Doctoral Dissertation Research in Political Science: Economic Interdependence and Interstate Conflict

基于国际贸易和金融的经济相互依赖对国家冲突行为是否有缓和或加剧的作用--或者根本没有作用？ 最近的研究得出了相互矛盾的推论;研究结果似乎取决于所研究的国家和年份以及所使用的分析技术。 越来越多的政策制定者断言，经济上的相互依赖促进了国家间的和平与合作。 但很少有政策制定者或学者提供理论和经验上的理由。本论文的研究提供了洞察国内和国际条件下，贸易和金融影响冲突。 要研究的主要机制是社会中特定群体的经济成本和收益与其外交政策偏好的联系，以及他们影响国家外交政策选择的能力。本论文研究将：（1）提供一个更完整的概念化和操作化的经济相互依存;（2）构建一个理论连接经济相互依存国家间的冲突（战争、军事化的国家间争端、低层次的冲突行为）通过可检验的因果过程;（3）调查将国际贸易和金融与国家间冲突联系起来的国内经济和政治条件;（4）收集和汇编必要的数据，对来自该理论的假设进行跨国和纵向检验;（5）在控制合理的替代解释的同时，对该理论的表现进行统计分析和实质性评估。

Does economic interdependence based on international trade and finance have pacifying or exacerbating effects on states' conflict behavior - or no effects at all? Recent research yields contradictory inferences; findings seem to depend on the countries and years studied, and the techniques of analysis used. Increasingly, policy makers assert that economic interdependence promotes interstate peace and cooperation. But rarely is a theoretical and empirical justification provided by either policy makers or scholars. This dissertation research provides insight into the domestic and international conditions under which trade and finance affect conflict. The primary mechanism to be studied is the linkage from the economic costs and benefits to particular groups in society to their foreign policy preferences, and their ability to affect states' foreign policy choices. This dissertation research will: (1) provide a more complete conceptualization and operationalization of economic interdependence; (2) construct a theory connecting economic interdependence to interstate conflict (wars, militarized interstate disputes, lower-level forms of conflictual behavior) via a testable, causal process; (3) investigate the domestic economic and political conditions linking international trade and finance to interstate conflict; (4) collect and compile the data necessary to conduct cross-national and longitudinal tests of hypotheses derived from the theory; and (5) statistically analyze and substantively evaluate the performance of the theory while controlling for plausible alternative explanations.