Democratic Political Systems and International Conflict Behavior

9511005 Huth In this project a game-theoretic approach is used to explain: 1) when international disputes over political-security issues will emerge between states; 2) why some international disputes involve high levels of diplomatic and military conflict whereas in other disputes such conflict is absent; 3) when will international disputes be settled by compromise or unilateral concessions? Hypotheses are derived from a game-theoretic model and then systematically tested against historical data on international disputes between 1918-1990 by a series of statistical analyses. The theoretical focus of the project is to examine how democratic political institutions and norms of conflict resolution affect the foreign policy decisions of state leaders. Propositions on the relationship between democracy and foreign policy will be derived from a general model of foreign policy decision making which integrates insights from both realism and recent domestic politics approaches to the study of international relations. ***

9511005 Huth In this project a game-theoretic approach is used to explain: 1) when international disputes over political-security issues will emerge between states; 2) why some international disputes involve high levels of diplomatic and military conflict whereas in other disputes such conflict is absent; 3) when will international disputes be settled by compromise or unilateral concessions? Hypotheses are derived from a game-theoretic model and then systematically tested against historical data on international disputes between 1918-1990 by a series of statistical analyses. The theoretical focus of the project is to examine how democratic political institutions and norms of conflict resolution affect the foreign policy decisions of state leaders. Propositions on the relationship between democracy and foreign policy will be derived from a general model of foreign policy decision making which integrates insights from both realism and recent domestic politics approaches to the study of international relations. ***