Effective but inefficient: understanding the costs of counterterrorism

This article analyses state counterterrorism (CT) policy on two dimensions: its effectiveness and its efficiency. It points out that CT is likely to be effective but inefficient. The material weakness of terrorist groups in relation to their state opponents, and different organisational dilemmas, increases the probability of an effective CT policy. However, states frequently overreact to terrorist attacks, which are valued in normative instead of strategic terms. Hence, they spend more resources on CT than justified by the threat posed by the terrorist groups. The article concludes that CT should be framed as an allocation of scarce resources that could be used in other important contexts.     

Fools Suffer Gladly: The Use of Economic Sanctions in International Crises

A number of recent international situations have raised again questions regarding the usefulness of economic sanctions as an instrument of foreign policy. Sanctions continue to be applied in a variety of contexts, yet we have not developed a sufficient understanding of the processes involved to determine when, or even if, sanctions can "work." While a great deal has been written on the subject, there have been neither attempts to subject the theoretical arguments to empirical testing nor efforts to provide systematic theoretical explanations for the empirical results that have been produced. In this article, we attempt to address this shortcoming in the literature. We propose a theory of sanctions effectiveness that is based on the spatial model of bargaining in international crises and use this theory to derive a number of hypotheses regarding when sanctions should produce favorable policy outcomes. We then subject some of the derived hypotheses to an empirical test based on a large number of international disputes. The model suggests that while sanctions will not work in many cases, they can have a slight effect on the distribution of expected outcomes if the costs of the sanctions are sufficiently high relative to the values at stake. The available evidence appears to support these expectations.     

The Deceptive Simplicity of Teaching Negotiation: Reflections on Thirty Years of the Negotiation Workshop

What is required for effective teaching depends on the goal of the effort, and our criteria for success should be much more demanding than positive ratings from participants. If the goal is to improve participants' effectiveness as negotiators, we need a proven theory and associated skills. In the absence of robust confirming empirical data, which is still mostly lacking, we can take some confidence from qualitative evaluations. But whether or not we have a proven theory, the pedagogical task is complex and challenging, calling for a variety of sophisticated techniques deployed by a skilled instructor committed to joint learning. This article tells the story of some of the instructors' pedagogical learnings in thirty years of teaching the pioneering Negotiation Workshop at Harvard Law School, many of which now have empirical support. It also suggests some areas and tools for more experimentation in future advanced courses.     

Corporate accountability to the poor? Assessing the effectiveness of community-based strategies

This paper investigates how, why, and when community-based strategies are effective in promoting corporate accountability (CA) to the poor. It argues that mainstream approaches to corporate social responsibility (CSR) underestimate the importance of power in the relationship between corporations and the communities in which they invest, which limits their applicability to many developing-country contexts in particular. In addressing this neglect, the article draws on literature on power, accountability, and citizen participation in order to analyse cases where communities have attempted to hold corporations to account for their social and environmental responsibilities. The paper argues that more attention should be paid to a number of state-, corporation-, and community-related factors, which are found to be key to the effectiveness of strategies aimed at enhancing CA to the poor.     

Psychological Barriers to Resolving Intergroup Conflict: An Extensive Review and Consolidation of the Literature

This article reviews over sixty years of research on psychological barriers to intergroup conflict resolution and finds that scholars have identified eighty nominally different barriers that create or exacerbate intergroup conflict. In order to create a tractable list that would be more helpful to future scholars and practitioners, we consolidate this vast literature (e.g., by eliminating substantive and conceptual redundancies) to produce a list of twenty‐six “unique” psychological barriers. We further organize this inventory of barriers with a framework that distinguishes between “cognitive,” “affective,” and “motivated” psychological barriers. To better understand the literature ecosystem of research on psychological barriers, we employ a data visualization tool to illustrate the extent to which each of the twenty‐six unique barriers has been studied conjointly with every other barrier in the articles we reviewed. We then shift our attention to the work of scholars who have attempted, experimentally, to attenuate psychological barriers in negotiation and conflict settings, and identify five primary methods for doing so. Finally, we discuss the implications of our review for future work in this field.     

Some common questions about participatory research: a review of the literature

This article reviews, through reference to the published literature, some key questions about participatory research. When should participatory research be used? How should participatory research be applied? What about quality of science in participatory research? Are there any institutional issues associated with the use of participatory research? And what are the benefits and costs of participatory research? The article is not a comprehensive literature review on participatory research, it is not meant to set standards for participatory research, nor to define what constitutes ‘good’ participatory research, but rather it seeks to summarise the realities of implementing participatory research, as discussed and debated by several published authors, and to provide some useful background for this special issue.     

