WHY DO SOME SOCIETIES/ STATES/CULTURES FIGHT MORE THAN OTHERS?

1. WHY DO SOME SOCIETIES/ STATES/CULTURES FIGHT MORE THAN OTHERS?

2. WHY STUDY THE SECOND IMAGE? A handful of observations about the 2nd image… Waltz: Good states still go to war, so state structure can’t explain everything What is the specific connection between bad leaders and bad societies? (next time) Studying the second image: Historians versus political scientists? What does Jack Levy have to say about this

3. WHAT SOCIAL CONDITIONS HAVE BEEN LINKED TO GOING TO WAR? Thinking about cause and effect: Do weak & divided states attract or create civil and/or international conflict?: The “endogeneity” problem: Weak states = war? Or is it the reverse? Or is there a causal loop? “Missing variable bias”: Does something else cause both weak states and war? Why are multinational states more prone to war? What evidence is there to support scapegoat/diversionary theory? Not as much as you would think Military structure arguments: Graham Allison’s discussion of SOPs and bureaucratic politics as an explanation of the Cuban Missile Crisis The interaction between nationalism, state structure, and geography: The US and Britain versus Germany and Russia (different “in-group/out-group pressures?) Nationalist/aggressive cultures and especially “national narratives” dramatically vary and they seem to be linked to aggression: Japan, China, US, Russia Relative deprivation and the willingness to fight wars

4. ARE SOME REGIME TYPES MORE SUSCEPTIBLE TO CONFLICT? THE DEMOCRATIC PEACE Kant: Why do democracies fight less? (What about totalitarian regimes?) Updates to the democratic peace theory: How do checks & balances and the role of oppositional politics impact the propensity to war? Public opinion & electoral cycles: Are there incentives to engage in scapegoating in presidential democracies because of the forced timing of elections? Are democracies less susceptible to group think? Do civil liberties mean fewer conflicts? They certainly mean better information both domestically and abroad. If democracies are less inclined to start wars (at least with non democracies), are they less prone to joining them? Are they less likely to be targeted by other countries (Iraq as case and point) Are democracies going to be more likely to fight in a world that takes human rights seriously? What happens when your voters are stupid or divided along ethnic lines? What happens when democracies choose to fight? Do they fight more nicely? Do they end wars more nicely?

5. ARE CERTAIN ECONOMIES LESS PRONE TO CONFLICT? More causality issues: Do capitalist states fight because they are capitalist or because they are strong? What was Karl Marx’s theory of inter-state war? He didn’t have much of one What was Vladimir Lenin’s theory of imperialism? Why would rich states fight in and over developing countries? Why did pacifying the local working classes depend on exporting brutality? What was the fighting all about? Finding markets for surplus of goods and capital that could have a high return on investment Other reasons to fight in and over countries in the economic periphery: The need for raw materials and the internal politics of rich states’ military industrial complex What is interdependency theory, and why might advanced capitalist countries actually be a lot less likely to fight (at least each other?: What are the economic stakes and vulnerability of states that are highly interconnected economically? (Why would we be fools to fight China?) Subnational actor stakes: Even if politicians want to fight, why don’t businessmen? How does globalization give us all a shared vision of reality and the future?