The properties of the distance metric in social field theory

The concept of balancing—joining the weaker party in a conflict—is an important part of the realist literature. The concept has a modern counterpart in the literature on extended deterrence that grew up in the nuclear era. But despite the importance of this concept, it has not been subjected to extensive empirical study. In this paper, we show how the realist and extended deterrence literature are linked, and go on to test for the existence of balancing behavior in serious disputes for the 1816–1976 time period. The results indicate that, while there are many disputes in which no joining occurs, when it does happen, the capability balance is likely to shift to favor the initially smaller side, as the balancing literature would predict.     

Theorizing India–US–China strategic triangle

ABSTRACT

In this paper we build on Robert Jervis’ concept of strategic triangles, relations between three states where from the point of view of each state the others are pivotal for its security or foreign policy behavior in a given region. We argue that triangles are important in influencing state behavior in the areas of balance of power, deterrence, arms races and status competition, and consider how these dimensions might interact. In this context, this article examines the US–India–China triangle, while also addressing to a lesser extent how other related triangles interlink with it, taking into account how China’s rise and increasing economic interdependence impact these relations.     

The prince of darkness and the evil empire: Richard Perle,the Soviet Union,and U.S. arms control policy

This paper consists of three parts. First, it investigates the rationality assumption behind much deterrence theorizing and arrives at the conclusion that the rationality assumption is not fully compatible with credible retaliation. Moreover, the requirements of central deterrence and of extended deterrence tend to be incompatible with each other. Since theoretical deliberations call the persisting reliability of deterrence into question, alternatives to deterrence have to be considered. The second part of the paper therefore investigates strategic defense as an improvement over deterrence and a possibly stabilizing element in deterrence. The final part refers to conceivable conflicts of interests between the USA and Western Europe concerning SDI. It is argued that such conflicts of interest either arise from parochial concerns or from overlooking the comparative advantages of free and totalitarian systems in the production of military power.     

Deterrence games and social choice: Asymmetry,aggregation of preferences,and a conjecture about uncertainty

Rational choice principles of mutual deterrence in 2 × 2 games elaborated for Prisoner's Dilemma and for Chicken are generalized to a variety of other, asymmetric games in which players’ preferences satisfy a Condition for Mutual Deterrence. Players’ preferences are taken to be aggregations from the preferences of subsidiary participants. It is shown that, unless all subsidiary actors hold deterrable preferences, the ordering of the player cannot be guaranteed to be deterrable. Uncertainty regarding the preferences of subsidiary actors is conjectured to make it more likely a player will adopt a deterrence strategy, no matter the opponent's preferences in fact.     

Triad of terror: post-START reductions in broader context

Abstract

This paper considers the present condition and future prospects for post-Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (post-START) nuclear arms reductions in the following sequence. First, we review the essential features of the agreement between Obama and Russian President Dmitri Medvedev in July 2009, for a START follow-on agreement. Second, we discuss the larger political and military-strategic contexts within which these post-START negotiations will play out. Third, we perform an analysis to determine whether the START follow-on guidelines would meet prospective requirements for mutual deterrence and, in addition, whether US–Russian reductions could safely go even lower. Fourth, we take a specific look at the estimated impact of defenses on deterrence stability under post-START reductions. Fifth, pertinent conclusions are summarized.     

The conceptual essentials of minimum: explaining Pakistan's rationale of minimum deterrence

Very little is known about Pakistan's nuclear policy and, in particular, about its adoption of minimum deterrence, given the existence of nuclear ambiguity and the absence of public, official documentation of Pakistan's understanding of minimum deterrence. Therefore, despite its innocuousness, ‘minimum’ remains a vague and complex phenomenon short of definitional concreteness when it is brought to a real conceptual test. On the one hand, minimum is regarded as a small number of deterrent forces arguing against expansion and arms competition, while, on the other hand, it is viewed as a relative, and therefore continually evolving, concept depending on the region's fast-changing strategic environment. A conceptual basis for the concept of minimum is explored, leading to the question: why does Pakistan pursue minimum deterrence? It traces out the rationale of Pakistan's minimum deterrence as conceptualized following the 1998 nuclear tests. This rationale of Pakistan's minimum deterrence is then analysed in light of the essentials of minimum deterrence in order to see whether it is consistent with the basics of minimum as conceived here.     

