Research on the `democratic peace' has received considerable attention in the last few years. Democracies, though, are often thrown together when examining the propensity of different regime types to become engaged in international conflict. Yet, democratic governments vary dramatically across nation-states. Whether it be presidential versus parliamentary, or multi-party versus single-party, democratic states clearly differ in the structure of their governing institutions. This article examines the relationship between government type, domestic political opposition, and the threat, show or use of military force. The analysis finds that Western parliamentary governments are rarely involved in militarized interstate disputes, but when they are they tend to be the targets of aggression by non-democratic states. Furthermore, the evidence suggests that these democratic governments are much more likely to reciprocate disputes when their opponent is a non-democracy. Reciprocation, though, also tends to be influenced by the type of government in power during a dispute. Coalition democratic governments, rather than single-party governments, are much more likely to reciprocate militarized disputes. In fact, the findings suggest that coalition governments are more likely to reciprocate disputes in general, and particularly more likely to reciprocate with the actual use of military force. The results also suggest that the level of polarization of a parliamentary government tends to decrease the probability of dispute reciprocation.

Economic sanctions are frequently used as a tool of foreign policy, described by some as falling between diplomacy and military force. An important question regarding the use of sanctions is whether they can function as an alternative to military force by demonstrating the sender's resolve and making military force unnecessary, or if their use tends to result in an increased probability that military force will be used. Based on a theory of sanctions as costly signals, the authors develop and test hypotheses regarding the relationship between sanctions and military force. The results show that after a sanction occurs, there is a significantly increased probability of a use of military force. Democracies, because of their propensity to tie their hands with audience costs, while at the same time facing domestic pressure to devise sanctions to be costless to the sender, are highly likely to be involved in a militarized dispute after using sanctions.

As a manifestation of its self-reliance doctrine, the state of Israel has acted unilaterally in the military realm throughout its history. Several scholars have also linked Israeli actions to elections and the economy in the context of diversionary theory. Hypotheses derived from earlier empirical work on internalization-externalization linkages and additional causal hypotheses are tested to enhance diversionary theory. Vector autoregression (VAR) is used to relax causal assumptions and test basic relationships in the Israeli case from 1948 to 1998. Findings suggest that Israel responds militarily to Arab military actions and domestic political protests. However, Israeli actions also lead to more domestic protests. The potential for this reciprocal relationship is typically ignored in the current diversionary research program. Arab military actions appear to be driven by Israeli military actions and seem to decrease in response to Israeli actions.

Poliheuristic (PH) theory models foreign policy decisions using a two-stage process. The first step eliminates alternatives on the basis of a simplifying heuristic. The second step involves a selection from among the remaining alternatives and can employ a more rational and compensatory means of processing information. The PH model posits that strategic/realist factors are more important in the second step of the process. The model is tested for the years 1918 to 1994, using crisis actors from the International Crisis Behavior data set. Results show that domestic political loss has a negative impact on the use of violence in response to a crisis trigger. Contiguity, joint democracy, and trigger are also significant in the expected directions. Relative capabilities have a positive impact, and enduring rivals do not appear more likely to use violence against each other as a first response in a crisis.A key divergence in the empirical study of international relations has been that between cognitive and systemic/rational approaches (Hagan 2001). All too often, each school has considered the other as overly deterministic or ad hoc. Jerel Rosati (2001) takes this discussion a step further because he calls for a merger between rational and cognitive approaches. Like Hagan (2001), Rosati asserts that scholars should not treat the state as a "black box." In other words, we need to explore state actions as a function of the human cognition of their leaders. By dismissing the human cognition component of decisions, we may be discarding important information. Focusing on the rational model alone might give only information about outcomes and preferences. Looking at cognitive issues can tell us about processes and beliefs as well as where preferences come from and how they are established. Rosati suggests that the

Rivalry‐related issues tend to dominate the foreign policy agenda of states in enduring rivalries. Thus, the enduring rivalry research program provides an important framework for foreign policy analysis. This paper probes the domestic elements of strategic interaction in the three main Middle Eastern rivalries: Israel–Egypt, Israel–Jordan, and Israel–Syria. The empirical tests probe whether the number of parties represented in Israel's cabinet and Arab and Israeli domestic unrest impact the propensity for these rivals to employ hostility against each other. We specify vector autoregression (VAR) models and negative binomial event count models with monthly levels of hostility as the dependent variables for the period 1948–1998. The results provide interesting foreign policy implications regarding the impact of Israeli domestic political structures on conflict dynamics in the Middle East. There is no evidence that the foreign policy behavior of Arab states becomes risk averse when Israeli leaders might need an external scapegoat. These findings are discussed in the context of other research on enduring rivalries and strategic interaction.

Alliances are subject to many scholarly inquiries in international relations and peace research because they are major instruments of foreign and security policies. Since the early work on alliances produced by the Correlates of War (COW) project, there have been significant advances in conceptual, theoretical, and empirical alliance research. New typologies and data permit us to differentiate more thoroughly among a variety of alliance objectives and functions. Furthermore, there has been new theoretical and empirical research on alliance formation, alliance configuration/polarization, effects of alliances on military conflict, connections between alliances and trade, and the economics of alliances. Providing new theoretical approaches, data, and empirical evidence on alliances, this special issue includes articles that address alliance formation, alliance polarization, alliances and democratization, trade among allies, regional economic institutions with alliance obligations, and defense industrial policies of military alliances. The articles in this issue extend our understanding of alliances past the traditional realist balance-of-power framework and encourage further testing and refinement of older alliance arguments and extensions to new theoretical developments.

Scholars often observe that the foreign policies of states are not made in a vacuum but rather are determined or moulded to a significant degree by the external and internal actions of rivals. Domestic unrest is often considered a potential impetus for changing strategic behaviour. Leaders may be tempted to employ force externally to divert attention away from domestic unrest. The intended result is a 'rally round the flag' effect that culminates in higher approval/support for the executive as citizens forget about domestic problems and pay attention to a common adversary. One implication of this sort of 'diversion' is that potential scapegoats might employ strategic behaviour to avoid becoming a diversionary target. In other words, when they witness domestic unrest in a rival state, they worry that the rival may lash out at them and thus engage in 'strategic avoidance'. 1 Conversely, strategic behaviour may lead to a greater chance that the potential 'diverter' will itself be targeted for hostile behaviour. Erstwhile scapegoats may view periods of social unrest such as elections, domestic political protests or unstable cabinet structures in the other country as convenient and favourable times to escalate hostility. Such situations are viewed as opportunities that are ripe for exploitation.Alastair Smith's work has been extended to both the US case and a comparative cross-national study. 2 Our purpose here is to extend this line of inquiry by looking at a region of the world locked in a long-term hostile relationship; namely, the Middle East. Our approach builds upon previous research that addresses the strategic interaction of enduring rivals. 3 Specifically, we explore strategic avoidance and opportunity exploitation explanations of conflict in the three main Middle Eastern enduring rivalries: Israel-Egypt, Our goal is to determine which theoretical viewpoint best captures hostility dynamics in the Middle East conflict milieu. While we treat all three dyads as rivals, not all three dyads are coded as enduring rivalries during our time frame. We consider the three dyads as a rival milieu and use a cross-national design to capture the general nature of the strategic interaction argument. Regarding this, see Leeds and Davis, 'Domestic Political Vulnerability and International Disputes'.

No abstract