How Perceptions Influence the Risk of War

Abstract

We identify conditions for which perceptual differences diminish the risk of war and others for which differences in perceptions increase the likelihood of warfare. We show empirically on a data set concerning 469 European disputes between 1816 and 1970 that these game-theoretic conditions are a significant improvement over the decision-theoretic view suggested by Bueno de Mesquita and Lalman (1986) and help resolve some concerns raised by Jervis (1989). The expectations from the game are empirically robust in the face of bipolarity/multipolarity, a variable commonly thought to be important by structural realists or neorealists. Differences in perceptions need not be thought of as purely idiosyncratic phenomena with unpredictable consequences for events. Nor is it necessary to rely on ex post, thick analysis of specific events to portray the relationship between perceptions and outcomes. Rather, we identify a formulation that allows ex ante predictions of how decision makers will behave in crisis situations based on their perceptions of the circumstances they find themselves in.