New media and strategic narratives: the Dutch referendum on Ukraine – EU Association Agreement in Ukrainian and Russian Internet blogs

ABSTRACT

This article analyses two confronting narratives authored by Ukrainian and Russian bloggers who reported the Dutch referendum held on 6 March 2016, and discussed Dutch citizens’ referendum vote on the Ukraine–EU Association Agreement. The considered narratives, addressed to the Ukrainian and Russian audiences respectively, are viewed as strategic because they specifically portray political actors of the referendum “drama” – the Netherlands, the European Union (EU), Ukraine and Russia. These actors are significant participants of European international relations, and their perceptions of one another are important for European security at the present time of critical diplomacy. In this paper, information about the DUTCH REFERENDUM obtained from the new media texts is regarded as a narrative-based political concept (NBPC). It is argued that this concept has different versions, or images that reflect the narrators’ biased perceptions imposed upon the public. Identification and comparison of such images require a particular methodology. Therefore, the objective of this paper is two-fold: to expose the two confronting versions of a strategically relevant political image, and to develop an authentic, interdisciplinary methodology for its analysis. The proposed methodology is informed by the ontology theory employed in cognitive science and cognitive linguistics.     

Divided Priorities: Why and When Allies Differ Over Military Intervention

Abstract

Scholars have vigorously debated whether adversaries carefully scrutinize if states have, in the past, demonstrated toughness and whether adversaries base present and future crisis-bargaining behavior on this record. If they do—as a central strain of deterrence theory, and its contemporary defenders, maintain—hard-line policies, including limited military interventions, can bolster deterrence. We know much less about a second audience that is presumably attentive to demonstrations of resolve: allies. A common view, derived from the same logic, and which we call Hawkish Reassurance Theory, suggests that states should support and find reassuring their allies’ faraway military interventions. In contrast, we argue that such interventions call into doubt the intervener’s will and capacity to fulfill its core alliance commitments, undermine the credibility of the alliance, and threaten allies’ security in both the short and long run. Allies thus ultimately oppose powerful partners’ hawkish postures in distant conflicts, and they may even consequently explore routes to security beyond the alliance. To assess this argument, we examine the varied stances leading US allies took from the start of the US intervention in Vietnam through its end. Allied behavior was largely consistent with our expectations. We conclude that, if one reason to deploy force is to signal to allies that you will come to their aid when they call, states should not bother.     

The long‐term stability of deterrence

In this article, we construct a model of deterrence that specifically integrates both systemic and decision‐making variables. After contrasting its underlying structure with more standard views of the deterrence relationship, we demonstrate the logical consistency of the power transition model with the expected utility framework. The model we develop combines and extends the insights of each of these two approaches, thereby permitting us to develop a theory of the necessary and sufficient conditions of major power war and conflict initiation. In other words, for the first time, we are able to specify, precisely, the theoretical consequences of variations in power dynamics, evaluations of the status quo, salience, and attitudes toward risk. As theories of the necessary conditions for international conflict, neither the power transition theory nor the expected utility model provide this information. Thus, by combining and then extending these two frameworks, we merely refine propositions implicit in each of them, making them more exact. The resulting structure provides several additional insights into the dynamics of nuclear conflict.     

The effects of uncertainty and sex in a crisis simulation game

We conducted an experimental test of spiraling behavior, sex differences, and uncertainty in a simulated crisis situation. We investigated the relationship between weapons acquisition and the likelihood of engaging in aggressive behavior, such as going to war. The sample included 100 male and female subjects who participated in a crisis simulation in same‐sex dyads; each student was instructed to role play the leader of a country in conflict with another leader over a nearby island replete with newly discovered oil resources. Participants were randomly assigned to stimulus materials that manipulated the certainty of the information they received about their partner's force structure. In four cycles of decision‐making, each participant made procurement decisions, took an action related to the conflict, including decisions about going to war, completed questionnaires on characteristics such as the hostility and trustworthiness of themselves and their opponents, and wrote messages to the other member of the pair. The results of the study demonstrate a strong relationship between weapons acquisition and hostility. In addition, we found large and robust sex differences, showing that men are much more likely than women to acquire weapons and engage in aggressive behavior at every stage. There was no effect of uncertainty on either arms procurement or aggression.     

Territory and Commitment: The Concert of Europe as Self-Enforcing Equilibrium

The pattern of cooperative behavior seen in the Concert of Europe during the first half of the nineteenth century resulted from a commitment to uphold the settlement, which hinged on the credibility of enforcement threats and a distribution of benefits commensurate with military capabilities. The equilibrium was self-enforcing because the powers that could oppose an alteration of the system had incentives to do so, and the powers that could upset it did not have incentives to do so. This behavior is markedly different from eighteenth-century practices, although no change in state preferences is necessary to explain the change in behavior.     

The intermediate nuclear force missiles: An analysis of coupling and reassurance

The main official purposes for installing American intermediate nuclear force (INF) missiles in Europe were to deter a Warsaw Pact invasion by linking a European war to a global one, and to show NATO's cohesion and resolve. These two rationales are investigated using two game‐theoretical models. The analysis of coupling, which involves partially credible threats, indicates that the optimal level of INF is positive, but is impossible to calculate in practice, and that a deployment of the wrong size may lessen deterrence. The second notion, showing resolve, has a coherent justification that fits various details of the episode, but implies the politcally unacceptable conclusion that INF is nothing more than a public destruction of NATO's resources.     

