POLISCI 240 Quizlet

Mercantilism

an economic doctrine based on a belief that military power and economic influence complement each other; applied especially to colonial empires in the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries.

Peace of Westphalia

The settlement that ended the Thirty Years' War in 1648; often said to have created the modern state system because it included a general recognition of the principles of sovereignty and nonintervention.

Sovereignty

the expectation that states have legal and political supremacy - or ultimate authority - within their territorial boundaries.

Hegemony

the predominance of one nation-state over others.

Pax Britannica

"British Peace," a century-long period, beginning with Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo in 1815 and ending with the outbreak of WWI in 1914, during which Britain's economic and diplomatic influence contributed to economic openness and relative peace.

Gold Standard

the monetary system that prevailed between about 1870 and 1914, in which countries tied their currencies to this system at a legally fixed price.

Treaty of Versailles

the peace treaty between the Allies and Germany that formally ended WWI on June 28, 1919.

League of Nations

a collective security organization founded in 1919 after WWI and ended in 1946 and was replaced by the United Nations.

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)

An alliance formed in 1949 among the United States, Canada, and most of the states of Western Europe in response to the threat imposed by the Soviet Union. The alliance requires its members to consider an attack on any one of them is an attack on all.

Bretton Woods System

The economic order negotiated among allied nations, which led to a series of cooperative arrangements involving a commitment to relatively low barriers to international trade and investment.

Warsaw Pact

A military alliance formed in 1955 to bring together the Soviet Union and its Cold War allies in Eastern Europe and elsewhere; dissolved on March 31, 1991, as the Cold War ended.

Decolonization

the process of colonial possessions winning independence, especially during the rapid end of the European empires in Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean between the 1940s and the 1960s.

Interests

what actors want to achieve through political action; their preferences among the possible outcomes that might result from their political choices.

Actors

the basic unit for the analysis of international politics; can either be individuals or groups of people with common interests.

State

a central authority that has the ability to make and enforce laws, rules, and decisions within a specified territory.

Anarchy

the absence of a central authority with the ability to make and enforce laws that bind all actors.

National Interests

interests attributed to the state itself, usually security and power.

Interactions

the ways in which the choices of two or more actors combine to produce political outcomes.

Cooperation

an interaction in which two or more actors adopt policies that make at least one actor better off relative to the status quo without making others worse off.

Bargaining

an interaction in which two or more actors must decide how to distribute something of value.

Distributional Conflict

when each actor seeks a greater share of the good at the expense of the other; however to reach a bargain, both sides must decide that a deal is better than the alternative.

Coordination

a type of cooperative interaction in which actors benefit from all making the same choices and subsequently have no incentive not to comply.

Defecting

to adopt an uncooperative strategy that undermines the collective goal.

Collaboration

a type of cooperative interaction in which actors gain from working together but nonetheless have incentives not to comply with any agreement.

Public Goods

products that are nonexcludable and nonrival in consumption, such as national defense.

Collection Action Problems

obstacles to cooperation that occur when actors have incentives to collaborate but each acts with the expectation that others will pay the costs of cooperation.

Free Ride

to fail to contribute to a public good while benefiting from the contributions of others.

Iteration

repeated interactions with the same partners.

Linkage

cooperation on one issue that leads to interactions on a second issue.

Power

the ability of Actor A to get Actor B to do something that B would otherwise not do; the ability to get the other to make concessions and to avoid having to make concessions oneself.

Coercion

a strategy of imposing or threatening to impose costs on other actors in order to induce a change in behavior.

Outside Options

the alternatives to bargaining with a specific actor.

Agenda Setting

actions taken before or during bargaining that make the reversion outcome more favorable for one party.

Institutions

a set of rules (known and shared by the relevant community) that structure interactions in specific ways.

War

an event involving the organized use of military force by at least two parties that reaches a minimum threshold of severity.

Interstate War

a war in which the main participants are states.

Civil War

a war in which the main participants are within the same state, such as the government and rebel groups.

Security Dilemma

a situation that arises when efforts that states make to defend themselves cause other states to feel less secure; can lead to arms races and war because of the fear of being attacked.

Crisis Bargaining

a bargaining interaction in which at least one actor threatens to use force in the event its demands are not met.

Coercive Diplomacy

the use of threats to advance specific demands in a bargaining interaction.

Bargaining Range

the set of deals that both parties in a bargaining interaction prefer over the reversion outcome.

Compellence

an effort to change the status quo through the threat of force.

Deterrence

an effort to preserve the status quo through the threat of force.

Deterrence by Punishment

threats to punish for non-compliance; retaliation.

Deterrence by Denial

threats to ensure that the adversary will not reach their goal.

Incomplete Information

a situation in which actors in a strategic interaction lack information about other actors' interests/capabilities.

Resolve

the willingness of an actor to endure what it costs to acquire a particular good.

Risk-Return Trade-Off

in crisis bargaining, the trade-off between trying to get a better deal and trying to avoid a war.

Credibility

threats and commitments that the target believes will be carried out.

Incentives to Misrepresent

may way to appear weaker or stronger.

Brinksmanship

a strategy in which adversaries take actions that increase the risk of accidental war, with the hope that the other will "blink" (lose its nerve) first and make concessions.

