad”
 Lower chance of other states going to war

Lecture 6: Institutions and International Security

 Lectures so far had a realist bias.
 Liberals in IR believe that progress in the international system is possible.
 Institutions: What are they good for?
o Overcoming risk and reaping gains from trade
o Reducing transaction costs
o Governing common-pool resources
 Preventing tragedy of the commons
 Institutions: When are they useful?
o “Positive-sum conflict”
 Situations in which 2+ parties may or may not benefit from interaction of they
can overcome the risk of defection (i.e. cheating) by their counterparts
 Absolute gains: when it’s not “zero sum” (possible for symbiotic benefits)
 Institutions: When are they not useful?
o “Zero-sum conflict”
 Situations in which each party’s gain implies losses by one or more additional
parties to interaction

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 Relative gains
 Institutions and IR: What is at stake?
o Identifying and realizing gains from positive sum conflict
o Political Economy
 Reducing the incentives to cheat in order to increase commerce and preserve
common pool resources at sustainable levels
o International Security
 Preserving peace and stability
 Institutions and Security: The Big Question
o Can the logic of institutions in political economy be extended to the core problems of
security in international politics?
 Rationalist Theory of Institutions: The Prisoner’s Dilemma
o Institutions as the “equilibria” of strategic games
 Stable patterns of interaction
 Strategy profiles from which no actor has an independent incentive to deviate
 When is cooperation possible? (“Folk Theorems”)
o Cooperation is possible if the payoff from defecting (once) is less than the discounted
sum of the payoffs from indefinitely repeated cooperation
 If long-term benefits are more valuable than a one-time “rip-off”, then
cooperation will persist.
o Examples of cooperative strategies
 “Grim trigger” (socially suboptimal)
 Start by trusting. If they ever cheat you, end the relationship.
 “Tit-for-tat” (socially optimal)
 More forgiving: Start by trusting. If they ever cheat you, trade rounds of
cheating.
 What are institutions?
o Institutions are stable rules that specify cooperative “strategies” in prisoner’s dilemma-
like interactions
o May be formal (clearly specified relations) or informal
 Formal: WTO
 Informal: G-20
 Is security like commerce? Can security institutions work?
o Yes.
 Security competition and especially war are risky and potentially costly
ventures.
 Agreements short of war may be mutually beneficial.
 Agreements are vulnerable to cheating, and institutions can help eliminate
cheating.
o No. (Some Mearsheimer critiques)
 “Sucker payoff” in security may be “state death”.
 States are concerned with relative, not just absolute, gains. (All states can’t
collectively get more powerful at the same time, but all can get richer.)
 Concerns about relative gains are inherently zero-sum in nature.
 Even commerce among states can be zero-sum in nature.
 Institutions, Security, and Ikenberry: Empirical Problem

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o USSR released its satellites in central and eastern Europe and permitted unification of
Germany
 Belief that the USSR “gave” up in the security competition and perpetuated
collapse
o Industrialized democracies did not balance against the US
o US pursued new, or expanded existing, institutions.
 Rather than ignoring its former commitments when the USSR was a threat
 Institutions, Security, and Ikenberry: Theoretical Problem
o How can dominant states be bound by institutions?
o Reformulation: Why do powerful states want to be bound by institutions?
o How can other powerful states feel secure against domination or abandonment?
 Institutions, Security, and Ikenberry: Concession to Realism
o Security institutions reflect the balance of power, rather than determining it (at least
initially).
o Why? Because dominant states use their power to set the basic terms of cooperation
after victory
o Q: Can institutions outlive the superpower’s dominance?
 Not answered (or attempted) by Ikenberry
 Institutions, Security, and Ikenberry: Divergence from Realism
o Institutions do have independent causal power over international security.
o Institutions permit dominant states to maintain their dominance longer, at lower cost,
and with less resistance from other states.
 Institutions, Security, and Ikenberry: Divergence from Neoliberal Institutionalism
o P. 17 of After Victory
o Traditional neoliberal institutionalism misses the deep entrenchment of American
power post-WWII
 Institutions, Security, and Ikenberry: Deep, meta-theoretical divergence
o Int’l system not necessarily characterized by anarchy
o “Int’l order” takes 3 forms
 Balance of power
 Hegemonic: informal empire dictating to rest of world
 Constitutional: doesn’t exist for most IR theorists
o Organizing principles are, respectively
 Anarchy, hierarchy, and rule of law
 Institutions, Security, and Ikenberry: What is constitutionalism?
o Shared agreement over basic principles
o Limits on the exercise of power
o Path dependency or “entrenchment” of principles
 Difficult to change, on purpose
o NB: But not all constitutions are written and highly specified
 Institutions, Security, and Ikenberry: Logic of constitutionalism
o Reduce the implications of winning in domestic and international politics
 Rules with commitment, legitimacy, and understood consent
o Domestic politics: counter-majoritarian institutions (limit ability of majority to change)
 “Pacted” democracies: quotas, rotating authority, etc.

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o International politics: states bind themselves to one another via institutions—sets of

rules and procedures that all see as mandatory and legitimate; in return, cost is reduced
and longevity is extended
 Institutions, Security, and Ikenberry: Why do states follow the rules?
o States follow the rules for the same reasons that political parties in domestic politics
follow the rules.
 Following the rules is better for them because they expect everyone else to
follow the rules.
o System is both stable and highly contingent
o Can it survive dramatic changes in the balance of power?

