ICBeLLM: High Quality International Events Data with Open Source Large Language Models on Consumer Hardware

The International Crises Behavior Events (ICBe) ontology provides high coverage over the thoughts, communications, and actions that constitute international relations. A major disadvantage of that level of detail is that it requires large human capital costs to apply it manually to new texts. Whether such an ontolgy is practical for international relations research given limited human and financial resources is a pressing concern. We introduce a working proof of concept showing that ICBe codings can be reliably extracted from new texts using the current generation of open source large language models (LLM) running on consumer grade computer hardware. Our solution requires no finetuning and only limited prompt engineering. We detail our solution and present benchmarks against the original ICBe codings. We conclude by discussing the implications of very high quality event coding of any text being within reach of individual researchers with limited resources

Extended deterrence dilemmas in the grey zone: transatlantic insights on Baltic security challenges

This is the final version. Available from De Gruyter via the DOI in this record.Should the U.S. respond with military means to a limited Russian incursion in the Baltics? This paper explores Western public and expert attitudes towards such a hypothetical grey zone crisis. Using survey experiments and crisis simulations we find considerable reluctance to use military tools and channels in order to support a Baltic ally, and surprisingly little variation across the audiences. We also find that the understanding of Baltic regional realities in the U.S. and Western Europe, although gradually increasing, remains limited. The underlying reluctance to get the U.S. involved in an armed conflict with Russia in the hopes that such acquiescence may help preserve global stability indicates that the conflict in Ukraine only had a fundamentally limited impact on Western strategic thought vis-à-vis deterring Russia. The study points to young Democrats as the most likely prospective supporters of armed defense of the Baltic region (as opposed to Republicans traditionally approached by Baltic lobbyists), suggesting a due shift in Transatlantic engagement

The Myth of Cyberwar: Bringing War in Cyberspace Back Down to Earth

Cyberwar has been described as a revolution in military affairs, a transformation of technology and doctrine capable of overturning the prevailing world order. This characterization of the threat from cyberwar, however, reflects a common tendency to conflate means and ends; studying what could happen in cyberspace (or anywhere else) makes little sense without considering how conflict over the internet is going to realize objectives commonly addressed by terrestrial warfare. To supplant established modes of conflict, cyberwar must be capable of furthering the political ends to which force or threats of force are commonly applied, something that in major respects cyberwar fails to do. As such, conflict over the internet is much more likely to serve as an adjunct to, rather than a substitute for, existing modes of terrestrial force. Indeed, rather than threatening existing political hierarchies, cyberwar is much more likely to simply augment the advantages of status quo powers. </jats:p

Networked international politics

Network theory and methods are becoming increasingly used to study the causes and consequences of conflict. Network analysis allows researchers to develop a better understanding of the causal dynamics and structural geometry of the complex web of interdependencies at work in the onset, incidence, and diffusion of conflict and peace. This issue features new theoretical and empirical research demonstrating how properly accounting for networked interdependencies has profound implications for our understanding of the processes thought to be responsible for the conflict behavior of state and non-state actors. The contributors examine the variation in networks of states and transnational actors to explain outcomes related to international conflict and peace. They highlight how networked interdependencies affect conflict and cooperation in a broad range of areas at the center of international relations scholarship. It is helpful to distinguish between three uses of networks, namely: (1) as theoretical tools, (2) as measurement tools, and (3) as inferential tools. The introduction discusses each of these uses and shows how the contributions rely on one or several of them. Next, Monte Carlo simulations are used to illustrate one of the strengths of network analysis, namely that it helps researchers avoid biased inferences when the data generating process underlying the observed data contains extradyadic interdependencies. </jats:p

Environmental changes and violent conflict

This letter reviews the scientific literature on whether and how environmental changes affect the risk of violent conflict. The available evidence from qualitative case studies indicates that environmental stress can contribute to violent conflict in some specific cases. Results from quantitative large-N studies, however, strongly suggest that we should be careful in drawing general conclusions. Those large-N studies that we regard as the most sophisticated ones obtain results that are not robust to alternative model specifications and, thus, have been debated. This suggests that environmental changes may, under specific circumstances, increase the risk of violent conflict, but not necessarily in a systematic way and unconditionally. Hence there is, to date, no scientific consensus on the impact of environmental changes on violent conflict. This letter also highlights the most important challenges for further research on the subject. One of the key issues is that the effects of environmental changes on violent conflict are likely to be contingent on a set of economic and political conditions that determine adaptation capacity. In the authors' view, the most important indirect effects are likely to lead from environmental changes via economic performance and migration to violent conflict. © 2012 IOP Publishing Ltd

