Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Danielle L. Lupton
Keyword(s):  
International Politics ◽  
International Conflicts ◽  
International Crises ◽  
Past Behavior

This introductory chapter provides an overview of reputation for resolve and why leaders care about their reputations. Leaders worry about their reputations for resolve because they believe certain reputations, such as a reputation for irresolute action, will make them and their states more vulnerable to international threats; but other reputations, such as a reputation for resolute action, will make them and their states more secure. While reputations are perceptions actors hold about each other, resolve is about an actor's determination, “firmness, or steadfastness of purpose.” Reputation for resolve, therefore, is the belief others hold about an actor's willingness to stand firm and face costs, based on that actor's past behavior. Reputations for resolve can help explain when international crises and disputes start, which actors are most likely to face international threats, and who will win international conflicts. The chapter then looks at the debate on how much reputations matter in international politics.

Are You Experienced? US Ambassadors and International Crises, 1946–2014

2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul K MacDonald
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
International Politics ◽  
The United States ◽  
International Crises ◽  
Systematic Analysis ◽  
Militarized Disputes ◽  
Political Appointees ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
The Military ◽  
Sizable Number

Abstract How important are ambassadors in international politics? While a growing body of research stresses the importance of diplomacy in international politics, it remains unclear if individual ambassadors make a significant difference or what attributes make for an effective ambassador. This paper explores these questions through a systematic analysis of 2,730 US ambassadors between 1946 and 2014. The United States is distinctive in that it sends a sizable number of noncareer political appointees to serve as ambassadors. This provides a unique opportunity to examine how an ambassador's experience shapes where they are placed and how they perform. Using various techniques to address selection effects, including matching, I find that the United States is less likely to experience a militarized dispute with a host nation when it is represented by a political ambassador. Moreover, political ambassadors with professional experience in politics or the military, those who are close to the president, and those who are appointed in permissive congressional environments are less likely to experience militarized disputes during their tenure. Individual ambassadors matter, but diplomatic experience alone is not the only attribute that makes for an effective ambassador.

Introduction

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Ian Hurd
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Social Practice ◽  
Good Governance ◽  
World Politics ◽  
International Conflicts ◽  
Legal Forms ◽  
The One ◽  
International Rule

This introductory chapter provides an overview of the politics of the international rule of law. The big debates in world politics today are inseparable from international law. Controversy over what is and is not legal is standard fare in international conflicts, and commitment to rule of law is presumed a marker of good governance. Yet the politics of the international rule of law are not so simple and are rarely investigated directly. This book shows that international law is properly seen not as a set of rules external to and constraining of state power but rather as a social practice in which states and others engage. They put the political power of international law to work in the pursuit of their goals and interests. Indeed, governments use international law to explain and justify their choices. This is both constraining and permissive. On the one hand, states must fit their preferences into legal forms. On the other hand, they are empowered when they can show their choices to be lawful. Thus, international law makes it easier for states to do some things (those that can be presented as lawful) and harder to do others (those that appear to be unlawful). The book then looks at how the concept of international law is used in world politics and to what ends.

Prologue

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Wierzbicki
Keyword(s):  
International Politics ◽  
American Music ◽  
Cultural Environment ◽  
White People ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
Black And White ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
American Society ◽  
The Way

This introductory chapter explains how music is considered less as a phenomenon unto itself than as a manifestation of the conditions under which it emerged or receded. The music under consideration represents a wide range of styles that attracted the attention of a wide range of audiences, which sounds have little in common. What these types of music do have in common is the fact that all of them sprang up in a particular cultural environment: the postwar Fifties. A great many forces—technology; the economy; domestic and international politics; relationships between black and white people, between men and women, between young and old—animated American society during the Fifties. The lenses through which the whole of American music in the Fifties is examined here represent forces whose interconnected dynamics between 1945 and 1963 are linked to the fact that, for America, the war ended the way it did.

Do Democratic Institutions Constrain or Inform? Contrasting Two Institutional Perspectives on Democracy and War

1999 ◽  
Vol 53 (2) ◽  
pp. 233-266 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth A. Schultz
Keyword(s):  
Political Institutions ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Democratic Peace ◽  
Democratic Institutions ◽  
International Crises ◽  
Single Observation ◽  
Domestic Political Institutions ◽  
The Way

How do domestic political institutions affect the way states interact in international crises? In the last decade we have witnessed an explosion of interest in this question, thanks largely to the well-known claim that democratic states do not fight wars with one another. Work on the “democratic peace” has generated a number of theoretical arguments about how practices, values, and institutions associated with democracy might generate distinctive outcomes. Although the level of interest in this topic has focused much-needed attention on the interaction between domestic and international politics, the proliferation of competing explanations for a single observation is not entirely desirable. Progress in this area requires that researchers devise tests not only to support different causal stories but also to discriminate between them.