Lecture 7: The First World War

 Why study WWI?
o Explaining it has been a central focus on work on the causes of war
o Brought to a close the longest period w/o general war in Europe (1815-1914)
 Similar to some people’s opinions about the current period (no major war for a
long time)
o Futility of war
 Length, massive casualties
 Front lines barely moved
 Unresolved “problem of Germany”
o Triviality of crisis that brought on war compared w/ magnitude of its consequences
 The Great War: Consequences
o Breakup of Ottoman, Austro-Hungarian Empires
o Fall of German, Russian monarchies
o Birth of new states
 Austria, Hungary, Poland, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Turkey, etc.
o Rise of US to great power status
 The Great War: Casualties
o 4 of 9 involved nations had more than 1 million lethal casualties
o 8 of 9 had at least 100,000 lethal casualties
 The July Crisis: June 28 – August 4
o Assassination of Franz Ferdinand (heir to Austro-Hungarian throne) by Serbian
nationalist (June 28)
 Serbia had expansionist aims
o A-H seeks and receives German assurances (July 5)
 A-H was weak and sought strong help
 German “blank check” to Austria-Hungary
o A-H note w/ 10 demands delivered to Serbia (July 24)
 Included A-H led investigation into assassination
o Serbia rejects some A-H demands (July 26)
o A-H declares war on Serbia (July 28)
 A-H fires on Belgrade
o Full Russian mobilization (July 30)
 Protecting Serbia
o Germany mobilizes, declares war on Russia (August 1), France (August 3), Belgium
(August 4)

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 Belgians were neutral but Germany wanted to invade France via Belgium
o Great Britain declares war on Germany (August 4)
 Puzzles
o Why did Germany and Austria-Hungary accept a two-front war against such a powerful
coalition?
o Why did Russia back Serbia at risk of having to fight Germany?
o Why did A-H decide not to continue diplomacy w/ Serbia?
o Why did all major powers anticipate short war?
 More a debate over historiography
o Given the technology and doctrine of time, why did states pursue offensive strategies at
the outset of the war (esp. given the difficulty of stepping back from the brink once war
was declared)?
 Causes of WWI: General Interpretations
o Germany wanted the war and gave other powers no choice but to fight.
 Mearsheimer and others
o The war was a mistake; none of the states wanted or expected the war.
 Majority view, including Prof. Kocher
 Political Regimes
o Common framing of the war in France, Britain, US as a war “to make the world safe for
democracy” (Pres. Woodrow Wilson)
o Russia, A-H, Germany, Britain, Italy, and the Ottoman Empire were monarchies.
o Only France and the US were republics.
o All of the combatants had parliaments and civilian governments (even Russia).
o Britain and France were democratic at home, but authoritarian in colonies.
o Civilian/parliamentary control over military and foreign affairs varied greatly among
combatants
 Electoral Franchise among Major Combatants
o No votes for women
o US, Germany, France have universal male suffrage at roughly the same time
o Russia and the Austrian half of A-H have universal male suffrage at the same time
o 40% of British males lacked suffrage at the time of WWI
 WWI as Germany’s Fault: Appeal of the Explanation
o Victors wanted the war to be understood as Germany’s fault.
o Post-Hitler, it was easy to see Germany as a fundamentally expansionist state.
o Austria-Hungary and Germany were the first states to formally declare war.
 WWI as Germany’s Fault: Elements of an Explanation
o Russia was a rising power vis-à-vis Germany
 Russia’s relative growth was quicker than Germany’s (and thus a concern)
 Window of opportunity/preventive war logic: neutralize a threat before it
becomes one
o Relative power gave Germany a shot at escaping encirclement (French in West and
Russia in east) and ensuring its security through continental hegemony
o Entente was not as powerful as it appears to have been
 Russian underdevelopment, lack of British land army, alliance coordination
problems
o July crisis was merely a pretext for launching an expansionist war; also kept Austria-
Hungary onside

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 European Balance of Power (in 1914)

o Germany ~40% of wealth and 2nd most populous
o Russia most populous but least developed
o Triple Entente ~52% wealth and more population
o Central Powers ~48% wealth
 WWI as a Mistake: Appeal of the Interpretation
o War grew out of a highly contingent crisis
 What if the assassin had missed/not been lethal?
o Alliance against Germany was formidable
o War was extraordinarily long and destructive (and predictably so)
o Evidence suggests that most (if not all) of the powers wanted to and expected to deter
their opponents
o (Some) leaders in all the combatant state were undecided, and worked to avoid war,
right to the very last moment
 Elements of Explanation [Background Conditions]
o Disagreements over relative power
 Ger. and A-H faced 2 front war, but had the advantage of internal lines (could
shift between fronts rapidly)
 Ger. land army was best among European states
 British decisive advantage at sea
 British, French extensive trade networks, access to imported capital, natural
resources, food
 Including empires, Entente had much larger population
 Britain had small standing army, no reserve
 Russian army largest but low tech. dev., including a poor rail network
 No one expected Russian or German revolution; no one expected US
involvement; no one sure about Italian involvement
o Security dilemma (German encirclement)
 Germany was encircled by powerful balancing coalition; ambitions for power
and prestige blocked
 German fears understandable, but its attempts to improve its situation were
perceived by the Entente as threatening
 Security dilemma played out in spiraling armaments race
o Mobilization schedules and offensive war plans (“mobilization means war”) – Timetables
and Reserves
 All combatants (except Britain) had conscription armies with large reserve
elements
 Rapid mobilization of the reserves was a key element of war plans
 Mobilization depended on coordination of complex train timetables
 States feared being late to mobilize, as “mobilization means war”
o Alliances (too tight or not tight enough)
 Tight alliances led states to take greater risks.
 A-H defiance of Russ due to Ger blank check
 Russ decision to mobilize due to confidence that France would fight w/
them
 Tight alliances allowed states to get other states into trouble
 Britain’s coastal defense of France

