The politics of alliance formation is central to the study of international relations. Many prominent alliances have been forged since the end of the Napoleonic Wars, including the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949 and the Warsaw Pact in 1955. Less well known is the fact that many treaty negotiations ended in failure. On…
Tag: alliances
Roundtable 10-9 on Powerplay: The Origins of the American Alliance System in Asia
For alliance scholars who are interested in institutional design and U.S. foreign policy in Asia, Victor Cha’s 2010 International Security article, “Powerplay: The Origins of the U.S. Alliance System in Asia” is a valuable resource.[1] Cha has expanded his article-length treatment into a thoughtful and timely book, and in so doing has given us much…
Article Review 72 on “To Arm or to Ally?: The Patron’s Dilemma and the Strategic Logic of Arms Transfers and Alliances.”
In an analytical review of alliance research, James Morrow posed the title question, “Alliances: why write them down?”[1] A decade and a half later, Keren Yarhi-Milo, Alexander Lanoszka, and Zack Cooper revisit this issue, posing their own title question: “To arm or to ally?” Yarhi-Milo, Lanoszka, and Cooper pose this question through the structural lens…
Roundtable 6-2 on Alliance Formation in Civil Wars
Over the last decade much of the best work in comparative politics and international relations has focused on explaining the onset and termination of civil wars. In her new book, Alliance Formation in Civil Wars, Fotini Christia seeks to explain the constant shifts in alliances that characterize these conflicts. With a combination of theoretical richness,…