Midterm Flashcards
An economic theory that believed that economic wealth and power are complements to each other, and emphasizes a monopoly in the exports of goods, usually by a mother country over colonies and over competitors.
Mercantilism
The settlement that ended the Thirty Years War in 1648, said to have created the modern system of states by establishing sovereignty and asking states to not interfere in each other affairs.
Peace of Westphalia
The expectation that within a states boundaries they have legal and political supremacy.
Sovereignty
The supremacy of one-nation state over others.
Hegemony
British peace from 1815-1915, where British economic and political dominance led to a period of widespread peace.
Pax Britannica
Monetary system that prevailed from 1870 to 1914, as countries tied their currency to gold at a fixed price.
Gold Standard
A global conflict that took place from 1914 to 1918, involving many of the world’s major powers and resulting in widespread devastation and significant political and territorial changes. Allies vs. Central Powers.
World War I
Peace treaty between Allies and Germany that formally ended World War I.
Treaty of Versailles
An international organization established after World War I in 1920 with the aim of promoting peace, cooperation, and diplomacy among nations, but it ultimately failed to prevent the outbreak of World War II and was replaced by the United Nations in 1945. U.S. was not a member.
League of Nations
A global conflict that lasted from 1939 to 1945, involving many of the world’s nations and characterized by widespread violence and significant geopolitical changes. It began with the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany and ended with the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, ultimately leading to the defeat of Axis powers, including Germany and Japan.
World War II
A period of geopolitical tension and rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, which lasted from the mid-20th century until the early 1990s. It was characterized by political, economic, and ideological conflicts, as well as a nuclear arms race, but it never escalated into direct military confrontation between the two superpowers.
Cold War
A military alliance established in 1949, composed of North American and European countries, designed to promote mutual defense and security cooperation among its member states.
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
An international monetary arrangement established in 1944 that fixed exchange rates to the U.S. dollar, as well as low barriers to international trade and investment promoting economic stability and post-World War II reconstruction
Bretton Woods System
A political and military alliance of Eastern Bloc countries, led by the Soviet Union, formed in 1955 in response to NATO’s Western alliance during the Cold War.
Warsaw Pact
The process by which many former colonies gained independence from colonial powers, leading to the establishment of sovereign nations in the mid-20th century.
Decolonization
The process of increased interconnectedness and interdependence among countries, leading to the exchange of goods, services, information, and cultures on a global scale.
Globalization
What actors want to achieve through political actions. Their preference among possible outcomes from a situation.
Interests
The basic unit for analysis of international politics, can be either individuals or groups of people with common interests.
Actors
A political entity with defined borders, government, and sovereignty, typically recognized as a nation, with control over its particular region.
State
A state of disorder or absence of a central authority or government control, often used in the context of international relations.
Anarchy
The goals, priorities, and objectives of a specific nation within the context of international relations.
National Interests
The way in which the choices of two or more political actors combine to make an outcome.
Interactions
An interaction in which two or more actors work together to adopt policies that make at least one actor better off relative to the status quo.
Cooperation
The process of negotiating and reaching agreements, often involving compromise and trade-offs.
Bargaining
The process of aligning actions and efforts among different actors to achieve common goals or objectives. Ex: Cars on the right side.
Coordination
Working together towards a shared goal, often involving cooperation, joint effort, and mutual contribution. Actors can gain from this, but also may have incentives not to join. Ex: Prisoner Dilemma.
Collaboration
Products that are non-excludable and non-rival in consumption, such as national defense.
Public Goods
Refer to situations in which individuals or groups face a challenge in coordinating their actions to achieve a common goal, often because of conflicting interests or the temptation to free ride on the efforts of others. Resolving collective action problems typically involves finding mechanisms or incentives that encourage cooperation and overcoming barriers.
Collective Action Problem
Benefiting from a collective resource or effort without contributing to it, often to the detriment of the group’s overall success.
Free Rider
The repetition of a process or action, often in negotiations or interactions, to refine and improve outcomes.
Iteration
The linking of coordination on one issue to interactions on another issue. Ex: US and England
Linkage
A key factor that affects the likelihood of cooperation.
Information
The ability of Actor A to get Actor B to do something that B would otherwise not do; the ability to get the other side to make concessions and to avoid having to make concessions oneself.
Power
Strategy of Power. A strategy of imposing or threatening to impose costs on other actors in order to induce a change in their behavior.
Coercion
The alternatives to bargaining with a specific
actor.
Outside Options
Actions taken before or during bargaining that make the reversion outcome more favorable for one party.
Agenda Setting
Sets of rules (known and shared by the community) that structure interactions in specific ways.
Institutions
A set of rules and principles governing relations between sovereign states and other international actors, designed to promote cooperation, resolve disputes, and maintain global order.
International Law
Must be woven together by one or more unifying principles (not just ad hoc rules)
Body of Rules
must include both primary rules (content) and secondary rules
(process for making rules)
Status of Law
A body of law that seeks to limit the effects of armed conflict, protest noncombatants, and restrict means and methods of warfare for humanitarian reasons. Ex: UNCLOS
International Humanitarian Laws (Laws of War)
Widely accepted norms that have come to be seen as legally binding, even if they are not formally agreed upon. Ex: Diplomatic Immunity
Customary International Law
A formally concluded and ratified agreement between countries.