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 Deterrence failure of loose aliances; miscalculation

 Ger could reasonably doubt Brit intention to fight alongside France
 Fear of abandonment leads states to embrace a more aggressive policy than
they otherwise would
 France fears that Russ will become powerful enough that it doesn’t
need to defend them
 Offensive war plans
o Ger, France, Russ all adopted offensive strategies right out of the gate
o Defensive strategies were heavily favored by the technology and military doctrine of the
time
o So what explains cult of offensive?
o Did belief in offense cause pre-emptive mobilization and attack?
 Schlieffen Plan (Germany) and Plan XVII (France)
o Germany was going through Belgium, but didn’t make it all the way to Paris.
o France went right across the border (and got crushed and retreated to respond to
German offensive).
 Austria-Hungary [Key Interests]
o Wanted/needed to punish Serbia
 Regional security arrangements ruined by Balkan Wars
 Sarajevo murders a transformative event with real and symbolic menace
o Wanted to avoid larger war
o Understood that Russia would oppose a war against Serbia
o Expected Ger to deter Russia
 Germany
o Supported A-H bid to punish Serbia
o Expected it could deter Riss from attacking A-H
o Thought that fighting Russia now was pref to fighting them later
o Expected Fr to fight if Russ fought; unsure about Brit
 France
o Wanted to regain territories lost to Ger in 1871
o Not wiling to see Russ fight Ger alone
o Willing to fight Ger only if Russ and Brit fought as well
 Russ
o Expected to deter A-H attack on Serbia
o Willing to fight A-H and Ger if France and Brit would fight as well
o Strategic interest in Bosphorous and Dardanelles (opposed by everyone, particularly the
British)
 Brit
o Important conflicts with Russia (Asia), France (Africa), Ger (naval armaments)
o Feared consequences of Ger victory over France b/c Ger dom of W Europe
o Also feared consequences of Russ vict in Balkans (Russ challenge in E Mediterranean)
 Elements of Explanation
o Ger vital interest of safeguarding A-H (only true ally)
o Preventing defeat of France a vital interest for Russia AND vice versa
o Preventing defeat of France arguable a vital interst for Britain, but outright Russian
victory not good for Britain
o Defending Serbia not a vital interest for Russ

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o Key to understand origins of WWI was figure out why Russ risked war with Ger (a vital
interst) to protect Serb (NOT vital interest)
o Ger had good reason to believe Russ bluffing in commitment to war with AH, also AH
intention to attack Serbia regarded as legit in Ger
o Once Russ decides to fight, war inescapable and attractive for France

Midterm
 18 people got 97 or higher. 2 100s. A is most common grade. Mean score a 77. Median an 80. 97
plus an A. 90 plus an A-. 84 plus a B+. (Half the class B+ or better) 76 plus a B. B- a 68 or higher.
C+ is 62 or more.
 TFs fairly consistent but differed on subtractions for lacking clarity.
 #1 post-WWII; #2 B and C; #3 Britain France Germany Russia Austria-Hungary; #4 Geoffrey
Blainey; #5 [Fire and] Maneuver (2nd part of answer varies); #6 Define balance, band-wagoning,
and buck-passing. (Explanation varies); #7 France; #8 Account of relative power AND equilibrium
among states; #9 Mention repeated play. (Points for explanation varies.); #10 Anarchy, rule-of-
law; #11 Uncertainty about Serbia being a vital interest (?); #12 False, [explain]; #13 No data.
Never happened. Hard to formulate model and test accurately.; #14 Germany, storm troopers,
combined arms integration; #15 State death. Interest in relative gains, in addition to absolute
gains

Lecture 8: The Democratic Peace

the fact of democratic peace
Fact/observation: states with “democratic” regimes have (almost) never gone to war with each other
Political science: canonical definition of war = 1000 battle deaths
Arbitrary – some wars are on the edge
Whether or not a regime is in fact “democratic” also causes some disputes
Democratic states have rarely had serious militarized disputes with each other
Have had them less than authoritarian regimes have had with other authoritarian regimes or
democracies
Militarized dispute – less than 1000 battle deaths
Democratic states have (almost) always been on the same side in the world’s major wars
Democratic states have fought many wars against authoritarian states – more mistrusting of
authoritarian regimes
democratic peace: some caveats
Democratic peace is a fact/observation, not a theory
There is no singular “democratic peace theory”, just a bunch of theories
Based mostly on post-1945 evidence, plus a small number of pre-1945 states
Relatively peaceful period – fits with theory
“democratic” is underspecified
large set of theoretically distinct ideas (includes rule of law, widened franchise, civilian government, etc)
– doesn’t tell you which of these things actually matter
many different way of measuring democracy
Wars are treated as homogenous
WWI would be the same as war with 1001 deaths. Could cause potential problems when equating these
conflicts
the challenge of democratic peace
Democratic states are similar in a great many respects: which are important?
things that are associated with democracy

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things that are components of democracy

Most of democratic peace literature consists of increasingly sophisticated attempts to separate out
which variables/associations are authentic (responsible for causing events) versus just related facts
Is it because the states are democracy-democracy? Rich-poor? Rich-rich? Variables!
Democratic peace appears to be a property of dyads, not monads
Property of PAIRS of states, not individual states
Monad – democracies are more peaceful
Dyad – countries that interact with each other. Democracies are more peaceful against other
democracies. Only a property of two countries interacting of the same type
Theories of the democratic peace must generate additional testable implications
Theory should not consist of “restating phenomenon”
the perpetual peace
Work by Immanuel Kant
Self described it as a “Utopian sketch” of a world of states at peace
Republican governments (not democratic)
Federation of free states (no world government)
Freedom of hospitality (not immigration)
Accountability of leaders assures peace: representative government aligns the interests of
ruler and ruled
Problem of monarchies is that rulers don't suffer consequences of the wars they engage in
Rulers don't listen to subjects – Kant anticipated that republican governments would be more peaceful
because wants of rulers and ruled would be more aligned
Monadic and dyadic implications

 NB: Correlations supporting their non-warring status.