An effective sanctioning actor? Merging effectiveness and EU actorness criteria to explain evolutions in (in)effective coercion towards Iran

EU sanctions invoked in response to the Iranian nuclear crisis (2006–2016) were long considered to be of limited effectiveness in halting Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Recently, however, sanctions seem to have contributed to a breakthrough in the negotiations over Iran’s nuclear programme. This article aims at explaining this evolution. It, therefore, designs a framework that explains why sanctions (fail to) change targets’ behaviour. Since the sanctions effectiveness literature lacks an integrated framework to explain evolutions in effective coercion, this article merges sanctions effectiveness variables and Bretherton and Vogler’s actorness criteria. Applying the resulting framework to two broad episodes of the Iranian case (2006–2013 and 2013–2016), this article provides a first test of the framework’s added value. It concludes that a full understanding of sanctions effectiveness requires consideration of external, internal, and in-between factors.     

Bolt from the Blue or Avoidable Failure? Revisiting September 11 and the Origins of Strategic Surprise

Drawing on the strategic surprise, warning-response, and foreign policy literature, this article argues that the September 11 terror attacks should be regarded as a strategic surprise and examines a number of key factors that contributed to vulnerability and inhibited vigilance. Three broad explanatory "cuts" derived from the literature—psychological, bureau-organizational, and agenda-political—are deployed to sift through the rapidly expanding empirical record in an effort to shed light on the processes and contextual factors that left the United States vulnerable to the attacks. The article aims to improve our understanding of generic processes and practices that enhance or detract from vulnerability and vigilance.     

The Logic of Coercion in Cyberspace

What are the dynamics of coercion in cyberspace? Can states use cyber means as independent tools of coercion to influence the behavior of adversaries? This article critically assesses traditional coercion theory in light of cyberspace's emergence as a domain in which states use force, or its threat, to achieve political objectives. First, we review the core tenets of coercion theory and identify the requisites of successful coercion: clearly communicated threats; a cost–benefit calculus; credibility; and reassurance. We subsequently explore the extent to which each of these is feasible for or applicable to the cyber domain, highlighting how the dynamics of coercion in cyberspace mimic versus diverge from traditional domains of warfare. We demonstrate that cyber power alone has limited effectiveness as a tool of coercion, although it has significant utility when coupled with other elements of national power. Second, this article assesses the viability and effectiveness of six prominent warfighting strategies in the traditional coercion literature as applied to the cyber domain: attrition, denial, decapitation, intimidation, punishment, and risk. We conclude that, based on the current technological state of the field, states are only likely to achieve desired objectives employing attrition, denial, or decapitation strategies. Our analysis also has unique implications for the conduct of warfare in cyberspace. Perhaps counterintuitively, the obstacles to coercion that our analysis identifies may prompt states to reevaluate norms against targeting civilian infrastructure.     

Modernising the management of British diplomacy: towards a Foreign Office policy on policy-making?

The management of British diplomacy is being modernised in order to meet the challenges of foreign policy-making in a transformational age. Changing patterns of conflict and cooperation and the progressive erosion of hierarchies and their replacement by networking require that diplomacy as an instrument of foreign policy be better integrated with other government actors in order to sustain its relevance and effectiveness. Focusing on the changed role of planning within the United Kingdom Foreign & Commonwealth Office, this article argues that while these reforms have made some progress towards the integration of diplomats, this process has not gone far enough. It also argues that such integration should not be achieved at the expense of the traditional planning function which contributes a vital source of innovation and analysis in the policy-making process.     

Games,Claims, and New Frames: Rethinking the Use of Simulation in Negotiation Education

Negotiation educators have long considered the use of role‐play simulations as an essential classroom teaching method, and have had high expectations regarding their suitability and efficacy for teaching. In this article, we review the literature to examine the degree to which simulations deliver on these perceived benefits, finding that simulations enjoy only limited advantages over other teaching methods. We note three trends that have developed as part of this reevaluation process: improving the way simulations are conducted, deemphasizing the use of simulations as a teaching tool while seeking new methods, and finding paradigm‐changing uses for simulations. With regard to this last trend, we describe our own experiments assigning students to design their own simulations, rather than participate in them as role players. Among other benefits of the design method, we found that designers showed greater improvements in concept learning and motivation than did role players.     

Building indicators to address community sustainability: learning from the Mixteca region,Mexico

This article reports on an indicator model to assess sustainability at the community level that was developed by an interdisciplinary work group. We applied this model in a case study of the Mixteca region in Oaxaca, Mexico, and provided a tool guide to measure the effectiveness of community-based actions. Two innovative aspects are presented: an iterative process with the community to develop a locally appropriate set of indicators drawn from the literature, and a baseline diagnostic assessment of the community’s performance on these indicators. This assessment may serve as a basis for future research and community-driven projects.     

