Publications
"Endogenous Preferences, Credible Signaling, and the Security Dilemma: Bridging the Rationalist-Constructivist Divide" (with Brandon Yoder)
- Forthcoming in the American Journal of Political Science
"Arms Sales and Extended Deterrence"
- Forthcoming in The Journal of Politics
"Provocation in International Crisis Bargaining" (with Hyun-Binn Cho and Brandon Yoder)
- Forthcoming in The Journal of Conflict Resolution
"Trust, Cooperation, and the Tradeoffs of Reciprocity"
- (2024) Conflict Management and Peace Science. 41(1): 26-46.
"Votes and Violence: Electoral Vote Share and International Conflict in Democratic States"
- (2021) The British Journal of Politics & International Relations. 23(4): 717-735.
"Signaling under the Security Dilemma: An Experimental Analysis" (with Brandon Yoder)
- (2021) Journal of Conflict Resolution. (65)4: 672-700.
- Supplementary Appendix
- Replication Material: Data Code Codebook
"Balancing or Backscratching? Sino-Russian Cooperation during US Decline"
- (2020) International Politics. 57(5): 918-944.
"Mutual Uncertainty and Credible Reassurance: Experimental Evidence" (with Brandon Yoder)
- (2020) International Interactions. 46(4): 652-668.
- Replication Material: Sender Data Receiver Data Code
"Offsetting Uncertainty: Interstate Reassurance with Two-Sided Incomplete Information" (with Brandon Yoder)
- (2020) American Journal of Political Science. 64(1): 38-51.
"A Question of Costliness: Time Horizons and Interstate Signaling"
- (2019) Journal of Conflict Resolution. 63(8): 1939-1964.
"Useful Ignorance: The Benefits of Uncertainty during Power Shifts"
- (2019) International Interactions. 45(3): 421-446.
"Diversionary Conflict: Demonizing Enemies or Demonstrating Competence?"
- (2017) Conflict Management & Peace Science. 34(4): 337-358.
- Supplementary Empirical Appendix
"Diversity and Diversion: Testing the Effect of Ethnic Composition on Diversionary Conflict"
- (2016) International Studies Quarterly. 60(2): 258-271.
"Decline and Devolution: The Sources of Strategic Military Retrenchment"
- (2015) International Studies Quarterly. 59(3): 490-502.
- Subject of an online symposium in ISQ
"Simulating the Bargaining Model of War"
- (2015) PS: Political Science & Politics. 48(4): 626-629.
"Lame Ducks and Coercive Diplomacy: Do Executive Term Limits Reduce the Effectiveness of Democratic Threats?"
- (2012) Journal of Conflict Resolution. 56(5): 771-798.
- Replication Material
"Decline and Retrenchment: Peril or Promise?"
- (2012) International Security. 36(4): 189-203. (With William Thompson, Paul MacDonald, and Joseph Parent)
Book/Article Reviews
H-Diplo/ISSF Book Review: Robert Lieber (2015) Retreat and its Consequences: American Foreign Policy and the Problem of World Order. Cambridge University Press.
H-Diplo/ISSF Article Review: Sebastian Rosato (2015) "The Inscrutable Intentions of Great Powers." International Security. 39(3): 48-88. (with Brandon Yoder)
Review of Joshua Shifrinson's Rising Titans, Falling Giants: How Great Powers Exploit Power Shifts. (2021) Political Science Quarterly. 136(1): 171-172.
Working Papers & Works in Progress
"Endowments, Prospect Theory, and Signaling: An Experimental Approach"
- Working Paper
Abstract: We use a laboratory experiment to test whether endowment effects impact assessments of intentions. If prospect theory is correct and losses hurt more than gains reward, then actors facing prospective losses might also form more negative beliefs about others’ intentions. We test these expectations with a laboratory experiment. Our experiment used an ultimatum bargaining game with subjects randomly assigned either ``greedy" or ``benign" types, where type affects how players value each marginal unit of the good in dispute. Rationally, initial possession of the good should be inconsequential to both bargaining behavior and the players' beliefs. Our findings strongly suggest, to the contrary, that initial ``endowment" with the good can strongly affect beliefs about type. Endowed players were significantly more likely to believe their counterpart was benign after receiving a generous proposal, but also significantly more likely to perceive their counterpart was greedy after receiving a stingy proposal.
"The Trajectories of Personalization: How do Dictators Concentrate Power?" (with Joan Timoneda and Abel Escriba-Folch)
- Under Review
Abstract: Personalist rule is on the rise today. Many dictators have managed to usurp control of decision-making and political appointments at the expense of their top allies. Yet our knowledge of personalism as a dynamic process remains limited. We provide a novel theory of personalism in dictatorship based on the idea that personalization is a function of the ruling coalition's loyalty. Dictators make personalizing moves aimed at maximizing the loyalty of the ruling coalition while at the same time minimizing the threat of a coup. Somewhat counter-intuitively, we argue that ruling coalition members will accept the dictator's personalization of power despite knowing that they stand to lose out in the long-run. We introduce a game theory model to elucidate this strategic dynamic. Using the disaggregated components of Geddes et al.'s (2018) data for the 1946-2010 period, we find evidence for the most common trajectories of personalism derived from the model.
"Security Dilemmas, Leadership Turnover, and Cheap-Talk Diplomacy" (with Brandon Yoder)
- Working Paper
Abstract: Recent scholarship has combined rationalist and constructivist insights to examine how the prospect of socialization affects the credibility of foreign policy signals and the feasibility of cooperation under anarchy. However, these models have assumed that a state’s current decision makers pay no cost when national preferences change. This is often unrealistic, as one of the main mechanisms underlying such preference shifts is a change in leadership. Building on past work, this paper presents a model of interstate reassurance with endogenous preferences in which actors a) incur a cost for being socialized and b) have the opportunity to send a cheap-talk signal of their type at the outset of the game. The model shows that when the likelihood of preference change is sufficiently high, hostile senders honestly reveal their type on the first move. This makes even costless cooperative signals highly credible, and thus makes reassurance trivially easy. This contradicts a widespread conventional wisdom that the possibility of shifting preferences undermines credible signaling and exacerbates security dilemmas. Our argument helps account for numerous instances in which states have openly revealed revisionist goals, and, conversely, where simple cheap-talk reassurances have been believed, including in US-China relations.
"Decline and Detente: How Power Shifts can Produce Peace"
- Presented at 2018 APSA Conference
Abstract: The conventional wisdom holds that changes in the balance of relative power between states are highly destabilizing events that significantly increase the probability of conflict. This paper challenges this wisdom, demonstrating that under certain conditions bilateral power shifts can actually produce a thaw in tensions between rival states. Specifically, when declining states seek to retrench from commitments abroad, they often pursue a detente with erstwhile rivals in order to induce these adversaries to forgo exploiting the resultant power vacuums. In the short term, these inducements can create a significant thaw in bilateral relations. I illustrate this logic through comparative case studies of American and Soviet periods of decline during the Cold War. American decline surrounding the Vietnam War and Soviet decline in the 1980s both produced massive reductions in Cold War tensions. This directly contradicts the prevailing wisdom on interstate power shifts, highlighting the complex strategic interactions that structure international power shifts.