International Crisis Behavior (ICB) Project Overview PDF

international crisis Behavior (icB) Project: overview Origins The past 4 decades have been a period of intense research concentration on international crises, that is, international political earthquakes, and interstate con icts. From the outset it...

international crisis Behavior (icB) Project: overview Origins The past 4 decades have been a period of intense research concentration on international crises, that is, international political earthquakes, and interstate con icts. From the outset it was apparent that the ICB project would become an ambitious, demanding, and rewarding exploration, in depth and breadth, of a large segment of the IR eld: it encompassed the study of interstate military-security crises and protracted con icts on a scale that, as the project unfolded, seemed awesome: time—the twen- tieth century since the end of World War I, November 1918, into the rst 15 years of the twenty- rst century (ICB dataset, Version 12); geo- graphic scope—all states in the global system during that near-century; and content—from the eruption of crises, their escalation, de-escalation through attempts at successful crisis management, to the outcome and consequences of all international and foreign policy crises for all states. That project is now 42 years old but is still ourishing, measured by the number of scholars and students engaged in ICB research and the ow of publications, books, and articles. The origins of this project were closely linked to earlier periods and topics of my research. After more than two decades on a select number of crises and con icts in two volatile regions—from the India/Pakistan con ict over Kashmir (1947) © The Author(s) 2018 1 M. Brecher, A Century of Crisis and Con ict in the International System, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-57156-0_1 2 M. BRECHER to the Arab/Israel October-Yom Kippur crisis-war (1973–1974)—the time seemed ripe to launch an inquiry into crises, con icts, and wars in the world at large over an extended period of time. The result was my initiation of the ICB project in 1975. Its aims were ambitious. One was to generate comprehensive datasets on foreign policy and international crises in the twentieth century, for none existed at the time, unlike the closely related phenomenon of war. The other was to frame and test a uni ed model of international crisis and crisis behavior. Both proved to be demanding tasks on a vast scale. The few persons consulted, in 1974–1975, before taking the plunge, were skeptical, particularly of the ambitious scope of the project, which, they cautioned, could take decades; it did, with the end not yet in sight. Perhaps they were right; they certainly proved to be correct about the time frame. Their views were considered, with great care; but in the end, declined, and the saga began. (The evolution of this project, its publica- tions, and major ndings thus far, will be presented later in this book.) Colleagues, Coders and Advisers Since 1977, Jonathan Wilkenfeld has been my closest ICB colleague during what has become a very long-term research phase. Jonathan and I differ in many respects: fl fl fi fl fl fl fi fl fl fi fi fi fl educational background (McGill-Yale and Maryland-Indiana); research skills and methodological dispositions (qualitative, case study and quantitative, aggregate data analysis); an age difference, 17 years; physical distance—we lived on two continents and in three countries, Canada/Israel and the U.S. during virtually the entire history of the ICB Project, and most of it was before the coming of e-mail, and temperament. We learned a great deal from each other, with mutual respect. This cooperative endeavor facilitated a multi-method study of crises and con icts in world politics. Our close collaboration—and our friendship—continues undiminished and unimpaired after 40 years! In the early 1980s, we were joined by Patrick James, a very talented former Ph. D student of Jon Wilkenfeld, who has made major contribu- tions to the concepts, models, and methods of the ICB project and has become a high-pro le, accomplished IR scholar, serving as President of the International Studies Association (ISA) and Peace Science Society in 2018–2019. The ICB project also bene ted from a vibrant and stimulating group of colleagues and graduate students in three universities in three states—McGill, University of Maryland, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. It also had the good fortune of attracting many eager and committed research assistants in the seemingly endless task of creating reliable datasets of international crises, foreign policy crises, and pro- tracted con icts: for the initial, longest research period, 1929–1979— it took more than a decade, 1975–1987—Hemda Ben Yehuda, Gerald Bichunski, Diana Brecher, Ofra Einav, Robert Einav, Alex Forma, Etel Goldmann/Solingen, Sharon Greenblatt, Rutie Moser, Hanan Naveh, Arie Ofri, Lily Polliak, Mordechai Raz, Michel Reichman, André Rosenthal, Joel Schleicher, Bruce Slawitsky, and Sarah Vertzberger (in Jerusalem); and Mark Boyer, Doreen Duffy, Steve Hill, Patrick James, Cindy Kite, Maureen Latimer, Eileen Long (in Maryland); for the period, 1980–1985, Joel Schleicher (in Jerusalem), Brigid Starkey and Alice Schott (in Maryland); for the periods, 1918–1928 and 1985–1994, Tod Hoffman, Eric Laferriere, Michelle Lebrun, Mark Peranson, and Michael Vasko (at McGill); and Ronit Lupu, Iris Margulies, Meirav Mishali, Noam Shultz, and Sarah Vertzberger (in Jerusalem), and, from 1995– 2015, Kyle Beardsley, David M. Quinn, and