Treaties
The degree to which states are legally bound by an international rule.
Obligation
The degree to which international legal obligations are fully specified.
Precision
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.
Delegation
Widely accepted standards of behavior or conduct within a society or international community, shaping expectations and influencing actions of individuals and states.
Norms
What makes an actor legitimate or appropriate.
Constitutive Norms
How decisions should be made.
Procedural Norms
How actors should behave with other actors.
Regulative Norms
RIndividuals or groups that seek to advance standards of behavior for states or other actors.
Norms Entrepeneurs
A set of individuals and
nongovernmental organizations
acting in pursuit of a normative
objective.
Transnational advocacy network (TAN)
A three-stage model of how norms diffuse within a population and achieve a taken-for-granted status.
Norms life cycle
A theory describing how domestic or transnational advocacy networks can bypass uncooperative governments by appealing to international actors, creating pressure that “boomerangs” back to influence policy change within the uncooperative state.
Boomerang Model
An event involving organized use of a military force by at least two parties that involves a minimum threshold of security.
War
A war involving the main participants are states.
Interstate War
A war in which the main participants are within the same state, such as the same government and rebel group.
Civil War
A dilemma that arises when efforts that states make to defend themselves causes other states to feel less secure, can lead to an arms race and rising tensions.
Security Dillema
A bargaining interaction in which at least one actor threatens to use force in the event that its demands are not met.
Crisis Bargaining
The use of threats to
advance specific demands in
a bargaining interaction.
Coercive diplomacy
The set of deals that both parties in a bargaining interaction prefer over the reversion outcome. When the reversion outcome is war, the bargaining range is the set of deals that both sides prefer over war.
Bargaining Range
An effort to change the status quo through the threat of force.
Compellence
An effort to preserve the status quo through the threat of force.
Deterrence
A situation in which actors in a strategic interaction lack information about other actors’ interests and/or capabilities.
Incomplete Information
The willingness of an actor
to endure costs in order to
acquire a particular good. Ex: Ukraine
Resolve
Believability. A credible
threat is a threat that
the recipient believes
will be carried out. A
credible commitment is a
commitment or promise
that the recipient believes
will be honored.
Credibility
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.
Brinksmanship
Making threats in a way that makes backing down difficult.
Tying Hands
Negative repercussions for failing to follow through on a threat or to honor a
commitment.
Audience Costs
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.
Paying for power
A war fought with the intention of preventing an adversary from becoming stronger in the future.
Preventative War
The situation that arises when military technology, military strategies, and/or geography give a significant advantage to whichever state attacks first in a war.
First Strike Advantage
A war fought with the anticipation that the other side is about to strike.
Preemptive War
A good that cannot be divided without reducing its value. Ex: Land
Indivisible Good
Threats to punish for non-compliance.
Deterrence by Punishment
Threats to ensure that the adversary will not reach their goals.
Deterrence by Denial
Refers to a retaliatory action or policy taken by one country against another in response to a perceived injury, harm, or wrongdoing, often with the aim of restoring a sense of justice or retribution for a prior act.
Revenge
Occurs when an action that has a negative effect on someone is returned with an action that has an approximately equal negative effect.
Negative Reciprocity
Identification with one’s own nation and support for its interests, especially to the exclusion or detriment of the interests of other nations.
Nationalism
The collection of organizations—including the military, diplomatic corps, and intelligence agencies— that carry out most tasks of governance within the state.
Bureaucracy
Groups of individuals with common interests that organize to influence public policy in a manner that benefits their members.
Interest Groups
The tendency for people to
become more supportive of
their country’s government
in response to dramatic
international events, such
as crises or wars.
Rally Effect
The incentive that state leaders have to start international crises in order to rally public support back home.
Diversionary Incentive
An alliance between military leaders and the industries that benefit from international conflict, such as arms manufacturers.
Military Industrial Complex
The observation that there are very few, if any clear cases of war between mature democratic states
Democratic Peace
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.
Democracy
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.
Autocracy
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.
Accountability
Institutions that help their members cooperate military in the event of war.
Alliances
A situation in which the military capabilities of two states or groups of states is roughly equal
Balance of Power
A strategy in which states join forces with the stronger side in a conflict
Bandwangoning
The risk of being dragged into an unwanted war because of the opportunistic actions of an ally.
Entrapment
A collective security organizaiton founded in 1945 after World War II
United Nations
Broad-based institutions that promote peace and security among their members. Examples include the League of Nations and the United Nations
Collective security organizations
The intentional and systematic killing aimed at eliminating an identifiable group of people, such as an ethnic or religious group.
Genocide
Interventions designed to relieve humanitarian crises stemming from civil conflicts or large-scale human rights abuses, including genocide.
Humanitarian Interventions
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.
Security Council (UNSC)
The five permanent members of the UN security Council: the United States, Great Britain, France, Russia, China
Permanent Five
The ability to prevent the passage of a measure through a unilateral act, such as a single negative vote.
Veto Power
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.
Peace-enforcement operation
An operation in which troops and observers are deployed to monitor a cease-fire or peace agreement.
Peacekeeping Operation