Fusing the international system: Notes on regional and global integration processes

The relationship between regional integration and global integration is rarely attempted by scholars perhaps because the former appears to have had little impact upon the latter. Those who do examine the theoretical aspects of the relationship are inclined to argue that regional integration is dysfunctional for global integration because it may lead to interregional conflict. There is also the argument that the more unified regions become the more likely will there arise a lack of interest in global collaboration. On the other hand it is possible that in the next twenty‐five to fifty years an array of regionally unified blocs could function cooperatively on the basis of a system of regional coexistence supported by inter‐regional nuclear deterrence. This may not promote global integration but it could contribute to a semblance of order in a future global system.     

EU External Action,Intention and Explanation

ABSTRACT

“Unintended consequences” is an umbrella concept. It comprises phenomena that differ in crucial respects and consequently, without refinement, it remains a rather blunt instrument for policy analysis. The contributions in this volume, however, show that disentangling unintended consequences by making clear distinctions between various types, makes the concept much more useful for policy analysis. Assessing the impact of EU foreign policies as studied in this volume, we show that “bonuses”, “windfalls”, “accidents”, and “trade-offs” – all unintended – are very different when it comes to the explanation of policy outcomes, or to allocating responsibility for them.     

Differing member state approaches to the development of the EU Battlegroup Concept: implications for CSDP

Abstract

This article will analyse the challenges facing the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) through an evaluation of the impact that differing member state strategic cultures have on the EU Battlegroup Concept, highlighted through the examples of Germany and Poland. The concept was initiated to give the EU an increased rapid reaction capacity. However, as emphasised through the cases of Germany and Poland, divergences in EU member states' strategic cultures remain, including when, where and how force is used. When this is combined with the cost of plugging military capabilities' gaps, the political willingness to deploy a Battlegroup can be affected. Whilst the article highlights that the role that member states want to play within CSDP as well as international expectations can override constraining factors, the Battlegroups rely on a rotation system. As some member states are more willing to deploy the Battlegroups than others, the concept risks becoming a declaratory policy thus undermining CSDP.     

Restoring Deterrence

While the strategy of deterrence has faced considerable criticism since September 11, it needs to be reexamined. This article addresses serious challenges to the deterrence strategy. It also considers the deterrence strategy as it relates to states such as Iraq, North Korea, Iran and others. Ultimately, it argues that deterrence is a security policy offering a way forward for the United States that is not only more effective because more tailored, but is also more moral than its alternatives.     

Citizenship without representation? Blackface,misogyny and parody in Die Antwoord,Lupé Fiasco and Angel Haze

Abstract

This article explores Die Antwoord's blackface politics to question whether the concept of citizenship has any value in a context where marginal artists’ attempts to represent themselves on their own terms are overshadowed by the global reach of corporate entertainment media monopolies, and by the legacy of racism and sexism in the music industry. It analyses the work of Die Antwoord, Lupé Fiasco and Angel Haze to contend that global capital undermines the nation-state's ability to secure its citizens’ economic or cultural interests. Using Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri's concept of Empire, the author argues that corporate globalisation undermines the sovereignty of the nation-state, effectively compromising democratic ideals. The global appeal of Die Antwoord tells us a great deal about the extent to which diverse cultural expressions are marginalised, as well as the extent to which colonial conceptions of race, gender and class endear in public discourse – specifically in light of the continuing appeal of blackface in the mainstream entertainment industry.     

Missile Defenses and Mother Russia: Scarecrow or Showstopper?

Abstract

Missile defenses will neither derail the post-Cold War political relationship between the US and Russia nor repeal the existence of mutual deterrence as between their respective nuclear arsenals. Because politics rules strategy and strategy must pay homage to the realities of physics, missile defenses will emerge into arsenals gradually, if at all. Whether missile defenses exacerbate political tensions, or can be deployed cooperatively by the United States and/or NATO and Russia, is not a technological given, but a political decision point that will require care taking by the current and prospective administrations in Washington and Moscow.     

An alternative to the field theory interpretation of cooperative dyadic behavior

Of major concern herein is the possibility that the purported empirical suport for Model II of field theory is supirous. Model II focuses on only the variation in behavior within dyadic sets and is empirically supported when this behavior is some function of target magnitude. It is shown, however, that other linkage mechanicms also assume the variation in behavior within dyadic sets is a function of target magnitude. Thus, it is logically possible that the empirical patterns interpreted as proof of Model II's validity actually are the product of other general models. Such a general model, which focuses on the behavior best explained by Model II, is advanced and tested using the DON data. This general model is empiricaly supported and is more attractive than Model II because it explains variation not only within dyadic sets, but also across dyadic sets. There is thus serious question as to the degree of empirical support for Model II.