Pelin Erlap (at Maryland). Many scholars gave generously of their time and knowledge as regional specialists, with many bene ts to the ICB project: Douglas Anglin, Naomi Hazan, and Saadia Touval (on Africa); Alexander de Barros, Thomas Bruneau, Nelson Kas r, Jorge Dominguez, and Edy Kaufman (on the Americas); Ehud Harari, Ellis Joffe, Paul Kattenburg, Guy Pauker, Leo Rose, Martin Rudner, Yaakov Vertzberger, and George T.C. Yu (on Asia); Luigi Bonanate, Karen Dawisha, Galia Golan, Kjell Goldmann, Amnon Sella, and Robert Vogel (on Europe); and Richard H. Dekmejian, Alan Dowty, Benjamin Geist, Jacob Landau, and Yaakov Shimoni (on the Middle East). Rationale and Methods Like other scholars immersed in IR research, the senior ICB scholars have a longstanding policy interest, that is, a wish and hope that our ndings on crisis, con ict, and war, fi fi fl fl fi fi fi fl especially on how decision-makers behave under (often escalating) stress, might make a contribution in the quest for a more tranquil world, through advice on con ict resolution and even on war prevention. We had no illusions that the contribution would be decisive. But we did—and do—place a high value on trying to ‘bridge the gap’ between academe and the decision-makers’ world. 1 MULTIPLE PATHS TO KNOWLEDGE 3 4 M. BRECHER The ICB approach to the systematic study of crisis, con ict, and war derived from a deep commitment to pluralism in the quest for knowl- edge, that is, to complementary, not competing methodologies: this com- mitment to pluralism is not con ned to the issue of qualitative vs. quantitative methods. It includes recognition of the merit of both deduc- tive and inductive approaches to theory-building. And it extends to a focus on both large N and small N datasets: ICB has produced—and utilized—both types in its multifaceted inquiry. ICB began with a single-state foreign policy crisis decision-making model and a set of research questions. This model and the questions were designed to direct case studies of decision-making using a com- mon framework and therefore to facilitate generalizations about behavior under the stress of crisis. A series of in-depth studies of individual inter- state crises was launched—and nine volumes have been published since 1979; these volumes are set out below. Within 2 years (1977) and with Jonathan Wilkenfeld’s invaluable input, ICB moved to a second, parallel track, namely, studies in breadth of a large number of crises to complement the in-depth case studies. Each of these paths posed different questions. One dataset was appropriate to the system or interactor (macro) level of analysis, the other to the unit or actor (micro) level of analysis. One cluster of questions was designed to generate comparable data on the four phases of an international crisis— onset, escalation, de-escalation, and impact. The data were used to test hypotheses on the conditions most likely to lead to the eruption of a crisis, its escalation to peak hostility, often with violence at the eruption and/or escalation stage(s), the ‘winding down’ process leading to termi- nation, and its consequences. The second cluster focused on the behavior of decision-makers at different levels of stress in the pre-crisis, crisis, end- crisis, and post- crisis periods of a state’s foreign policy crisis. During the past 42 years, we pursued both paths simultaneously, viewing them as complementary, not competitive sources of ndings on international and foreign policy crises and on interstate protracted con- icts. Path I, 29 qualitative case studies, ranges from Ethiopia’s decisions in the 1935–1936 Ethiopia/Italy crisis and war and the U.K. decisions in the Munich Crisis of 1938 to Iraq and U.S. decisions in the Gulf Crisis and War of 1990–1991 and the North Korea (DPRK) and U.S. deci- sions during several crises in the North Korean Nuclear protracted con ict since 1993 (‘vertical’ research). Path II has taken the form of quantitative fl fi fl fl fi fl  aggregate data analysis of 476 international crises and 1052 foreign policy crises since the end of World War I (‘horizontal’ research). Objectives ICB research on international crises before, during, and after the Cold War focused on ve objectives. One was to develop the concept of inter- national crisis as an international political earthquake and to present a comparison of such earthquakes since the end of World War I: along many attributes such as trigger, triggering entity, duration, number of decisions, decision-makers, their attitudinal prism, and values; and along many dimensions such as geography-region, time, system structure, con ict setting, bloc alignment, peace–war setting, violence, military power, economic devel- opment, and political regime. A second, closely related aim was to create and apply concepts, indica- tors, indexes, and scales designed to measure the severity (intensity) and impact (consequences) of international crises viewed as international polit- ical earthquakes. These are based on the premise that such precise meas- urement is scienti cally possible. A third goal was to bring closure to the persistent debate on which international structure is the most—and the least—stable, that is, the least—and the most—disruptive of the global international system— bipolarity, multipolarity, bipolycentrism, and unipolarity [or unipolycen- trism]. The rationale for this debate and research question is that inter- national stability is—or should be—a high value for all states and nations/peoples in an epoch characterized by weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), the persistence of anarchy