The Rise of Market-Capitalism and the Roots of Anti-American Terrorism

We examine the role of market-capitalism in anti-American terrorism, differentiating between level- and rate-of-change-effects associated with market-capitalist development and their respective relationship with anti-U.S. violence. Using panel data for 149 countries between 1970 and 2007, we find that higher levels of capitalist development - consistent with the capitalist-peace literature - coincide with less anti-American terrorism, while the marketization process has inflammatory effects on anti-American terrorism. These findings are further corroborated by system-level time-series evidence. We argue that a higher level of market-capitalism is associated with less anti-American terrorism by creating economic interdependencies and a convergence of pro-peace values and institutions, while the destabilizing effects of the marketization process may stem from the violent opposition of various anti-market interest groups to economic, politico-institutional and cultural change initiated by a transition towards a market economy. These interest groups deliberately target the U.S. as the main proponent of modern capitalism, globalization and modernity, where anti-American terrorism serves the purpose of consolidating their respective societal position. Our findings that the U.S. may ultimately become a less likely target of transnational terrorism through the establishment of market economies, but should not disregard the disruptive political, economic and cultural effects of the marketization process in noncapitalist societies

THE LIBERAL PEACE: CHALLENGES TO DEVELOPMENT, DEMOCRACY AND SOFT POWER

The term “liberal” peace refers to the absence of fatal conflict between democratic nations, which are also economically interdependent. This chapter sketches the ideal and economic versions of the liberal peace theory. Policies promoting globalization may engender social conflict risks, as they produce inequality. In developed countries, we are witnessing the rise of populism, and the rolling back of the liberal aspects of democracy in developing countries. The avoidance of these problems requires careful management such that growth is broad-based, and policies promoting greater openness are sufficiently cushioned to protect losers. It is also necessary to manage globalization, and limit its negative impact on domestic social contracts, particularly when it comes to inequality, worker rights, and fiscal austerity

State Control and the Effects of Foreign Relations on Bilateral Trade

Do states use trade to reward and punish partners? WTO rules and the pressures of globalization restrict states’ capacity to manipulate trade policies, but we argue that governments can link political goals with economic outcomes using less direct avenues of influence over firm behavior. Where governments intervene in markets, politicization of trade is likely to occur. In this paper, we examine one important form of government control: state ownership of firms. Taking China and India as examples, we use bilateral trade data by firm ownership type, as well as measures of bilateral political relations based on diplomatic events and UN voting to estimate the effect of political relations on import and export flows. Our results support the hypothesis that imports controlled by state-owned enterprises (SOEs) exhibit stronger responsiveness to political relations than imports controlled by private enterprises. A more nuanced picture emerges for exports; while India’s exports through SOEs are more responsive to political tensions than its flows through private entities, the opposite is true for China. This research holds broader implications for how we should think about the relationship between political and economic relations going forward, especially as a number of countries with partially state-controlled economies gain strength in the global economy

Regime Type and Bilateral Treaty Formalization

How does domestic regime type affect bilateral cooperation, and one of its most visible manifestations, bilateral treaties? This article explains how domestic political regime affects bilateral cooperation and, contrary to the expectations of some scholars, why autocracies should be expected to be more likely than democracies to enter into bilateral treaties. If the preferences of a pair of states are not identical, the sets of agreements that each party would consent to (win-sets) need to overlap for a bilateral treaty to be acceptable. Because additional domestic constraints reduce the size of a country’s win-set, autocracies should have broader win-sets than democracies. Therefore, autocratic dyads should be more likely to formalize bilateral treaties than other pairs of states. Based on an original data set, I present empirical evidence showing that pairs of autocracies are more likely than other pairs of states to enter into agreements formalizing bilateral cooperation