By Land or by Sea
Decision by Design: Leaders, Bureaucracies, and International Crisis Performance
Tyler Jost
International Studies Quarterly, December 2025
Abstract:
When do leaders initiate international crises in which they fail to achieve their goals? I argue that poor crisis performance is more likely when a state’s bureaucracy provides incomplete or inaccurate information to leaders. Two characteristics of a state’s national security institutions -- capacity for information search and interbureaucratic information sharing -- shape the quality of information provision. Leaders are thus less likely to initiate international crises that fail to advance their goals when they sit atop institutions that ease transaction costs of relaying information to leaders and that allow bureaucracies to competitively evaluate each other’s information. To test my argument, I leverage data measuring bureaucratic institutions across the globe from 1946 to 2015. The analysis finds that crisis performance depends on institutional design, suggesting that some leaders are more prone that others to exhibit poor judgment in high-stakes international crises because of institutional constraints on their information. A case study on China’s decision-making prior to the Sino-Vietnamese War illustrates the theory’s mechanisms. Collectively, the theory and findings improve our understanding of how bureaucracy shapes international conflict.
Polls and Precision Strikes: Electoral Origins of High-Tech Warfighting
Kerry Chávez & Andrés Gannon
Presidential Studies Quarterly, December 2025
Abstract:
How do domestic politics influence the conduct of war? Conventional wisdom suggests that politicians select into war and military institutions fight them with some independence. This article argues that domestic political considerations, namely electoral vulnerability, significantly shape how wars are fought. We posit that American presidents facing electoral risks intensify their control over military operations, prioritizing politically safer approaches that afford greater operational oversight, control over optics, and casualty aversion. Insofar as high-tech military platforms, such as drone strikes and precision munitions, minimize the military footprint and can fall directly under executive discretion, we theorize that presidents perceive them as politically safer. Using a new data set capturing the means of force employed in United States military operations from 1989 to 2021, we provide robust evidence that political vulnerability -- measured by presidential disapproval and proximity to elections -- correlates with high-tech warfare. These findings contribute to scholarship on public opinion in foreign policy, democratic warfighting, diversionary theory, civil-military relations, and the politics of emerging technologies, demonstrating that electoral constraints systematically influence the employment of force in ongoing conflicts.
Elite–Public Gaps on Nuclear Weapons: The Roles of Salience and Knowledge
David Logan
International Organization, Summer 2025, Pages 574-597
Abstract:
An explosion of survey experimental research shows that public support for nuclear use is alarmingly high and malleable. Thus, nuclear nonuse may depend on elite restraint. Can elites be counted on to resist nuclear use? How do national security elites think about nuclear weapons, and what does this imply for potential nuclear use and our understanding of public–elite gaps in political behavior? Drawing on the literature on public opinion formation, I argue that two features of public attitudes toward nuclear weapons help explain elite–public gaps on nuclear weapons: low salience and low knowledge. I then test this explanation using parallel preregistered survey experiments assessing support for nuclear use across three samples: the US public before the Ukraine conflict; the US public after the Ukraine conflict began; and a highly elite sample of US military officers and strategists, also after the Ukraine conflict began. While the US public is willing to support nuclear use, US national security elites are significantly more reluctant. Among the public, respondents for whom nuclear weapons are a high-knowledge or high-salience issue behave more like elites: they are less likely to support nuclear use. The findings have important implications for survey experimental research, scholarship on nuclear weapons, public opinion formation, and elite–public gaps in political behavior.
Who Should Fight? Experimental Evidence on Policy Corrections to the Unequal Costs of US Wars
Daniel Goldstein & Drew Stommes
International Studies Quarterly, December 2025
Abstract:
The physical costs of war -- who fights and experiences casualties -- are borne unequally in the USA. However, little is known about how informing individuals about this disparity affects preferences about how to address it. We introduce a framework of “policy corrections” that differentially allocates the costs associated with providing public goods to socioeconomic groups. A formal model then presents competing perspectives, for example, in-group versus altruistic, on how citizens would prefer these policies. A survey experiment tests how informing Americans that low-income communities disproportionately bear the physical costs of US wars affects their support for each policy correction. Our empirical results reveal heightened support for increased military recruitment among the wealthiest half of Americans (a direct correction), but unchanged preferences for increasing taxes on this group (an indirect correction). Textual analysis of open-ended responses suggests that treated respondents’ preferences for policy corrections are motivated by notions of fairness. Our results suggest that war casualties transcend in-group socioeconomic calculus, leading even individuals who benefit from the disparity to support redressing the unequal costs associated with the provision of defense.
Race, Democracy, and Public Support for War
Michael Tomz & Jessica Weeks
American Political Science Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
Studies have found that voters in democratic countries are far more reluctant to use military force against democracies than against nondemocracies. This pattern may help explain why democracies almost never wage war against other democracies. In an important contribution, Rathbun, Parker, and Pomeroy (2025) propose that the apparent democratic peace in public opinion is an artifact of failing to account for race. Rather than democracy itself influencing support for war, they argue, the term “democracy” cues assumptions about the adversary’s racial composition, and those racialized assumptions are the true drivers of support for war. We reevaluate RPP’s evidence, concluding that their data do not support their predictions. In fact, their novel experiments provide powerful evidence that democracy affects support for war, independent of race. Our findings contribute to major debates about both regime type and race in international relations, as well as the design and interpretation of survey experiments.
