Promises under Pressure: Reassurance and Burden-Sharing in Asymmetric Alliances

Great power patrons frequently reassure allies of their protection, whether by stationing troops abroad, visiting allied countries, or making public statements. In the case of the United States, observers and practitioners alike have emphasized the need to instill confidence in U.S. allies. However, allied reassurance is fundamentally puzzling because it gives away a key source of bargaining leverage: the threat of abandonment. Patrons should ideally strive to limit the extent to which they are perceived as committed to allies, lest they encourage allies to free-ride on their protection and contribute little to the common defense. Existing literature tends to either treat reassurance as a secondary effect of deterrence, or to focus on understanding how patrons can reassure their allies rather than why. Studies that do provide explanations for reassurance, for their part, often regard reassurance as strategically suboptimal, and emphasize domestic political factors that drive reassurance. The causes of reassurance are thus poorly understood. I argue that although reassurance can have adverse consequences, patrons have incentives to reassure to the extent that allies have the capacity to exit the alliance. The more credible an ally’s threat to pursue outside options, and the more costs that doing so would impose on the patron, the more reassurance it will receive. Patrons thus face a dilemma, trading off between withholding reassurance to drive hard bargains with allies and reassuring allies to dissuade them from exiting the alliance. This dilemma may be mitigated, however, if a patron can make its assurances conditional on allied burden-sharing by combining its assurances with threats of abandonment. These threats are more potent to the extent that a patron faces domestic pressure to retrench from its foreign commitments, and that allies face severe threat environments. I test the theory using a mixed-method approach that combines statistical analysis of an original dataset on American reassurance and allied burden-sharing between 1950 and 2010 with qualitative historical case studies. In Chapters 1 and 2, I introduce the concepts of alliance reassurance and burden-sharing and review the literature on both concepts. I argue that reassurance is puzzling in light of existing theories of alliance bargaining which stress the threat of abandonment as a source of leverage. The “reassurance dilemma” that patrons face, however, is that withholding reassurance may encourage allies to distance themselves from the alliance and seek outside options. In Chapter 3, I present a theory of bargaining leverage in asymmetric alliances in order to identify the conditions under which this dilemma is most severe—and thus to explain variation in patron reassurance and allied burden-sharing. I posit that reassurance serves the purpose of discouraging allies from leaving the alliance; the more credible allies’ threats of exit, the more reassurance they will receive. However, patrons can make their assurances conditional on allies’ burden-sharing efforts if their own threat of exiting the alliance is credible as well. I present a simple formal model illustrating both the tradeoffs between reassurance and burden-sharing, as well as the conditions under which patrons are more likely to reassure and allies are more likely to increase their contributions to the alliance. I then introduce hypotheses for testing the theory’s observable implications. Chapter 4 presents the quantitative analysis on the determinants of patron reassurance and allied burden-sharing. First, using an original dataset of U.S. reassurance collected and analyzed with automated text analysis, I use statistical models to identify correlates of U.S. willingness to offer reassurances. Second, I study allied burden-sharing using data on allies’ military spending, support for U.S. military bases, and participation in U.S. foreign military interventions. The quantitative findings strongly support the theory; the United States reassures allies that are at greater risk of exiting the alliance more, while allies more dependent on U.S. protection also spend more on defense, provide more compensation for the costs of U.S. military bases, and participate in U.S. foreign military interventions at a greater rate. In Chapters 5-8, I conduct case studies on U.S. reassurance and burden-sharing pressure toward West Germany, Japan, South Korea, and the United Kingdom during the 1960s and 1970s. Process-tracing of these cases shows that the United States saw reassurance as a way of discouraging its allies from pursuing outside options—in particular nuclear weapons and rapprochement with the Soviet Union. However, the United States was simultaneously able to extract significant burden-sharing efforts, especially from West Germany and South Korea owing to their geographic vulnerability, and during the early 1970s due to doubts about U.S. reliability in the aftermath of the Vietnam War. Finally, Chapter 9 concludes with a summary of the analysis, as well as a discussion of implications and avenues for future research. My findings suggest that by withholding reassurance and deliberately casting doubt on its protection, a patron makes its allies prone to reconsidering their reliance on it and to instead pursue outside options