 Normative Theories
o Democracies externalize their internal norms.
o Democracies resolve internal political conflicts without violence (elections, courts, etc.)
o Democratic states expect other democratic states to resolve ext. polit. conflicts w/o war
 Critique of Normative Theories
o Why should states expect the same norms that prevail internally to prevail externally?
 Normal thought with norms is that new context = new norms, not the
assumption that the same ones will fly.
o Explanations that simply restate the observed phenomenon are weak explanations
 It’s not an argument.
 Conventions don’t have some convincing explanations, even if they’re norms.
 “Tautological” relationship
o Democratic states should externalize their norms generally, unless they are threatened
w/ being taken advantage of.
 Why be aggressive to states that don’t threaten you?
 Why have democratic states undermined democratic rule in other states?
 Institutional Theories: Info
o Blainey, Fearon: private information about capabilities of intentions can eliminate
bargaining space between two states
o Democratic regimes are more open, and publicity makes it difficult for them to maintain
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o Therefore, signals sent by democratic regimes are more likely to be deemed credible,
thereby opening a space for negotiated settlements.
 Institutional Theories: Accountability
o Leaders can sometimes be held responsible for wars they fight, especially losing or
costly wars
o Democratic institutions provide a regular mechanism for accountability (elections)
o Therefore, democratic leaders will be more cautious than authoritarian leaders about
leading their states into war.
o Do authoritarian regimes have mechanisms of accountability?
 Revolt
 Party factionalism
o Are authoritarian leaders really less accountable than democratic leaders?
 Probability of removal
 Probability of punishment
 More on Accountability
o Democratic states win most of the wars they fight
o Leaders may be held accountable for war (esp. losing/costly) in any regime type
o Whether or not a leader will be held accountable depends on size of “selectorate” (size
of group choosing leader; whose good will is required to stay in office)
o When selectorate large, public goods (like security) predominate; when selectorate
small, private payoffs predominate [and public neglected]
o Consequently, when selectorate larger, leaders will allocate more resources to winning
war (i.e. they will try harder)
o Regimes with large selectorates will avoid wars with each other (because costs and risks
are likely to be high
 And probably high resource investment
o Regimes with large selectorates will accept (or more likely initiate) wars with small
selectorate regimes because they are likely to win
 Less resources to war

Lecture 9: The Security Dilemma and the Offense/Defense Balance

 Why a dilemma?
o Account for security competition and war in a world of status quo states (defensive
realism)
o War (and other bad intl outcomes) are, in some sense, accidental
o That is, war (and other bad intl outcomes) happen even though nobody wants them to
happen
 The Security Dilemma and the First World War
o Robert Jervis, Cooperation under the security dilemma
 Germany was surrounded by powerful states.
 Even a status quo Germany needed a Schileffen Plan
 The Stag Hunt (stage game)
o More from Jervis
o The stag hunt has two equilibria in pure strategies: upper left and lower right. Even
though both players are better off in the upper-left, neither wants to move there
unilaterally. Lack of cooperation can become self-enforcing.

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 Slight contrast to prisoner’s dilemma, where only defecting is a dominant

strategy
 Theoretical Problems
o Prisoner’s dilemma over-predicts competition/war
o Stag hunt over-predicts cooperation/peace
o Solution: states are uncertain which game they are playing
 The Security Dilemma and Misperception
o Actions taken to ensure one state’s security are misinterpreted by other states as
aggressive
o States’ “types” (status quo v. revisionist) are known only to themselves
o Each state’s defensive behavior provokes other states to further defensive behavior,
producing a “spiral” of misperceived intentions
o Assumptions: offensive and defensive actions can be difficult to distinguish AND
offensive actions came sometimes offer a military advantage
 Offense/Defense Theory (Variables in the Literature)
o Degree of distinguishability of offensive and defensive behavior
o The balance – “…some measure of the relative ease of attacking and taking territory v.
defending territory” (Lieber)
o The perception of the offense-defense balance
 Need not reflect the actual balance
 Offense/Defense Balance (Intuitions)
o “Mobility innovations favor offense, whereas firepower innovations favor defense.”
(Lieber)
 Tanks permit decisive battle through rapid advance; Blitzkrieg (offensive
technology)
 Fortifications cannot be moved from place to place (defensive technology)
 Offense/Defense Balance (WWI)
o Offense/defense theorists code the period of WWI as defense dominant
 Technology (field artillery, machine guns, rifles)
 Outcome of recent wars (American Civil, Russo-Turkish, Russo-Japanese, WWI)
o “Cult of the offensive” – common belief that offense was dominant
o Germans and French adopted offensive strategies
 Schlieffen Plan: outflank French army to the northwest by invading through
Belgium
 Plan XVI: French counter-attack directly to [ ]
 Offense/Defense and WWI (the explanation)
o Stephen Van Evera, The Cult of the Offensive and the Origins of the First World War
 Actors thought they lived in an offense-dominant world because they saw
offense as an advantage
 The Cult of the Offensive (The Problem)
o Jack Snyder: “Military tech should have made the Euro strategic balance in 7/1914 a
model of stability, but off milit strategy defied those tech realities
o Why?
 Civ-milit relations in major powers (Ger, Fra, Russ)
 “The prestige, self-image, and material health [budgets] of military institutions
will prosper if the milit can convince civilians and themselves that wars can be
short, decisive, and socially beneficial.

