Scott Wolford National Leaders

1
Scott Wolford National Leaders Intl Politics

• International conflict bargaining takes place
  between leaders rather than states. Leaders
  (incumbents successors) vary in their level of
  resolve this creates incentives for new leaders
  to build reputations early on, and for their
  adversaries to discover their level of
  resoluteness. These beliefs and the actions by
  each affect both incumbents survival and the
  likelihood of conflict.
• Assumptions
• Actors Leaders States. Levels of resoluteness
  types
• Holds for B what about A? (propositions)
• Conflict is costly (better off ex post if avoided
  ex ante)
• Bs prob of survival is determined by outcome of
  1st crisis
• How reasonable is this? Elections?
• Regarding As prefs for B over B what does A
  know about B?
• B has good that A wants, only A has incentive to
  pick fights
• what does this say about the distrib of power?
• Empirical Implications
• Propositions 1-6 many testable implications.
• Prop 3 if ?øW, ? p(C), effect is greater as p
  increases
• Prop 5 if ?øP, p(C) can increase OR decrease,
  depending on p
• if p is low (below threshold) A does not make
  aggressive offers
• yet øW gt øP, and ?øW, ? p(C) why wouldnt B
  pick fight for good 2?