Meeting # 5: Alliances.

1. In what ways are alliances "institutions" in the sense we have used throughout? In what ways are they not, if any?
2. Describe the variety of forms, commitments, instruments, and organizational structures of alliances as institutions. What are an alliance’s purposes?
3. How credible are alliance contracts? Are alliances just "scraps of paper," as German Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg said with respect to the violation of Belgium neutrality in August 1914? Obviously, this question is at the heart of the realist-institutionalist debate as applied to this topic.
4. How would we know if an alliance were truly credible? Produce a research design to assess the credibility of alliances.
5. What design features of an alliance institution might make it more credible? Explain.
6. Think back to the institutionalist and constructivist theories of institutions. Do alliances typically fulfill the functions Keohane et al. ascribe to institutions, e.g., reducing transaction costs, providing information & monitoring compliance, increasing the "shadow of the future," etc.? How about the roles emphasized by constructivists, e.g., spreading and diffusing norms & ideology, serving as the focus of legitimacy, bureaucratizing foreign commitments, etc.? Consider examples.
7. If alliances are somewhat influential or credible, then a second problem emerges: moral hazard. As British Prime Minister Lord Salisbury wrote to Queen Victoria in 1898, "Isolation is much less dangerous than the danger of being dragged into wars which do not concern us." How do you balance the need for deterrence of aggression (via a strong credible alliance) versus the fear of inducing an ally to initiate conflicts that would not otherwise occur? Can you design an alliance in a way that maximizes the first’s probability while minimizes the second’s?
8. Lord Salisbury, the architect of Great Britain’s policy of "Splendid Isolation" in the late 19^th century, argued, "No incumbent British government could commit a future government to declare war over an issue which was not supported by British public opinion at the moment of crisis. In such an instance, the treaty would be repudiated and the government would fall." One interpretation is that he was just a realist – national interest, not treaties, guide foreign policy. But he was particularly skeptical of the British Parliament’s willingness to accept such commitments. Are democracies more or less likely to honor their alliance commitments, as compared to non-democracies? Consider alternative arguments. Propose a research design to prove your case.