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 The Cult of the Offensive (The Problems)

o Two diff theories w/ two diff implications
o Falsifiability: symptoms of offensive dominance can be seen both when there is and isn’t
offensive dominance
o Degenerate research program – change the theory when data doesn’t fit
o Generalizability: depends on persistent and systematic deviation from rationality
 Offense/Defense Theory (Critiques)
o Most important case of WWI appears to falsify the theory
o Whether or not a technology is offensive or not depends on how it is employed
o Ontological/epistemic paradox: if we can measure it, then it doesn’t matter; if it doesn’t
matter, we can’t measure it
 Offense/Defense Theory (Ontological/Epistemic Dilemma)
o Assume we live in world where off and def tech can be easily distinguished, then states
can easily signal benign intentions, even if off is relatively dominant
 Def dominant world: very peaceful
 Off dom world: peaceful if states are status quo
o Assume we live in world where off and def can’t be easily distinguished, then we cannot
know the off/def balance, either contemporaneously or retrospectively.

Lecture 10: The Bargaining Model of War

 Standard framework for thinking about the causes of war since the 1990s
 Is a rationalist theory of war; not necessarily correct
 Presented as analogous to lawsuits
 Other Theories of War
o Anarchy: states will sometimes go to war b/c they can
o Polarity: wars more likely under some global divisions of power
o Regime type: some types of states or state dyads are more war prone than others
o Offense/defense balance: states more likely to go to war when int’l system is offense
dominant or when offensive and defensive technologies are less distinguishable
 War as a Rare Event
o Wars are rare events in general and even under bad structural conditions
o A good theory should explain how the same structural conditions are consistent w/ both
peace and war
o A good theory should help us explain the timing of war
o A good theory should help to explain why a state would intentionally choose war over
peace
 Von Clausewitz: War as the continuation of politics by other means
o Plausible state preference ordering (Blainey)
 Achieve aims by peaceful means
 Achieve part of aims by peaceful means
 Achieve aims by forceful action not itself war but creates risk of war
 Achieve aims by short, small-scale war
 Achieve aims by long, large-scale war
 Sacrifice some aims by peaceful methods
 Achieve nothing by war
 Sacrifice most aims by peaceful methods
 Sacrifice most aims by war

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 Politics as Bargaining
o War is an instrument of politics: (assumed that) states want war strictly as a means to
get something else, not for its own sake
o All states prefer war to some alternatives
o States choose war when bargaining fails, such as when they like the outcome of
bargaining worse than the costs and risks of war
 The War Puzzle (Fearon/Blainey – Kocher believes this is where they are consistent)
o War is costly, risky
 May be lost
 May be protracted, bloody
 Short, successful wars imply dead-weight costs (depreciation, destruction, etc.)
o Most issues are divisible and negotiable (territory, money, etc.)
o Why don’t states reach ex ante [pre-war] bargains that would eliminate risk and dead-
weight costs? (Why don’t states internalize the expected costs of war?)
 “I take $69, you take $31.”
 Caveats
o Bargaining is preferable to war if states are risk neutral or risk averse
 If risk neutral or risk averse, there is a bargain that exists that would be
accepted over war
o Prefer $50 with probability 1 to $100 with probability .5? (risk averse)
o Prefer $100 with probability .5 to $50 with probability 1? (risk acceptant)
o No preference? (Risk neutral)
o Depends on the assumption that goods are divisible
 Or is the issue “commitment”?
 Solutions I (Blainey)
o Disagreements over capabilities: war occurs b/c states disagree about relative power
 Biases, complexity, private info
o Disagreements over resolve: war occurs when states don’t know how willing other
states are to fight
 Pushing states right up to their “reservation value” (i.e. the worst possible deal
they prefer to war)
 Solutions II (Fearon)
o Private info + incentives to misrepresent
 “While states have an incentive to avoid the costs of war, they also wish to
obtain a favorable resolution of the issue. This latter desire can give them an
incentive to exaggerate their true willingness or capability to fight.” (Fearon)
o Commitment problems
 Both parties to the negotiation know that at least one of them will prefer to
renege [in the future] on a commitment they would like to make today.
o Also issue indivisibility and non-unitary actors (internal cleavages within states)
 Possibilities Kocher won’t go in depth about
 Types of Commitment Problems
o Preemptive war
 “Gunslinger” analogy
 Other side WILL attack you, but you just go first
 So you can’t commit, out of fear
o Preventive war

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 Declining power vs. rising power

 A later attack is expected in a situation that would be worse for the “aggressor-
to-be”
 Fear that a rising power would renege on a promise that prevents war now
 “Illegal” in international law
o “The appeasement logic”
 Objects of negotiation convey future advantages.
 May lead to a preference of fighting now
 What A Commitment Problem Is (and Is Not)
o Not a failure to adhere to a previously agreed bargain
o Not a generalized “inability to commit” to things
o An unwillingness to commit at t0 to a policy that will become unattractive at t 1
 Rationality and War (A Critique)
o Dismissive of Blainey
o “Under a strict but standard def of rationality… if two rational agents have the same info
about an uncertain event, they should have the same beliefs about its likely outcome.”
(Fearon)
o Normative Critique 1: Should we prefer theories that assume rational agents over those
assuming non-rational agents?
o Norm Critique 2: Should we assume that historical rational agents agreed to relative
power and resolve when we currently have no generally accepted theory?
o Empirical Critique: Do people/states actually form identical beliefs about the probability
of uncertain events?
 Preventive War Again
o “Power transition” classic realist recipe for war
o Declining power launches a preventive war to check the otherwise inevitable rise of a
rival
o According to Fearon, power transitions create commitment problems.
 Preventive War and Deterrence (Debs and Monteiro)
o Power transitions are particularly dangerous when they are large and rapid.
o Power transitions may be exogenous (economic growth) or endogenous (military
buildup).
o Large and rapid power shifts are almost always endogenous.
 Conscious decisions to militarize
o Endogenous power shifts should be deterrable.
o Investments in military equipment pay off with a delay.
o If the declining power attacks during the buildup, it will have an advantage.
o Therefore, rising powers have incentives to conceal their military investments, creating
uncertainty.
o Danger exists when a state is investing heavily AND when it is not (but it is believed to
be)
o Nuclear proliferation (and other WMD) is a particularly dangerous type of power
transition
 The Bargaining Model (General Problems)
o Does not generalize to multiplayer games
o Does not generalize to non-unitary actors
o Assumes that the steps of “the game” are anticipated correctly

