Who really protects civilians?

Current debate tends to suggest that the protection of civilians is something ‘done to’ the passive recipients of international largesse. Whether in terms of macro-level interventions of the UN Security Council or micro-level attempts to reduce the negative side-effects of relief action, those in need of protection are rarely seen as key players in their own futures. Although this type of external intervention can be valuable, it fails to take complete account of how people manage to survive the effects of conflicts. This concept of protection seriously underestimates the resourcefulness of people who have no choice, and using it to define protection results in missed opportunities to help communities as they are being forced to adapt to their new realities. Effective humanitarian action will thus not only focus on the actions of those with a responsibility to protect, but will also support and strengthen the rational decisions that people themselves take to try to ensure their own safety in conflict.     

The Rationality of Rational Choice Theory

Rational choice theory has long been criticized, with several recent critiques of applications in political science in general and international relations in particular. In this paper, I seek to clarify discussion about rationality in several ways. I discuss the role of assumptions in theory and the assumption of rationality in rational choice theory. I demonstrate that many critiques of rational choice theory have been misguided , since instrumental rationality-the rationality of rational choice theory-is applicable to a wide variety of social situations, including situations where various psychological, informational, and structural factors claimed to interfere with rational decision-making are present. I also focus on three applications of rational choice theory in international relations that demonstrate ways that rational choice theorists have potentially added to confusion about the rationality assumption and created disillusionment in others about the rational choice enterprise. Finally, I point out that, since rational choice theory is not a single theory, critics' claims about the non-falsifiability of rational choice are immaterial. An understanding of these issues facilitates movement by the international relations community away from argument over the assumption of rationality and on to more productive and integrative theory building.     

Social contention,authoritarian resilience,and political change

This article takes stock of recent advances in the field of comparative authoritarianism. The four books reviewed shed light on the effects of social activism, claim-making and social protests on authoritarian resilience. Taken as a whole, they intervene in the scholarly debates that examine the rise of collective, often contentious action under authoritarian rule. In so doing they account both for how states tolerate or even encourage collective action and the extent to which, in turn, protests by distinct social groups re-shape the political system. As authoritarian institutions, democratic-looking or otherwise, have received considerable attention of late, this article calls for greater attention to the economic and ideational dimensions of authoritarianism and, more generally, a broader research agenda.     

What makes the European identity?

This paper aims to find out the factors that affect the formation of European identity, by which the author means a self-identification of individual citizens of the EU member states with this supranational entity. Following a comprehensive and critical review of the main approaches which try to explain the formation of European identity, i.e. the essentialist, rational choice, functionalist, social–psychological, social-constructivist, and neo-institutionalist approaches, the author establishes his hypothesis: what matter most in the shaping of a European identity are the factors of rational choice and institutional construction. This hypothesis is being examined with statistical analyses on the Eurobarometer Trend File Database, as well as against historical experiences.     

Credibility and Strategy in International Mediation

We study mediation in international conflict as a process of strategic interaction among the two disputants and the (would-be) mediator. We develop a rational model that examines the choice, process, and outcome of mediation. We start with a conflict game of incomplete information played by rational players that examines the conditions under which disputants and would-be mediators would consider mediation a preferred strategy. The mediation game that follows models the mediator's choice of mediation strategy and the possible responses of the disputants offers. Finally, we explore the conditions under which a mediated solution emerges and the conditions under which mediation fails.

The credibility of the mediator—defined as the extent to which disputants believe the mediator's statements, threats, or promises and her ability to deliver the promised agreement—emerges as a key factor that drives the model. Each disputant has an assessment of the mediator's credibility. Broadly speaking, the more credible the mediator is perceived by the disputant, the more accepting the disputant will be of her offers. Yet, the mediator does not know how credible she is in the view of the disputants. This uncertainty affects the mediator's decision to intervene and her choice of strategies. We derive testable propositions from this model and test them on a dataset consisting of mediation efforts in international conflicts over the years 1945–1995. The findings generally support the propositions derived from the model, and we explore the theoretical and empirical implications of these findings.     