Tying Hands

making threats in a way that makes backing down difficult.

Audience Costs

negative repercussions for failing to follow through on a threat or to honor a commitment.

Paying For Power

taking costly steps to increase their capabilities, such as by mobilizing and deploying a large military force, increasing military manpower, and/or spending large sums of money.

Commitment problems

the difficulty that states have making credible promises not to use force to revise a settlement at a later date.

Preventative War

a war fought with the intention of stopping an adversary from becoming stronger in the future.

First-Strike Advantage

the situation that arises when military technology, military strategies, and/or geography give a significant advantage to whichever state attacks first in a war.

Preemptive War

a war fought with the anticipation that an attack by the other side is imminent.

Indivisible Good

a good that cannot be divided without destroying its value.

Fait Accompli

'accomplished fact.' seizing a disputed piece of territory before the other side can react (moves the reversion point!)

Tripwire Forces

small deployments, not large enough to shift the local balance of forces, but meant to deter future aggression; they 'die heroically.'

Nationalism

a political ideology that prioritizes attachment to one's nation, where nations are groups defined by common origin, ethnicity, language, or cultural ties.

Bureaucracy

the collection of organizations - including the military, diplomatic corps, and intelligence agencies - that carry out most tasks of governance within a state.

Interest Groups

groups of individuals with common interests that organize to influence public policy in a manner that benefits their members.

Rally Effect

people's tendency to become more supportive of their country's government in times of dramatic international events, such as crises or wars.

Diversionary Incentive

the concept that state leaders have to start international crises in order to have public support at home.

Military-Industrial Complex

an alliance between military leaders and the industries that benefit from international conflict, such as arms manufacturers.

Democratic Peace

the observation that there are few if any, clear cases of war between mature democratic states.

Democracy

a political system in which candidates compete for political office through frequent, fair elections in which a sizable portion of the adult population can vote.

Autocracy

a political system in which an individual or small group exercises power with few constraints and no meaningful competition or participation by the general public.

Accountability

the ability to punish or reward leaders for the decisions they make, as when frequent, fair elections enable voters to hold elected officials responsible for their actions by granting or withholding access to political office.

Alliances

institutions that help their members cooperate militarily in the event of a war.

Balance of Power

a situation in which the military capabilities of two states or groups of states are roughly equal.

Bandwagoning

a strategy in which states join forces with the stronger side in a conflict.

Entrapment

the condition of being dragged into an unwanted war because of the opportunistic actions of an ally.

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)

an alliance formed in 1949 among the US, Canada, and most of Western Europe in response to the threat posed by the Soviet Union. The alliance requires the members to consider an attack on any one of them as an attack on all.

League of Nations

a collective security organization founded in 1919 after WWI and

ended in 1949 and was replaced by the United Nations.

United Nations (UN)

a collective security organization founded in 1945 after WWII. over 190 members.

Collective Security Organizations

broad-based institutions that promote peace and security among their members. Examples include the League of Nations and the UN.

Genocide

intentional and systematic killing aimed at eliminating an identifiable group of people, such as an ethnic or religious group.

Humanitarian Interventions

actions designed to relieve humanitarian crises stemming from civil conflicts or large-scale human rights abuses, including genocide.

United Nations Security Council (UNSC)

the main governing body of the UN, which has the authority to identify threats to international peace and security and to prescribe the organization's response, including military and/or economic sanctions.

Permanent Five (P5)

the members of the UNSC: the US, UK, France, Russia, and China.

Veto Power

the ability to prevent the passage of a measure through a unilateral act, such as a single negative vote.

Peace-Enforcement Operation

a military operation in which force is used to make and/or enforce peace among warring parties that have not agreed to end their fighting.

Peacekeeping Operations

an operation in which troops and observers are deployed to monitor a cease-fire or peace agreement.

International Law

a body of rules that binds states and other agents in world politics and is considered to have the status of law.

International Humanitarian Law (Laws of War)

a body rules that seeks to limit the effects of armed conflict, protect noncombatants, and restrict means and methods of warfare for humanitarian reasons.

Customary International Law

international law that usually develops slowly over time, as states come to recognize practices as appropriate and correct.

Obligation

the degree to which states are legally bound by an international rule. Other rules must be performed in good faith and, if breached, require reparations to the injured party.

Precision

the degree to which international legal obligations are fully specified and rules narrow the scope for reasonable interpretation.

Delegation

the degree to which third parties, such as courts, arbitrators, or mediators, are given authority to implement, interpret, and apply international legal rules; to resolve disputes over the rules; and to make additional rules.

Norms

standards of behavior for actors with a given identity; defines what actions are 'right' or appropriate under particular circumstances.

Norms Entrepreneurs

individuals or groups that seek to advance principled standards of behavior for states and other actors.

Transnational Advocacy Network (TAN)

a set of individuals and NGOs acting in pursuit of a normative objective.

Norms Life Cycle

a three-stage model of how norms diffuse within a population and achieve a taken-for-granted status.

Private Authority

an expression of legitimate rulemaking by nonstate actors in international affairs, including the establishment of norms governing the behavior of global actions such as multinational corporations and INGOs.

Boomerang Model

a process through which NGOs in one state are able to activate transnational linkages to bring pressure from other states on their own governments.