Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-fbnjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-01T20:11:13.678Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Conceptual Problems in Theorizing About International Conflict

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2014

James D. Morrow ,
Barry L. Price  and
Roslyn Simowitz
James D. Morrow
Affiliation:
Hoover Institution Stanford University
Barry L. Price
Affiliation:
Tarleton State University
Roslyn Simowitz
Affiliation:
University of Texas, Arlington
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Axiomatic and deductive theorizing about international political conflict has precipitated lively debate. Much of the disputation of recent years has derived from an expected utility theory of conflict advocated by Bruce Bueno de Mesquita. In the June 1990 issue of this Review, Roslyn Simowitz and Barry L. Price dissected crucial parts of Bueno de Mesquita's formulation of the theory, arguing that it suffers from errors of logic and clarity. In this controversy, James D. Morrow challenges the claims of Simowitz and Price that the reviewed theory is logically and conceptually flawed. In turn, Price and Simowitz join issue.

Type
Controversies
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 85 , Issue 3 , September 1991 , pp. 923 - 940
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1991

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bueno de Mesquita, Bruce. 1981. The War Trap. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Bueno de Mesquita, Bruce. 1985. “The War Trap Revisited: A Revised Expected Utility Model.” American Political Science Review 79:156–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bueno de Mesquita, Bruce, and Lalman, David. 1986. “Reason and War.” American Political Science Review 80:1113–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Laudan, Lawrence. 1977. Progress and Its Problems. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Morrow, James D. 1985. “A Continuous-Outcome Expected Utility Theory of War.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 29:473–502.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morrow, James D. 1986. “A Spatial Model of International Conflict.” American Political Science Review 80:1131–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nicholson, Michael. 1987. “The Conceptual Bases of The War Trap.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 31:346–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Niou, Emerson M. S., Ordeshook, Peter, and Rose, Gregory F.. 1989. The Balance of Power: Stability in International Systems. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Powell, Robert. 1990. Nuclear Deterrence Theory: The Search for Credibility. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simowitz, Roslyn, and Price, Barry L.. 1990. “The Expected Utility Theory of Conflict: Measuring Theoretical Progress.” American Political Science Review 84:439–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Small, Melvin, and Singer, J. David. 1982. Resort to Arms: International and Civil Wars, 1816–1980. Beverly Hills: Sage.Google Scholar
Wagner, R. Harrison. 1984. “War and Expected Utility Theory.” World Politics 36:407–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.