The Effect of Historical Analogies on Foreign Policy Attitudes
Anil Menon et al.
Security Studies, forthcoming
Abstract:
Existing research points to the potential impact of historical analogies on domestic audiences, but it has not examined the effect of historical analogies on foreign publics. Using speeches by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky after Russia’s February 2022 invasion, we investigated whether evoking salient events from the audience country’s past effectively increased popular support for aiding Ukraine. We conducted survey experiments simultaneously in four countries where Zelensky delivered speeches rich in historical analogies: United Kingdom (WWII), United States (Pearl Harbor and 9/11), Germany and Israel (Holocaust). Exposure to excerpts from Zelensky’s speeches triggered distinctive emotional reactions in all countries consistent with the tailored content. Only in Israel, however, where domestic assistance to Ukraine was perceived as insufficient, did exposure increase support for aiding Ukraine. Our findings suggest that the persuasive potential of historical analogies is limited.
Does Import Substitutability Constrain Foreign Policy? Evidence from UNGA Voting During Russia-Ukraine Conflicts
Eunji Kim, Joohyun Lee & Jong Hee Park
Princeton Working Paper, September 2025
Abstract:
This study examines how economic dependencies constrain foreign policy autonomy by analyzing UN General Assembly voting patterns following Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea and 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Using a novel measure of product-level import substitutability, we decouple genuine economic constraints from underlying factors correlated with UN voting preferences. Our analysis reveals that countries with higher constraint-weighted (i.e., harder-to-replace) import dependence on Russia were significantly more likely to support or abstain on Russia-related votes, with effects intensifying after 2022. Sectoral analysis shows that dependencies on hard-to-substitute products like 'Arms' and 'Cereals' created the strongest diplomatic constraints, while more substitutable 'Mineral Fuels' showed moderate effects despite their economic prominence. The 2022 invasion produced dramatic constraint intensification. These findings demonstrate that product-level substitutability-particularly switching costs and supply concentration-determines when economic ties translate into foreign policy constraints, with arms and specialized agricultural products proving more constraining than energy despite conventional wisdom emphasizing energy leverage.
The Politics of Alliance Cohesion: Experimental Evidence on American Attitudes toward Corrective Measures in Security Partnerships
Osman Sabri Kiratli
Perspectives on Politics, forthcoming
Abstract:
This paper examines American public attitudes toward corrective measures against uncooperative security allies through a preregistered survey experiment on a nationally representative sample of 1,502 American citizens. The findings demonstrate strong public support for corrective measures, particularly coercive strategies such as economic sanctions and military aid reduction, against allies whose policies conflict with the dominant power’s interests. While alliance discord also triggers demands for reduced American contributions to the alliance, public response varies substantially based on the nature of the misalignment and the characteristics of the uncooperative ally. Notably, the ally regime type significantly moderates support for corrective measures, with Americans demonstrating marked reluctance to endorse punitive actions against democratic allies. However, neither the ally’s military capabilities nor the presence of formal treaty arrangements significantly moderates public preferences. These findings contribute to our understanding of alliance management and the domestic foundations of international cooperation while offering insights into the pressures leaders face when addressing alliance noncompliance.
One step forward, two steps back: The dark side of helping initiatives in protracted conflicts
Eli Adler et al.
Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
In asymmetrical, prolonged conflicts, advantaged groups may implement unilateral helping policies to improve disadvantaged groups’ well-being without substantial political compromises or altering the status quo. We investigated how exposure to such helping initiatives affects the advantaged group’s willingness to make actual political concessions for peace. Three hundred fifty-three Jewish Israeli participants were randomly assigned to watch an authentic Israeli helping initiative toward Palestinians before (manipulation) or after (control) completing conflict questionnaires. Results showed that following the manipulation, right-wing participants demonstrated less support for significant political concessions necessary for peace compared to the control group. This effect was mediated by decreased moral emotions and lower expectations for peace. Findings suggest that helping initiatives in an asymmetrical context may strengthen the advantaged group’s moral image while reducing expectations for peace and the willingness to make genuine political compromises essential for sustainable peace. Hence, while seemingly benevolent, such initiatives can hinder peace.
Performative Violence and the Spectacular Debut of the Atomic Bomb
Joshua Byun & Austin Carson
American Political Science Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki reshaped international politics and the field of International Relations. But one question -- “How should the atomic bomb be used?” -- has been largely overlooked in political science. This article recovers American deliberations on alternative nuclear use options before August 1945, including the “noncombat demonstration,” targeting military installations, giving advance warning, and striking more symbolically valuable cities. We develop theoretical insights on the value of staging violent spectacles and the emotive power of visible destruction. We then use a wide range of sources to show that U.S. leaders selected an ostentatiously lethal means of atomic debut due to concerns about conventional military inferiority vis-à-vis the Soviet Union, the desire to instill a widespread view of the bomb’s revolutionary character, and the imperative of shaping the postwar international order. This study advances our understanding of the post-1945 international order and the performative dimensions of political violence.