Assessment Procedures for Skills‐Based MBA Courses Adapted from the U.S. Army Reserve Officer Training Corps Leadership Development Program

Measuring student progress toward the achievement of learning outcomes in negotiation skills courses is a difficult task. Measuring the effectiveness of the delivery of course instruction can be equally challenging. This article proposes some answers to these questions: How can student performance in skills such as negotiation, leadership, and teamwork (sometimes referred to as “soft skills”) be effectively measured and accurately evaluated? What standards can be used to determine whether student performance is superior, adequate, or inferior? How can teaching effectiveness be evaluated to determine whether students are receiving the instruction necessary to achieve the course learning objectives? This article describes how the authors collaborated on an adaptation of the assessment processes used in the U.S. Army Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) cadet Leadership Development Program for use in an MBA course on negotiation skills. We report on a pilot effort that has demonstrated that the ROTC‐style leadership assessment process can be successfully adapted for use in a graduate course on negotiation and that it provides useful means for evaluating both individual student performance and overall course effectiveness. While our work involved a negotiation course, we suggest that the process could be adapted for use in other skills‐oriented courses such as leadership.     

Holding the state at bay: understanding media freedoms in Africa

Focused on democratic and hybrid regimes in sub-Saharan Africa, this article explores the factors and conditions that dissuade or restrain governments from clamping down on press freedoms. We suggest that governments might hesitate to interfere with the media for three reasons: they may face excessive political or legal costs for such interference; they might have limited options available to them to curtail media freedoms, and, finally, under some circumstances, governments may obtain a limited payoff from efforts to clamp down on the media. Consistent with anecdotal evidence that motivates some of our hypotheses, our findings suggest that strong media sectors within civil society encourage government respect for media freedoms. We also find that the rule of law is associated with more favourable climates for the media. This likely reflects the protection free media receive from independent judiciaries.     

Too Bad for the Women or Does It Have to Be? Gender and Negotiation Research over the Past Twenty‐Five Years

One overriding question that scholars have addressed over the past twenty‐five years is: are women the same or different from men when it comes to negotiating and what might explain these differences? The inquiry has shifted and has become more nuanced over time, but in its essence the issue of individual difference still dominates much of our thinking and research on the topic. The purpose of this article is to provide a structured overview of this considerable literature on gender and negotiation as it has evolved over the past twenty‐five years. In doing this, the article highlights how the social construction of gender has generally changed the discourse from essentialist concepts of differences between men and women to seeing gender as a more complex and shifting dimension of individual identity that is shaped by the contexts in which negotiation occurs. The second purpose of this article is to consider how recent feminist perspectives on gender, which have shifted from viewing gender as a property of individuals to considering the role of institutionalized social practices that sustain gender differences and inequities, can be incorporated into our understanding of gender relations in negotiation theory, practice, and research.     

Introduction: the accountability function of the courts in new democracies

Much of the literature on ‘democratic consolidation’ has adopted a forward‐looking, future‐oriented perspective. Rather than studying past regimes, it tries to assess the life expectancies of contemporary ’third wave’ democracies. The article contends that authors have usually been unaware of the methodological complexities this choice of time perspective involves. If we want to reach reasonable judgements about the chances of democratic survival in a given country we have to be conscious of the probabilistic nature of such a prospective exercise. And we have to make (and justify) some basic analytical decisions. We have to explain the time horizons we are adopting as well as the future conditions we are assuming. We have to make clear how we construct the binary opposition between ‘consolidated’ and ‘non‐consolidated’ democracies. We have to decide whose expectations of democratic stability we take into account. And we have to cope with conflicting and unstable perceptions. Unless we ‘consolidologists’ heed these methodological ground rules, it is unlikely that we will ever reach shared judgements, or else, intelligible disagreements, about empirical states of democratic consolidation.     

Reevaluating Peacekeeping Effectiveness: Does Gender Neutrality Inhibit Progress?

Since the adoption of UNSCR 1325, more female peacekeepers are participating in peacekeeping missions than ever before. Nevertheless, the current literature on peacekeeping effectiveness is largely gender neutral, discounting the unique role female peacekeepers may play in peacekeeping operations. This article addresses this missing piece in the literature by assessing how female peacekeepers and locals view the role of women in peacekeeping operations. Using interviews and focus groups conducted with peacekeepers in the UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) and original surveys conducted in Liberian communities, it finds that there is an “access gap” that prevents female peacekeepers from fully contributing to the mission’s operations and therefore prevents the peacekeeping mission from reaching its full potential. The findings have broader implications for how to improve peacekeeping missions’ effectiveness moving forward.     

Teaching the New Inequalities: Using the Human Development Report as Class Text

In this article we share our experiences helping students to think critically about global issues by using the data and the conceptual innovations presented by the authors of the United Nations Development Programme's Human Development Report We discuss a number of strategies we have applied to actively engage students in the analysis of the extensive data in the Report and the approaches we have taken to help our students understand both the research and the policy implications of the diverse conceptual frameworks introduced in each annual edition. By using a publication that introduces new concepts, new measures, and new insights in each annual edition, we help our students to see how social scientists work and how knowledge is constructed. At the same time, by requiring them to use the data to analyze, compare, and conceptualize, we show them they can "do" social science and discover for themselves some of the realities of the global community described in the more traditional texts.