Surveillance by Algorithm: The NSA, Computerized Intelligence Collection, and Human Rights

ISIS’s cultivation of social media has reinforced states’ interest in using automated surveillance. However, automated surveillance using artificial intelligence (“machine learning”) techniques has also sharpened privacy concerns that have been acute since Edward Snowden’s disclosures. This Article examines machine-based surveillance by the NSA and other intelligence agencies through the prism of international human rights. Two camps have clashed on the human rights implications of machine surveillance abroad. The state-centric camp argues that human rights agreements like the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) do not apply extraterritorially. Moreover, the state-centric camp insists, machine surveillance is inherently unintrusive, like a dog seeing a human step out of the shower. Surveillance critics respond that machine and human access to data are equivalent invasions of privacy and legal protections must be equal for individuals within a state’s borders and nonnationals overseas. In a controversial recent decision, Schrems v. Data Protection Commissioner, the European Court of Justice appeared to side with surveillance’s critics. This Article argues that both the state-centric and critical positions are flawed. This Article agrees with surveillance critics that the ICCPR applies extraterritorially. Machine access to data can cause both ontological harm, stemming from individuals’ loss of spontaneity, and consequential harm, stemming from errors that machines compound in databases such as no-fly lists. However, the Schrems decision went too far by failing to acknowledge that human rights law provides states with a measure of deference in confronting threats such as ISIS. Deference on overseas surveillance is particularly appropriate given U.N. Security Council resolutions urging states to deny terrorists safe havens. But deference cannot be absolute. To provide appropriate safeguards, this Article recommends that machine searches abroad be tailored to compelling state purposes, scientifically validated, and subject to independent review

Top-Managers of Foreign Multinational Enterprises in Mexico : Socialization, Leadership Style and Impact

This study focuses on the top-managers who run the subsidiaries of foreign multinational enterprises (MNEs) in Mexico. While some of them are Mexican, others are foreigners who have been sent from the countries of origin of their enterprises. The thesis explores and compares the socialization, worldviews, values, identities and social distinction practices of these top-managers and investigates the intercultural interactions, identity, struggles and communication problems between Mexican and expatriate managers. In addition, the relationship and misunderstandings between foreign managers and local workers are taken into account. Furthermore, the impact of foreign multinational enterprises and foreign business elites on their local employees, their families and communities, and on Mexican society as a whole is examined. The question Are foreign multinational enterprises and elites agents of cultural and institutional change and, if so, which impact do they have on Mexican society? is addressed

The Private School Advantage: Evidence from School Vouchers and Educational Leadership

School choice is becoming increasingly popular around the globe. Broadly the term ‘school choice’ is used to describe the options available for families to send children to school(s) other than the one they are residentially assigned to. Private school choice interventions known as ‘school vouchers,’ offer public or private funding to enable families to send their children to private school. Research in 1970s and 80s by James Coleman and his colleagues showed a private school advantage in student achievement and graduation rates, in comparison to traditional public schools. Competing evidence was presented by Christopher Lubienski and Sarah Lubienski in 2013, claiming a public school advantage in student achievement. The debates surrounding a particular school sector advantage can be better addressed using causal evidence and using large datasets to understand possible mechanisms that differentiate the school sectors. This dissertation reports on four analyses of the possibility of a private school advantage, using a variety of data. The first study looks at overall evidence on student achievement in math and reading scores from causal studies on private school vouchers around the globe. The second study offers a supplemental cost-effectiveness evaluation of the same set of voucher programs. In the third study, nationally representative data on public and private school principals is analyzed to study principal autonomy over seven school-level activities across school sectors. Using the same dataset, the fourth study examines the determinants of principal attrition across school sectors. Principals’ stated responses to stay in the profession in the baseline year are compared to their revealed status a year later. Some contributions of this dissertation are evidence of vouchers increasing reading test scores more in comparison to math test scores and a larger test score impact in developing countries than in the U.S. The dissertation finds more autonomy over school-level activities and more likelihood to remain in the profession for the private school principal in comparison to the traditional public school principal. Hence, future studies may test the role of principal autonomy and principals’ remaining in the profession as a mediator of school choice outcomes