First Law of International Politics

• Security is the scarcest commodity
• Thus, nations build up their military

• They want to keep their jobs
• Never overlook the desire of political leadesr to remain in power at all costs
• If a leader doesn't protect the sate, he/she will be overthrown either externally or internally

• getting to a desired state in the guture
• the past is irrelevant except that it gives you information about how people will act
• may or may not involve changing people's beliefs/actions

Example of Influence

• JFK and Charles de Gaulle of France
• De Gaulle wanted France to have a nuclear weapons program
• Kennedy vehemently opposed, but de Gaulle did it anyways

• power is the essential element that motivates all actions between the states
• autonomy is only surrendered when a state forms a common alliance out of similar needs
• focuses on what goes on inside the state
• leaders are rational

Leaders are rational because:

(2 elements)

• they are able to rate their preference transitively
• they can be individually rational but collectively irrational

1. attitudes
2. experiences of leaders and their influences on their policies
3. how roles shape behavior
4. health
5. how international crises shape attitudes/behavior

• a predisposition to act or believe
• direction
• intensity of beliefs
• salience

• cognitive consistency
• cognitive dissonance
• 7 physiological mechanisms to cope

Response to cognitive dissonance #1:

Act to discredit the source

Response to cognitive dissonance #2:

Search for other Information

Response to cognitive dissonance #3:

Stop Thinking about the Problem

Response to cognitive dissonance #4:

Engage in Wishful Thinking

• conclusions that are more desirable than are warranted by the premises
• many ways are difficult to end because people have too much wishful thinking about their prospects of winning
• ex) the Japanese though the US Naval fleet would be destroyed and that the US would make peace quickly after Pearl Harbor

Response to cognitive dissonance #5:

Reinterpret Information to your Liking

• ex) secretary of state Dulles believed that any signs of compromise on the part of the Soviets was either a trick or a sign of weakness

Response to cognitive dissonance #6:

Differentiation

• attitudes are logic are split
• Ex) Kruschev let reporters go out into Russia freely instead of being constrained; showed that the Soviets were a lot like the US; the Soviets were split into 2 parts- nice commoners and corrupt leaders

Reponse to cognitive dissonance #7:

People change their attitudes

• Anthony Eden: British foreign minister under Chamberlain and Churchill- Prime Minister during the Suez Crisis
• Eden was against Chamberlain's policy of appeasement; resigned and worked in Parliament where he allied with Chruchill against Hitler
• When Nasser wanted tonational the Suez Canal, Eden viewed Nasser like Hitler in that he posed equal security threats to the UK and therefore applied his policies to Nasser

• positions have legal and normative aspects attached to them-
• Roles can be constraining in some ways but may have flexibility
• Dean Rusk was chosen by JFK as Secretary of Def b/c he seemed easy to control; McNamara revolutionized role with "Whiz Kids" to be cost effective

• high threat on something you value
• high personal threat, short time to respond, even is not anticipated
• "Who said what with whom to what effect"- context analysis
• audience effect: people will say different things to different audiences

• Perception of time: thinks more short-term
• Perception of alternatives
• Perceptions of capability: leaders think that their nation does not have capabilities but their enemies do

• communication level increases: people must process increasing amounts of information in a shorter time period
• humans engage in adaptive behavior: "Willy-Nicky Letters"
• ex) ABC diplomat John Scalt was able to give JFK information about Kruschev's intentions
• decision groups get smaller

• Imperialism: analysis of Great Britain
• Imperialism was immoral, net drain on UK's resources, only a minority of people benefitted from it
• "Imperialism developed when there was an oversupply of capital and goods"

• similar ideas with Hobson, but points fingers at all capitalist powers not just the UK
• theorizes that capitalist nations will start competing with each other, which will indefinitely lead to war
• when workers see that they will be the ones paying for wars, they will unite and revolt- failed to sway the nationalist sentiment of people

• Lateral pressure: a state going outside its borders to either increase its resources, reduce population, or increase technology- high capacity states more successful
• every society has a resource base- in order to make use of it they develop technologies

When 2 High Capacity States disagree:

5 options and how to avoid it

1. agree to disagree
2. conflict is decidedly not worth fighting over
3. intermittent crises
4. states X and Y collude
5. states X and Y clash physically
   TRADE SOLVES EVERYTHING

• Perceptual Peace
• found that representative governments were naturally more peaceful than non-representative governments
• citizens feel that their assets are protected and will see the benefits of laws and as a result will want to create international laws so everyone will benefit

• democracies see the benefits of civil society and are less likely to engage in war
• Problem: democratic states are not inherently more peaceful

• Robert Powel, UCB
• democracies are transparent, so that governments are fully informed about what is going on within them
• Problem: we cannot estimate the intentions of a state

Explanation #3 of Democratic Peace

• Siverson's theory
• above all, political leaders want to stay in office- by buying it
• this currency depends on the selectorate and winning coalition

• those who participate in the selection of leaders: S is the continuous variable

• those in the selectorate who actually win the contest and are part of the leader's group; also a continuous variable

• term limits
• if the leader fails to provide the public goods that S and W want, there are constitutional means for removing the leader
• the provision of public goods is crucial to maintaining office
• desire to perform well creates selection effects

• leaders chose wars they think they can win
• democratic states are on the winning side 75% of the time
• when democracies initiate the fight; casualties are much lower and fight harder

• democratic leaders can see what their risks are and know when political competition will occur
• dictatorships act more conservatively initially until they have pooled their power and can act aggressively

1. any dispute at all
2. leader's state is in an attempt to change the status quo
3. leader's state militarizes the dispute
4. violence was used, but no war (<1000 deaths)
5. international war

• states are unitary actors
• Arrow problem does not exist- there are no internal problems
• states are rational
• intenrational system is anarchic
• states will maximize their security as long as those gains do not place their security at risk

• the balance of power; multiple nations are sharing power and none is completely dominant over another
• must be at least 5 nations

Characteristics of a Multipolar system:

• states will act to increase their capabilities but would always rather negotiate than fight
• states will fight rather than fail to increase their capabilities
• states are going to stop fighting rather than eliminate another power

• when one state tries to go over the heads of a nation's leaders and appeal directly to the people on an international issue
• ex) French revolution, Karl Marx

• 2 states are approximately equal and are significantly more powerful than other states in the system; 2 superpowers are primary sources of security to the other states in the system
• 2 opposing alliance blicks

• with rational leaders and the diffusion of nuclear weapons, the world would be a much safer place
• leaders will recognize the price of attacking a state with nuclear weapons and choose not to do so

• most people do not trust that we will have rational leaders
• the US (or whatever superpower) would lose its ability to influence events

• If a state announces their intentions of acquiring nuclear weapons, it probably wants to acquire them to advance its political agenda; the state wants to change the status quo
• State that announce these intentions are likely to seem threatening by other states; thus, the other states will likely attempt to prevent them from acquiring nuclear weapons

• the international system is not anarchic and the security dilemma is vastly overemphasized; largely hierarchical; well organized but visible institutionsof power are lacking
• internation politics as a "committee" for each nation; do not have equal votes- the more resources you have, the more control over the resources you have, the more salient the issue, the more votes you get- on average the median voter will have the most power

• The primary source of this change is population
• As long as decision makers can control resources, population will drive changes in power
• The population must be effective in applying technology to their resources)

1. the states are at equal heights of power
2. one state is creeping ahead of the other