Prospect Theory, Rational Choice, and International Relations

A half-decade after the first systematic applications of prospect theory to international relations, scholars continue to debate its potential utility as a theoretical framework. Key questions include the validity of the experimental findings themselves, their relevance for real-world international behavior that involves high-stakes decisions by collective actors in interactive settings, and the conceptual status of prospect theory with respect to rational choice. In this essay I assess theoretical and methodological debates over these issues. I review work in social psychology and experimental economics and conclude that challenges to the external validity of prospect theory-based hypotheses for international behavior are much more serious than challenges to their internal validity. I emphasize the similarities between prospect theory and expected-utility theory, argue that hypotheses regarding loss aversion and the reflection effect are easily subsumed within the latter, and that evidence of framing effects and nonlinear responses to probabilities are more problematic for the theory. I conclude that priorities for future research include the construction of hypotheses on the framing of foreign policy decisions and research designs for testing them; the incorporation of framing, loss aversion, and the reflection effect into theories of collective and interactive decision making; and experimental research that is sensitive to the political and strategic context of foreign policy decision making.     

Making Volunteers: Civic Life after Welfare's End,by Nina Eliasoph

Extant research is not very specific about when the media matter for vote choice. In this study, we test multiple theories about the influences of the media on vote choice in 21 countries. The European Parliamentary (EP) election campaign offers a unique research context to test these influences. We rely on a two-wave panel survey conducted in 21 European Union (EU) member states, asking both vote intentions before the campaign and reported actual votes (among 14,000 voters). We link these data to media content data of campaign coverage between the two waves in these countries (37,000 coded news items). We conclude that media evaluations of the EU affect voting for Eurosceptic parties. On average, the more positive the evaluations of the EU a voter is exposed to, the less likely she or he is to cast a vote for a Eurosceptic party. In addition, our findings indicate that in countries where political parties have markedly different views on EU issues, the more a voter is exposed to framing of the EU in terms of benefits derived from membership in these countries, the less likely she or he is to cast a Eurosceptic vote. This suggests that the outcome of the 2009 EP elections was influenced by how the media covered EU-related news during the campaign.     

Challenging the State: Effect of Minority Discrimination,Economic Globalization,and Political Openness on Domestic Terrorism

Discrimination against minority groups is a robust predictor of domestic terrorism. However, economic and political openness might further facilitate mobilization of such aggrieved sections of a larger population. This study relates economic and political openness to minority discrimination in explaining vulnerability to domestic terrorism. Terrorism is a rational choice when a minority’s deprivation of public good provisions increases, while global economic integration and limited political openness facilitate rebel mobilization. Using data on 172 countries, I find strong support that countries discriminating against minority groups are more likely to experience domestic terrorist attacks when their economic and political systems open up.     

Chinese Choices: A Poliheuristic Analysis of Foreign Policy Crises, 1950–1996

This paper uses the Poliheuristic Theory (PH), developed by Mintz, which incorporates both psychological and rational choice components in a synthesis of these previously isolated approaches, to explain decision making in Chinese foreign policy crises. China is an interesting initial case for this project for two reasons. One is its importance as a permanent member of the UN Security Council and rising superpower. The other is China's reputation as a nearly unique "black box"—an especially challenging case—with regard to decision making in foreign policy crises. Taken from the authoritative compilation of the International Crisis Behavior (ICB) Project, the nine cases (with available data) in which China is a crisis actor span the period from 1950 to 1996. A comparative analysis of Chinese decision making in times of crisis is used to test hypotheses derived from the PH. The hypotheses focus on how decisions are anticipated to occur over two stages. Principal expectations are that the non compensatory rule, which places priority on political considerations, will determine viable alternatives at the first stage, while choices more in line with expected value maximization or lexicographic ordering will characterize the second stage.     