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o Assumes that actors know their own “types” perfectly

Lecture 11: Military Occupation

 Logistics
o Paper now due April 20
o We are at the point in the course where we shift from inter-state security to asymmetric
conflict.
 Military Occupation
o According to Hague Conventions of 1907 [included some aspects of customary
international law]: “Territory considered occupied when actually placed under authority
of hostile army. The occupation extends only to territory where such authority has been
established and can be exercise
 No formal transfer of sovereignty implied
 May be recognized by defeated state (i.e. France in WWII) or not
 Legally temporary but indefinite status (until peace)
 Antecedents to Occupation
o Systemic Wars
 Napoleonic
 WWII (between 20 and 25%)
 Both combine for a large share of ALL military occupations from the late 18 th C.
to the present.
 Fewer occupations in WWI
o Weak or unstable countries
 Sovereign debt enforcement (i.e. 19th C. Mexico occupied by US, other European
nations)
 Anti- piracy/slavery/genocide actions (i.e. Vietnam invades Cambodia in the
1970s)
 Local stability operations
 UN Peace-Keeping Operations
o Minor/dyadic wars
 Either not major powers OR only between two countries
 “Success” or “Failure” of Military Occupations
o Incidence of Rebellion/Renewed Hostilities
o Outcome of Rebellion/Renewed Hostilities
o Duration of occupation
o Stability/longevity of post-occupation regime
 Resistance to Occupation
o Incomplete occupations – ongoing conventional war
 Part of, but not the entire state
 Prussia in France (1871); Germany in USSR (1941-44)
o Irregular war (insurgency, terrorism)
 Occupational Hazards (Edelstein)
o Problem [set up by book, article]: why did the post-WWII allied occupations of Germany
and Japan succeed while most occupations fail?
 Occupations usually fail due to nationalism.
 Germany and Japan were different because of the Soviet threat; their elites
bought into the allied occupation by “balancing” against the USSR.

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 German Occupation of France (1940-44)

o Battle of France (May – June 1940)
 Total defeat of French land army
o French cabinet chose Marshal Philippe Petain as crisis Prime Minister
 Dashing, good-looking, popular, noble, patriotic WWI hero
o Petain sought immediate armistice w/ Germany
 Armistice Terms
o Germans occupied approx. 60% of metropolitan France, not south or southeast
 Vichy Zone is where French government continued
o France kept navy, colonies, small army
o Immediate cessation of hostilities
o Germany gets French neutrality, occupation costs, access to French industry, agriculture,
and eventually labor.
 French Domestic Politics
o Parliament dissolves self, abrogates constitution of 3 rd Republic, and put absolute power
in Petain
o Petain formed right-wing govt. of military officers and “notables”
o Petain initiated “National Revolution”, marginalizing and persecuting the left
 Firings, law changes, trials
 Collaboration [endemic and extensive in France]
o Defended own neutrality against British and Americans
 At one point seriously considered re-entering the war on the side of Axis powers
(but were not engaged by Germans)
o Cooperated with Nazi Holocaust policies
o Made major economic contribution to the German war effort
o Cooperated with German suppression of the French Resistance
 Used police, right-wing militias
 French Resistance
o De Gaulle’s “Free France” in London
o French Forces of the Interior (FFI): diverse [in origins], but mostly left-wing
o Very weak until 1943, when Germany started to lose the war
 British and American invasion of North Africa
 German occupation of Vichy
 Service du Travail Obligatoire (STO)
 Nationalism, Collaboration, and Resistance in France
o Was Petain and Vichy Regime as a whole nationalist? Yes
o Did they collaborate willingly, even enthusiastically? Yes and no
 French always asked for something in return, but didn’t always get what they
want
o Were French collaborators fascists, or more generally, pro-German? Mostly no
o Was the French Resistance “more nationalistic” than Vichy? No
o NB: “Natural” enemy of France had been Germany
 Why did the French collaborate?
o Most Frenchmen believed the war was over in 1940 and peace agreement would follow
quickly
o Germany would dominate Western Europe; France had to accommodate in the short-to-
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o Occupation offered the political right a chance at resurrection

 Did the French have options?
o Yes: in 1940, they could have shifted the government to the empire, kept the navy, and
fought on.
o Yes: they could have defected to the allies at any point prior to November 1942
 Lessons of Vichy
o Nationalists collaborate under occupation.
o States “bandwagon” under occupation [according to Kocher, who disagrees with
Edelstein].
 Germany and Japan after WWII, to help US check USSR
o Political factions use occupation authorities to advance their domestic agendas.
o Resistance emerges from domestic political opposition of the collaborators.