despite the proliferation of interna- tional and transnational regimes, the increase of ethnic and civil wars, and the growing preoccupation with worldwide terrorism. All these sources of turmoil enhance the normative value of stability. Thus illuminating the polarity–stability nexus has important long-term implications for foreign policy and national security decision-makers and the attentive publics of all states. A fourth objective has been to extend and deepen our knowledge of coping/crisis management by in-depth case studies, focusing on how decision-makers coped with the peak stress crisis period during diverse political earthquakes (crises) in each structural era of the past near- century: multipolarity (mid-November 1918 [end of World War I]– early September 1945 [end of WWII]), bipolarity (early September 1945–end 1962 [termination of the Cuban Missile crisis]), bipolycentrism 1 MULTIPLE PATHS TO KNOWLEDGE 5 6 M. BRECHER (beginning 1963–end 1989 [end of the Cold War]), and unipolycentrism (beginning 1990– ongoing). The nal aim has been to provide a novel test of the validity of neo- Realism. The discovery of no or minor differences in the patterns of crisis and crisis behavior during the four structural eras would indicate strong support for the neo-Realist contention that fi fi fl fi structure shapes world poli- tics, as well as the foreign policy-security behavior of states, its principal actors. However, the presence of substantive differences in the patterns of crisis and crisis behavior during the four structural eras since the end of WW I would seriously undermine the claim of neo-Realism to be the optimal paradigm for world politics throughout history and in the dec- ades ahead. Taken together, the general objective of the ICB inquiry since 1975 has been to enrich and deepen our knowledge of interna- tional crisis and interstate con ict in the twentieth century and beyond. Formative Publications (1977–1980) The late 1970s was also a period of several ICB-related publications which became guides to the Project’s research program, especially its theoretical framework and its in- depth case studies: two Brecher jour- nal articles, “Toward a Theory of International Crisis Behavior,” in the International Studies Quarterly (1977) and “State Behavior in International Crisis: A Model,” in the Journal of Con ict Resolution (1979). The following year, the rst ICB in-depth case study volume was published, Brecher with Geist, Decisions in Crisis: Israel, 1967 and 1973. This book, as noted, served as the conceptual and methodological model for the seven other ICB case study volumes (analyzing 15 crises) that were published from 1980 to 1994, as well as for the 14 unpublished graduate student case studies of foreign policy crises. Case Studies—Qualitative Analysis All ICB case studies applied the foreign policy crisis model, initially pre- sented as journal articles in 1977 and 1979, as noted above. The ICB case study volumes are as follows: *Brecher with Benjamin Geist, Decisions in Crisis: Israel 1967 and 1973 (1980). Dawisha, Adeed I., Syria and the Lebanese Crisis (1980). *Shlaim, Avi, The United States and the Berlin Blockade, 1948–1949 (1983). *Dawisha, Karen, The Kremlin and the Prague Spring (1984). *Dowty, Alan, Middle East Crisis: U.S. Decision-Making in 1958, 1970, and 1973 (1984). *Jukes, Geoffrey, Hitler’s Stalingrad Decisions (1985). *Hoffmann, Stephen: India and the China Crisis (1990), and Anglin, Douglas G., Zambian Crisis Behavior: Confronting Rhodesia’s Unilateral Declaration of Independence, 1965–1966 (1994). [*These six books were published from 1980 to 1990 by the University of California Press in a series, Studies in Crisis Behavior, edited by Brecher.] fi fl fl  The case study volumes and the unpublished crisis studies gener- ated comparable ndings which provided a valuable database for test- ing hypotheses on state behavior in crises. The published ICB books and other in-depth case studies analyzed 15 foreign policy crises of indi- vidual states. Fourteen other crises have been researched by my gradu- ate students. These 29 crises served as the empirical basis for Part B (“Qualitative Analysis”) in Brecher, International Political Earthquakes (2008); the ndings from that inquiry are presented later in this book. Datasets and Aggregate Analysis A dozen years, 1975–1987, were devoted to data gathering (coding) and analysis of crises and con icts from 1929 to 1979, the initial time frame of the ICB Project: it was a collective research enterprise whose success owed much to the devoted coding of our research assistants, under the direc- tion of Brecher and Wilkenfeld. Given the complexity of the Project, it took 2 years to complete the process of publication. In 1988, the rst two volumes of a three-volume work, Crises in the Twentieth Century, were published as Handbook of International Crises (Brecher and Wilkenfeld) and Handbook of Foreign Policy Crises (Wilkenfeld and Brecher). The next year, the third volume containing analytic papers on this dataset appeared as Crisis, Con ict and Instability (Brecher and Wilkenfeld). Almost a decade later (1997), a substantially revised and signi cantly enlarged aggregate dataset and analysis segment of the project appeared, A Study of Crisis (Brecher and Wilkenfeld). It presented the updated dataset at both the system-level and actor-level of analysis and an array of 1 MULTIPLE PATHS TO KNOWLEDGE 7 8 M. BRECHER ndings on crisis, con ict, and war from late 1918 to the end of 1994. [Important ndings from that book are presented later in this book.] fi fi fl fl fl fi fi fi fi