一个综合视角下的国际制度化动力分析

制度化动力是国际制度分析的重要问题之一。制度化动力往往包含理性选择和社会建构两重因素,二者之间存在密切的互动关系。在高级制度化形式下,制度化动力以理性计算为起点吸收社会性因素,转化为战略性社会建构动力并有机结合于国家间社会化进程之中,将制度化从工具性制度化推向建构性制度化,对国家产生根本性影响。     

Maize diversity,poverty, and market access: lessons from Mexico

Crop genetic diversity and poverty are linked: first, resource-poor farmers often maintain genetic diversity; and second, crop diversity, when properly valued by the market, has the potential to alleviate poverty. This article examines this supposition by drawing on three case studies of the intersection of the market with poverty and maize diversity in Mexico. These suggest that the bulk market for maize offers little room for maize landraces (local maize varieties known as criollo maize), in that it does not reward qualitative variation in maize grain and instead presents incentives that make planting ‘improved’ maize germplasm the rational economic choice for small-scale farmers. Meanwhile, attempts to add value to maize landraces via market differentiation have had varying success. Although there is potential for differentiated markets to contribute to successful business models and poverty alleviation, these cases exhibit trade-offs between product consistency, investment of labour and resources, and genetic-diversity conservation.     

Terrorism and the media

The linguistic turn in political science is an important step toward more sophisticated political knowledge. Greater awareness of political language implies attention to words such as reason. Reason is central to modern political discourse because of its historical and cultural importance and because of the contemporary dominance of the rational choice paradigm. Reason the concept therefore justifies closer scrutiny of reason the word. The meaning of reason is constructed as a variable. Standing by itself, reason seems relatively shapeless and empty; dictionary definitions are circular and tautological, although some subtle nuances derive from the network of reason's root words. Most of the variance in the meaning of reason is determined by other words that surround it, with a significant portion of reason's meaning being defined by its context. Anterior meaning shifters, nominal referents, spatiotemporal modifiers, and textual narrative all surround reason and fix it in a large lattice. The meaning of reason in use varies continuously. From this perspective, it becomes clear how reason functions as an important rhetorical trope in political discourse. Its plasticity and flexibility help reason stimulate and evoke variable mental images and responses in different settings and situations, all the more important because these go largely unnoticed. The example of reason of state shows reason's rhetorical power and privilege, its normative dimension, its persuasiveness, and its consequences. Seen in this light, a weak version of reason of state is preferable to a strong one. Pluralistic reason opens new paths for democratic thought and political action.     

Dilemmas of implementation: EU democracy assistance in the Mediterranean

The article shows how and why, after having agreed upon a programme for democracy assistance under the name of European Initiative for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR), the EU fell short of its original objectives in programme implementation. This is demonstrated by close analysis of microprojects in Mediterranean countries. The scope of EU action shrank as priorities for action were defined and projects approved. As a consequence, the EU has promoted democracy less than human rights, in relatively less demanding countries, and without spending all the budgeted money. This article shows how these findings are consistent with important themes in Policy analysis and implementation research, and thus supplements other explanations of EU shortcomings. EU democracy assistance, as represented by the EIDHR, is an ambiguous and contested policy, which also suffers from an institutional setting characterized by a long chain of command. This means that there are opportunities for small decisions to gradually shift the focus and downsize the relevance of the policy initiative. The EU is thus unintentionally undermining its own policy goals, as the large number of actors interpret the EU's best interest (and their own position in relation to it) in various and divergent ways.     

Centralizing Advisory Systems: Presidential Influence and the U.S. Foreign Policy Decision-Making Process

This study is motivated by a simple yet vitally important question for an understanding of U.S. foreign policy. Quite simply, how does a president's choice of management style influence the U.S. foreign policy decision-making process and decision outcomes? Presidents play a critical role in the formulation of U.S. foreign policy; however, the presidential studies literature and foreign policy analysis literature arrive at very different conclusions regarding how presidents influence the policy process and both are often inaccurate. This study develops an Advisory Systems Typology to address how presidents influence the decision-making process. In addressing this question, this study overcomes the deficiencies of both the presidential studies and foreign policy analysis literature. Four different types of decision-making processes are produced by a president's choice of advisory structure and level of centralization. In addition, the study identifies "unstructured solutions" that indicate how the presidential advisers and president choose to resolve policy disagreements, thereby providing an indication of the decision outcome. The identified decision-making processes and their associated decision outcomes are explored using four cases of decision making on security policy drawn from the Nixon (Vietnam War), Carter (Strategic Arms Limitation Talks II), Reagan (Strategic Arms Reduction Talks I), and Clinton (Bosnia conflict) administrations. The case studies are constructed using the method of structured–focused comparisons, whereby a set of theoretically based questions and anticipated observations to those questions are made in order to guide the research and allow for comparison of decision making within and between cases.     

