The Transformative Effects of Military Intervention on Grand Strategy

This chapter develops the first systematic theory—the informational theory of strategic adjustment—to explain why military interventions can be crucibles of grand strategy. It argues that, by prosecuting a military intervention, states glean rich and rare information about adversaries’ capabilities and intentions, as well as their own military power and cost tolerance. The uniquely costly nature of warfighting renders this data particularly credible. Amidst background conditions of intense interstate competition and pervasive uncertainty, states face strong incentives to reassess their grand strategies in light of this new information. This process of grand strategic updating begins with a reassessment of the strategic assumptions directly tested on the battlefield, but it doesn’t end there. Indeed, the grand strategic effects of military interventions are far-reaching because information conveyed via warfighting is widely extrapolated to related strategic assessments.

Contestation before Compliance: History, Politics, and Power in International Humanitarian Law

Despite the common reference to international humanitarian law (IHL) in the discourse and practice of international politics, international relations (IR) scholarship has yet to consistently engage in an analysis of IHL that extends beyond the relatively narrow specifications of its regulative and strategic effects. In this theory note, we argue that this prevailing focus leaves the discipline with an impoverished understanding of IHL and its operation in international politics. We propose that the study of IHL should be expanded through a deeper engagement with the law's historical development, the politics informing its codification and interpretation, and its multiple potential effects beyond compliance. This accomplishes three things. First, it corrects for IR's predominantly ahistorical approach to evaluating both IHL and compliance, revealing the complicated, contested, and productive construction of some of IHL's core legal concepts and rules. Second, our approach illuminates how IR's privileging of civilian targeting requires analytical connection to other rules such as proportionality and military necessity, none of which can be individually assessed and each of which remain open to debate. Third, we provide new resources for analyzing and understanding IHL and its contribution to “world making and world ordering.”

Second Fronts

War colleges often discuss what are termed “peripheral operations.” Unfortunately, it is a poor term because it connotes secondary military operations using expendable or auxiliary forces. Yet, some of these campaigns were major actions employing large numbers of troops and which had major strategic effects. Indeed, such maneuvers were often termed “the British Way of War.” “Second front operations” is a far more useful term to describe assaults occurring outside the main theater using major forces. This chapter discusses four such campaigns—two were successful and two were not. The intent is to address why such operations were launched, and then to draw lessons to guide future strategists.

The Strategic Effects of Trademark Protection

We study the effects of trademark protection on firms’ profits and strategy using the 1996 Federal Trademark Dilution Act, which granted additional legal protection to selected trademarks. We find that the FTDA raised treated firms’ operating profits and was followed by a spike in trademark lawsuits and lower entry and exit in affected product markets. Treated firms reduced R&D spending, produced fewer patents and new products, and recalled a higher number of unsafe products. Our results suggest that stronger trademark protection negatively affected innovation and product quality. (JEL D22, K2, L43, O31, O34, O38) Authors have furnished code/data and an Internet Appendix, which are available on the Oxford University Press Web site next to the link to the final published paper online.

The Effects of Auditor Tenure on Fraud and Its Detection

ABSTRACT We examine the strategic effects of auditor tenure on the auditor's testing strategy and the manager's inclination to commit fraud. Most empirical studies conclude that longer tenure improves audit quality. Proponents of restricting tenure argue that longer tenure impairs auditor independence and a “fresh look” from a new auditor results in higher audit quality. Validating this argument requires testing whether the observed difference in audit quality between a continuing auditor and a change in auditors is less than the theoretically expected difference in audit quality without impairment. Our findings provide the guidance necessary for developing such tests. Our results show that audit risk (the probability that fraud exists and goes undetected) is lower in both periods for the continuing auditor than with a change in auditors. More importantly, we show that across both periods, expected undetected fraud is lower for the continuing auditor than with a change in auditors.