Lecture 12: Civil War

 Contemporary Importance
o Long-term decline in frequency of interstate war
o Gradual post-1945 increase in the number of ongoing civil wars, which peaked in the
early 1990s
o Vast majority of all wars are now civil conflicts
 What is it?
o Armed combat above a body count threshold
 Can be aggregate totals; per year totals; etc.
o Within a recognized, sovereign state
o Among parties that were previously under common authority
o Somehow “political”
 Late Republican Rome I
o Aristocrats who led campaigns for redistribution of power and resources in the state
(“political revolutions”)
 Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus (d. 133 BCE)
 Murdered along with 300 supporters in the assembly
 Gaius Sempronius Gracchus (d. 121 BCE)
 Committed suicide to escape arrest; 3000 followers executed after huge
riot
 Lucius Sergius Catalina (d. 62 BCE)
 Conspired to overthrow Republic; organized army outside of Rome; died
fighting against the Consul and Roman Legions
 Late Republican Rome II
o Social War (91-88 BCE)
o Non-citizen Italian cities against Rome
 Sought full Roman citizenship
 ‘Seceded’ and made war against Rome [previously had a contract following
Roman conquest; midway between incorporation and freedom/sovereignty]
o Massive civil war (mobilized hundreds of thousands); concluded w/ defeat of Italians
and the grant of citizenship to the former non-citizen Italians
 Late Republican Rome III
o Series of wars among great commanders (40s and 30s BCE)
 Pompey v. Caesar

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 Conspirators (Brutus, et al.) v. Antony and Octavian

 Antony v. Octavian (Emperor Caesar Augustus)
o Contests for political preeminence among the Roman elite
o Julius Caesar’s fear and ambition overwhelmed Republican institutions
 Economic Agendas
o Civil war is fundamentally about how the economic pie is divided.
 Redistribution/class conflict pitting the elite versus the masses (Boix)
 Redistribution among competing ethnic coalitions (horiz inequalities –
Cederman)
 “Looting”; dominating/taxing illicit economies (Colliier)
 Deciding who gets to be the “stationary bandit”
 Inclusion/Exclusion
o Civil war is fundamentally about defining the boundaries of the political community by
force.
 Anti-colonial wars
 Secessionist wars
o Crucial ambiguity: does identity drive the war or does conflict/war create the identity?
 Examples: Confederate States of America, Taiwan, Eritrea (air-ih-TREE-uh)
 Institutional Equilibrium
o Civil war occurs when competitive elites lack a mechanism for peaceful alternation in
office – i.e. when “democracy” fails (Przeworski)
o If Julius Caesar had re-entered Rome as a private citizen, he would have lost his
immunity from prosecution.
o Examples: Algeria (FIS), Egypt (al-Sisi)
 Conflict v. War
o A theory of conflict cannot be a theory of (civil) war
o Political conflict is ubiquitous and takes many forms
 Institutionalized political competition (elections)
 Contentious politics (protest, non-violent resistance)
 Political violence
o Political violence can take many forms
 Riots, coups, terrorism, civil war
 Civil War Questions
o Why do some have them while others don’t? (Fearon, Laitin)
 Poverty, large populations, already had one
o What causes polarization or a high intensity of polit conflict?
o Why do some conflicts shift from institutionalzed politics to contentious politics or vice
versa?
o Why do some conflicts escalate from non-violence to violence? (Lawrence)
o Why do some violent conflicts turn into wars? (Fearon, Laitin)
o Why are some wars conventional, while others are irregular?
 Civil War and Interstate War: Why do we need different explanations?
o In interstate wars, states and their armies stand ready to fight
o In civil wars, we may need to explain how the rebel army emerges
o Explaining “collective action” is a key problem for civil war scholarship

Paper 2

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 “Creative” applications of theory get a higher grade

o Cross-theoretical comparisons are important
Lecture 13: Insurgency
 As a form of warfare
o Insurgency as violence to control a population
o Both sides try to control same population
 Characteristics
o Large asymmetry of combat power
o Irregular forces on at least one side
o Lack of clearly defined battlefields or front lines (war without fronts)
o Little combat; many civilian victims
o Lack of agreement over the basic terms of conflict
 Insurgency Examples
o Yugoslavia anti-German resistance
o Indochina/Vietnam Viet Minh, Viet Cong
o Algeria FLN
o Turkey PKK, Kurdish rebellion
o Peru Sendero Luminoso
o Afghanistan Taliban
o India Naxalites
 Insurgency (Contexts)
o Resistance to military occupation
o Anti-colonial war
o Secessionist war
o State capture/overthrow war
o “Ethnic” or “ideological” war
o Civil war or interstate war
 Insurgency: Common Patterns of Control
o State controls cities and towns; insurgents control agricultural villages
o State controls modern infrastructure (crossroads, rail depots, power plants, ports,
refineries, factories)
o Insurgents strong in the highlands, state in the lowlands
 Control in Vietnam
o Govt. control positively assoc. w/
 Urbanization
 Settlement size
 Proximity to road, river network
 Low elevation/smooth terrain
 Some religious and ethnic minorities (Catholics, Hoa Hao, “Mantagnards”)
 Insurgency and Popular Support
o Insurgents hide among civilians (the “identification problem”)
o Insurgents often lack reliable supply lines
o Insurgents often establish a “counter-state”
 “Support” v. “Allegiance”
o Theory 1: Allegiance – Insurgents gain popular support because they represent the will
of (some of) the people

