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Military Alliance:
An agreement between two or more sovereign states concerning the actions each will take in the event that a specified military contingency occurs
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3 Types of Alliance Agreements
- Mutual defense agreements
- -Promise to come to signatories defense
- Neutrality/Non-aggression agreement
- -Promise not to join against
- Consultation agreements(ententes)
- -Promise to consult with one another on a course of action
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Purposes of Alliances: Alliances can be:
-Offensive or defensive
-Large or small
-Focused on narrow or broad issues
-Long or short duration
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Different types of alliances suggests that
alliances are formed for different reasons
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Structural theories view alliances as
as quick, inexpensive ways of accumulating power or security
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Why do militarily strong states form alliances with obviously weak states?
One explanation for this puzzle is Security-Autonomy Tradeoff Theory (Morrow)
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Security-Autonomy Tradeoff Theory:
- Leaders are interested in maintaining sufficient security and sufficient autonomy
- -security: so they do not have to worry about changes to the international status quo
- -autonomy: enough freedom of action that one can exploit favorable shifts in the status quo to enhance their influence
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Security- Autonomy Tradeoff: Increased autonomy may come at the cost of
of a loss of security & increased security may come at the cost of a loss autonomy
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Security- Autonomy Tradeoff: Leaders make tradeoffs depending on
their domestic and international circumstances
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Security- Autonomy Tradeoff: Great powers...
- have a lot of security
- -Will not gain much from additional security, but could benefit from more autonomy
- -May be willing to trade away some security for more autonomy by aligning with weaker states
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Security- Autonomy Tradeoff: Smaller states...
- do not have a lot of security
- -May be willing to trade away some autonomy for more security by aligning with more powerful states
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Security- Autonomy Tradeoff: Smaller states in an alliance enhance their security, while more powerful states gain more autonomy
- Smaller states in an alliance enhance their security, while more powerful states gain more autonomy
- -Each gains on the dimension more beneficial to its overall well-being
- -Each sacrifices on the dimension less important to its overall well-being
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asymmetric alliance:
- -The status quo with the alliance makes both better off than the status quo without the alliance
- -one state gives up security, the other gives up autonomy
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Symmetric alliance:
both gain on the same dimension
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Symmetric vs. Asymmetric Alliances
The security-autonomy tradeoff suggests that although it is not impossible to form a symmetric alliance, doing so is more difficult than forming an asymmetric alliance
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Symmetric vs. Asymmetric Alliances, Empirically
-Empirically, on average, asymmetric alliances last 15.7 years and symmetric alliances last 12.2 years
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When Are Alliances Reliable?
- Realist view: Alliances are only reliable if they are part of the balance of power
- -Alliances are short-term arrangements
- -Under anarchy, cannot rely on allies for defense
- -1816-1965: alliances were not honored 73% of the time when an attack took place
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But, if alliances are generally reliable, we...
should expect to observe that most alliances are not honored when an attack takes place
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Only alliances that are perceived to be unreliable are tested
- Only alliances that are perceived to be unreliable are tested
- -There is a selection bias in the inferences drawn from the historical record
- -Deterred attacks leave no historical record
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Reliable alliances succeed in
- deterring attacks and so never get tested
- -Attack when you don’t expect a rival’s allies to honor their commitments
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Alliances(4):
- -Alliance membership is fluid
- -Alliances are neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for coordination between states
- -Allies sometimes fight one another
- -Alliances with more democratic members last longer than alliances with fewer democratic members
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