Mark L. Haas

Prospect Theory and the Cuban Missile Crisis

This article tests the predictions of expected-utility and prospect theories against the most important dimensions of the Cuban missile crisis. Largely through use of the most recently released information on the crisis from the American and Soviet governments, I attempt to ascertain the anticipated benefits, costs, and probabilities of success associated with each of the major policy choices that the key leaders in both superpowers perceived before each of the major decisions throughout the crisis was made. Using this information and the logic of extensive-form game-theoretic models of choice, I construct a baseline for expected-utility theory that helps us to understand when prospect or expected-utility theory provides the better explanation for a particular decision. Prospect theory predicts that when individuals perceive themselves to be experiencing losses at the time they make a decision, and when their probability estimates associated with their principal policy options are in the moderate to high range, they will tend to make excessively risky, non–value maximizing choices. I find that the evidence for the Cuban missile crisis supports this prediction for the most important decisions made by both Khrushchev and Kennedy.

The clash of ideologies : Middle Eastern politics and American security

Acknowledgments Dedication Introduction 1. The Importance of Ideological Distance and Polarity to Foreign Policies 2. Iranian Ideological Factions and International Policies, 1997-2009 3. Ideologies and the History of the Syrian-Iranian Alliance 4. Ideologies and Turkish Foreign Policies after the Cold War 5. Ideologies and U.S.-Saudi Relations After the Cold Wars End Conclusion

Ideology and Alliances: British and French External Balancing Decisions in the 1930s

WHAT ROLE do political ideologies play in the formation of alliances? Many of the most prominent examinations of this subject are clear in their answer: a relatively insignificant one. Although there are important differences among neorealist, balance-of-threat, and buck-passing arguments, proponents of each agree that “when great powers confront a serious threat . . . they pay little attention to ideology as they search for alliance partners.” The most prominent studies that challenge this consensus and attribute great powers’ alliance preferences to an important extent to ideological concerns tend to examine either the effects of only one ideology—liberalism—on outcomes, or for those who go beyond this restriction, the interactions of autocratic

Ideological Polarity and Balancing in Great Power Politics

This article examines the international effects of a variable that has yet to be studied in a systematic manner in the international relations literature: the number of prominent, distinct ideological groups that are present in a particular system, which is a variable that I label “ideological polarity.” My basic argument is that systems in which the great powers are divided into one, two, or three or more ideological groups (or “ideological unipolarity,” “ideological bipolarity,” or “ideological multipolarity,” respectively) have very different dynamics, including major variations in overall threat perceptions among the great powers and the efficiency of the balancing process against perceived dangers. The effects of ideological polarity explain key outcomes that analyses based on power polarity cannot. I test the argument by examining great power relations in two cases: the decades after the Napoleonic Wars and the years leading up to the Second World War. Both periods were multipolar in terms of power but varied in terms of ideological polarity. The result was significant variations in states’ core security policies for reasons consistent with the argument.

Reinhold Niebuhr's Christian pragmatism : A principled alternative to consequentialism

Although the influence of Reinhold Niebuhrs thought on political theory has been a profound one, curiously, scholars have quite often misunderstood or misinterpreted his philosophy on issues that are of central importance to his political vision. Specifically Niebuhrs program for ethical and political action is often described as one of unrestricted consequentialism, in which ethical decision making is by necessity reduced to a process where the ends justify the means. Despite the fact that Niebuhrs theory of ethics clearly called for an examination of the likely consequences of ones actions, it should nevertheless not be labeled in this manner. Although Niebuhr believed that the principles of justice were to be applied pragmatically (i.e., only after an examination of the likely consequences of ones actions), they were to be derived deontologically. Such a position not only made justice, and not prudence, the first principle of political obligation, but denied the correctness of the consequentialist tenet that the ends justify the means. The result of this two-step process of applying deontologically derived principles in a pragmatic fashion was an effective strategy, unique to Niebuhrs theory of ethics, for fulfilling the prescriptions of the law of love to the greatest degree possible, given the world as it is.

Correspondence: Can Great Powers Discern Intentions?

Over the past four decades, scholars and policymakers have learned a great deal about the conditions under which states can assess others’ intentions and the implications for states’ foreign and security policies.1 In “The Inscrutable Intentions of Great Powers,” however, Sebastian Rosato argues that there has never been much to learn, because states cannot acquire useful information about others’ intentions and therefore pay them little attention.2 In this letter, we argue that Rosato’s argument is deeply oawed, on both theoretical and empirical grounds, and should not be used as a guide for policy. Owing to space limitations, we restrict our response to three points—the mismatch between Rosato’s argument and the real world, the analytically misleading benchmark on which he rests his entire analysis, and his overstated claims about states’ inability to learn about intentions from others’ actions.

Missed Ideological Opportunities and George W. Bush’s Middle Eastern Policies

Numerous analysts have criticized George W. Bushs Middle Eastern policies for their strong ideological content. This article agrees with a core premise of these critiques, but it does so for very different reasons from most analyses. Ideological rigidity on some issues, paradoxically, prevented the Bush administration from taking advantage of the full range of ways in which ideologies shape international relations. There were three major opportunities to advance US interests in the Middle East during Bushs presidency that were created by the effects of ideologies. First, liberalizing parties in otherwise illiberal regimes tended to be significantly more supportive of US interests than other ideological groups in the same country at the same time. Second, major ideological differences among different types of illiberal enemies of the United States enhanced Americas ability to adopt “wedge” strategies toward various hostile coalitions. Finally, the existence of different types of ideological enemies in the Middle East created incentives for some illiberals to align with the United States because of mutual ideological enmity for a third ideological group. The Bush administration, however, failed at key times to take advantage of these openings. If Bush administration officials had been less ideologically dogmatic while, somewhat paradoxically, making better strategic use of ideologies’ major international effects, Americas security would have been significantly advanced in critical cases.