scholarly journals Threat Perception in International Relations: The Realist and the Liberal Accounts

2013 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 483-509
Author(s):  
Felipe Mendes Sozzi Miguel
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Threat Perception ◽  
International Crises ◽  
Crucial Component

Threat perception, i.e., the perception by one international actor that another actor or a certain behavior or action taken by that actor constitutes a threat to its security, is an important, if not crucial, component of international crises, conflicts, and wars. In this article, I seek to contribute to our understanding of threat perception by examining how two of the major schools of thought in the discipline of International Relations – realism and liberalism – address the issue of threat perception in international politics RESUMOPercepção de ameaça, isto é, a percepção por um ator internacional de que um determinado comportamento ou ação de outro ator constitui ameaça para a sua segurança, é um componente importante, ou mesmo fundamental, de crises internacionais, conflitos e guerras. Neste artigo, procuro contribuir para a compreensão do fenômeno de percepção de ameaça examinando como duas das principais escolas de pensamento da disciplina de Relações Internacionais - realismo e liberalismo - abordam a questão da percepção de ameaça na política internacional.

International crisis in the midst of civil war

2021 ◽  
pp. 004711782110528
Author(s):  
Meirav Mishali-Ram
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Civil Wars ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
International Conflicts ◽  
International Crises ◽  
Interstate Relations ◽  
International Crisis ◽  
International Dispute ◽  
Core Issue ◽  
Using Data

This article examines the nexus between international crises and civil wars. Based on the premise that not all simultaneous civil and international conflicts are related, the study aims to explore the circumstances in which civil wars affect violent escalation in international crises. The study identifies ‘composite’ crises – where the civil war is the core issue of the international dispute – as a unique subset of international crises. These crises are distinguished from ‘unrelated-civil war’ situations, in which the issues in the internal and international conflicts are separate. Using data from the ICB, COW, and UCDP/PRIO datasets, the article tests a dual-conflict argument, positing that interconnected issues and interactions between actors in composite situations inhibit moderate crisis management and aggravate interstate behavior. The findings show that while civil war in composite situations has a negative impact on crisis escalation, unrelated-civil war has an inverse impact on interstate relations in crisis.

1966 Prize Award Essay The Secretary–General and the United Nations’ Function of Peaceful Settlement

1966 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 724-749 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark W. Zacher
Keyword(s):  
United Nations ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Secretary General ◽  
International Conflicts ◽  
Peaceful Settlement ◽  
Prize Award ◽  
Peacekeeping Forces ◽  
The United Nations

During the first twenty years of the United Nations' existence the patterns of its activities changed significantly. One of the most important changes took place in the practices of the Secretary-General. While the most noticeable development was his assumption of the position of executive agent for peacekeeping forces, a less noticeable but equally important one occurred in his activities as an agent of peaceful settlement. The importance of the latter change was that not only did a single official of the United Nations assume new functions and become instrumental in the settlement of a number of international conflicts, but the Organization as a body gained a more influential role in international politics.

Winners or Losers? Democracies in International Crisis, 1918–94

2001 ◽  
Vol 95 (3) ◽  
pp. 633-647 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher F. Gelpi ◽  
Michael Griesdorf
Keyword(s):  
Strong Evidence ◽  
Democratic Peace ◽  
International Conflicts ◽  
International Crises ◽  
International Crisis ◽  
Audience Costs ◽  
Common Interests ◽  
Political Structures ◽  
The Many ◽  
Spurious Result

We attempt to explain when and why democratic states will prevail in international crises. We review several of the prominent theories about democratic political structures and derive hypotheses from each framework about crisis outcomes. These hypotheses are tested against the population of 422 international crises between 1918 and 1994. Our findings provide further evidence that the democratic peace is not a spurious result of common interests. Moreover, we also begin the difficult task of differentiating among the many theories of the democratic peace. In particular, we find strong evidence that democratic political structures are important because of their ability to generate domestic audience costs. Our findings also support the argument that democratic political structures encourage leaders to select international conflicts that they will win.

Introduction

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Policy Advice ◽  
The Other ◽  
International Affairs ◽  
Key Issues ◽  
The Right

This introductory chapter highlights Francesco Guicciardini's perspectives on international politics and foreign policy. Guicciardini frequently engages in the analysis of political situations through pairs of opposing speeches, one in favour and one against any given policy on any given issue. As a whole, they constitute a remarkable collection of debates on war, peace, alliance, and the like — in short, key issues in international affairs. Action takes place in various contexts: different Florentine institutions, the Venetian senate, the French royal council, the papal Curia, and the imperial council. The structure of the debates is always straightforward: the first speaker argues that X is the right policy and Y the wrong one; the second speaker argues the opposite. Thus, each criticises the policy advice of the other, and each supports what the other opposes.

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