How can European states respond to Russian information warfare? An analytical framework

How can European democratic states respond to Russian information warfare? This article aims to enable and spur systematic research of how democracies can respond to the spread of distorted information as part of information warfare. The article proposes four ideal-type models representing different strategies that democratic governments can employ; blocking, confronting, naturalising and ignoring. Each strategy is illustrated by ways of empirical examples of strategies applied by European states in view of what is regarded as an unwelcome Russian strategic narrative that is spread as part of information warfare. We problematise each strategy and explore reasons for why states choose one strategy over another. We then explore how different strategies might contribute to destabilise or stabilise the security environment and how they resonate with democratic values. Finally, we contribute to theorising on strategic narratives by highlighting that the choice of strategy will influence states in their formation of strategic narratives. We thus further theorising on strategic narratives by highlighting the link between strategies and narratives, thus identifying one central dynamic in how narratives are formed.     

Why Fight?: Examining Self-Interested Versus Communally-Oriented Motivations in Palestinian Resistance and Rebellion

Why do individuals participate in weak-against-strong resistance, terror, or insurgency? Drawing on rational choice theory, many claim that individuals join insurgent organizations for self-interested reasons, seeking status, money, protection, or rewards in the afterlife. Another line of research, largely ethnographic and social-network based, suggests that prospective fighters are driven by social identity—they join out of an allegiance to communal values, norms of reciprocity, and an orientation toward process rather than outcome. This article tests these two lines of argument against each other by directly linking values orientations in a refugee camp to professed willingness to participate in resistance or rebellion in two different contexts. Professed willingness to participate in resistance, and especially in violent rebellion, is positively correlated with communal orientation and negatively correlated with self-enhancement values. The strength of correlation grows—negatively for self-enhancement and positively for communal orientations—as anticipated sacrifice increases. Results are discussed.     

Participatory cooperative research: for the people,by the people,with the people

Participatory research with cooperatives, which are people-owned businesses, would seem a natural option. However, there is little discussion evident in this area, with risks of research instead bypassing the perspective of members. This article discusses two dairy farmer cooperatives in rural Kenya. It looks at how, even where research is directed and controlled by others (e.g. funders), it can still be undertaken with cooperatives in a participatory way. This is essential to preserving values and principles linked to member participation and decision-making, as well as of self-help and self-responsibility. Participatory approaches also provide interesting insights into the way cooperatives operate.     

The Failure of the Indian Federation's Process of Civic Nation Formation

The States Reorganization Act of 1956, which reformed India's state boundaries primarily along linguistic lines, derailed civic nation creation in postindependence India. Thereafter, regional politicians were given a linguistic community with occasional ethnic congruence as their vote bank. This post-1956 political reality incentivized regional identity formation for regional politicians consolidating political power and eroded the influence of the independence era English-educated secular elite. In addition, the 1956 act made it a strategic rational choice for regional political elites not given their own states, to fight for the formation of new states. The hypothesis demonstrated in this article follows: The States Reorganization Act of 1956 made it the rational choice for regional political and intellectual elites to consolidate power based upon linguistic regional identities, making the central independence era goal of an overarching civic nationalism for the Indian federation impossible.     

Scandals,News Coverage,and the 2006 Congressional Elections

In this study, I examine how the local news media covered members of Congress tied to the Jack Abramoff scandal during the 2006 congressional elections. Previous research suggests heavy coverage of any politicians tied to scandals, particularly during the campaign season. Using a multilevel data analysis approach, I show the local news media strategically considered whether to cover members under suspicion of scandal during the election season taking into account race competitiveness and challengers’ actions. Specifically, local newspapers paid the most attention to the Abramoff scandal when the incumbent was in a competitive race and the challenger was actively pushing the scandal.