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o 2: Coercion – Insurgents gain popular support because they coerce (some of the)
people.
o 3: Fear – Insurgents gain popular support because the people fear the state.
 The Identification Problem
o Types of Insurgents
 Guerillas [organized fighters trying to avoid govt.]
 Clandestine agents
 Local committees [can retaliate with force]
 Supporters
o How do counterinsurgents use force against insurgents w/o affecting weak or coerced
supporters and non-supporters?
 Some of them may want to switch sides if they could.
 The River Network in Vietnam
o Line of connection for communication for governments
o Use of swiftboats in Mekong
 Bombing and Control in Vietnam
o Aerial bombing highly associated w/ insurgent control
o US heavily bombed places controlled by Vietnamese communists
o Earlier-bombed places were more likely to end up in insurgent control.
 The Phoenix Program
o TL;DR US realizes they’re killing too many innocents. We will target assumed insurgents
with a list. Anyone on the list could be arbitrarily captured/detained/killed.
 The people wrongly on the list were easy to get/kill (because they had nothing
to fear). Over the course of the program, even more “innocents” died.
o Was an intelligence collection and sharing system designed to identify and neutralize
communist agents
o Compiled list of about 80,000 named individuals to be captured, killed, turned

4/21 Discussion Section

 Counterinsurgents target and eliminate insurgents.
o Have their own identification problem
o Try to thwart goals of insurgents

Lecture 14: Terrorism

 Toward a definition
o US State Department: Politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant
targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an
audience
 Definition includes many things that are not, and excludes many things that are,
terrorism (according to standard intuition)
 Highly politicized definition privileging state over non-state actors
 Problems
o Noncombatant targets excludes [the following events seen as terrorism]
 IED attacks against US/Iraqi armed forces
 Suicide bombing of US, French barracks (Lebanon 1983)
 Bombing of USS Cole (Yemen 2000)
 Ft. Hood shooting (Texas 2009)

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o Noncombatant targets includes

 Civ war violence (Kalyvas) typical of insurgencies, if committed by govt, non
govt-al, and anti-govt-al forces (Tilly) [even though counterinsurgents do this]
 Aerial bombing, artillery strikes, etc., against civilians
o Politically motivated excludes
 Mafias, drug catels
 So-called “loot seeking” rebel groups (RUF, Sierra Leone)
o Subnational groups or clandestine agents excludes
 States… unless they operate via clandestine agents (sometimes explicitly revised
to non-state actors)
 Lone nutjobs (i.e. Timothy McVeigh)
o “Usually intended to influence an audience”
 Excludes purely expressive violence
 Builds a causal account of violence into the definition
 Terrorism: Intuitions
o Use of threat of lethal violence
o Targets noncombatants or formal combatants not engaged in combat operations
o Relatively indiscriminate [assassinations aren’t understood to be terrorism]
o Surprise attack
o Carried out where state has firm control (i.e. where shifting control is not a realistic
short-term goal)
o The state, not local civilians, are targets of coercion.
 Goodwin’s Typology of Violence (Modified)
o When combatants are the targets, it’s war (conventional or guerilla).
o When individual non-combatants are targeted, it’s insurgency or counterinsurgency.
o Violence targeted at groups/categories
 State perpetrator: state terror/genocide/politicide
 Non-state perpetrator: Revolutionary or oppositional terrorism
 Common Explanations for Terrorism
o Grievance
 Fails to explain type of violence
 Doesn’t explain violence over non-violence
o Weakness
 Why is terrorism better than the alternatives? [Nothing is an alternative.]
 Strong groups use terrorism.
 Most non-state armed groups start out weak [but it’s unclear that groups “start”
with terrorism and shift to something else as they get stronger]
o Terrorism is “cheap” (relative to what?)
o Social distance (counterexamples)
 Goodwin’s Theory
o Terrorism used against groups of civilians thought to be complicit
o Complicit civilians:
 Benefit from malign policies of state/regime
 Are believed to support those policies
 Are believed to be able to influence those policies
 What determines who is understood to be complicit?
o Regime type

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o Political alliances or cooperation

o Perceived degree of popular support for violence against terrorist’s constituency
 Examples
o Israeli Jews are presumed supporters, beneficiares of Israeli govt. policy
o US citizens are presumed supporters, beneficiaries of “anti-Islam” or imperialist policies
o Shi’ite Iraqis are presumed supporters, beneficiaries of Iraqi central govt.
 Rehabilitating other explanations
o Social distance/polarization makes it easier to construct a group as complicit
o Terrorism will be perceived as cheap if the target group is understood to be complicit
(because they will be impossible to win over)
 Territorial and Non-Territorial Conflicts [Strong tendency; not causal or deterministic]
o De la Calle and Sancez Cuenca partition civil conflicts into two sets
 Territorial and non-territorial (dependent on if rebels control territory)
o Territorial conflicts happen in poor countries
o Non-territorial conflicts happen in middle-income countries
o Rich countries have almost no armed conflicts
 What does territory have to do with terrorism?
o Inability to control territory puts limits on armed group tactics
o “Warfare” (targeting combatants) is too difficult, dangerous (w/o it)
o Selective violence (targeting local non-combatants) pays few dividends
o Mass-casualty attacks against civilians are easy to execute, attract a lot of attention,
impose real costs on targets.

Review
 Bargaining Model: see paper 2 notes
 Preventive war: state that you fear has no intention to attack now, but it may come in the future
o Or something contrary to interests will happen
o Forestall what you fear by having war now
 Pre-emptive war:
 Insurgency as a warfare slide
o Same organizations may carry out all four types
 Stag Hunt v. Prisoner’s Dilemma
o Stag hunt has 2 equilibria (cooperate AND defect). Lack of cooperation can become self-
enforcing.
o Prisoner’s dilemma (defecting is the only =)
 It’s a commitment problem

Final
 Professor expects it to take 2 hours maximum (some will be done after 1 hour)
 1st section like midterm taking same amount of time
 2nd section more like an essay
o Explain the logic of X. Not like a paper question
 Last year: answer 2 of 4 for “essay”
 Will be choice regardless

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