Lectures

This page contains link to the lectures I give throughout the semester. Clicking the title of the week’s lecture will go to a PDF, embedded in the user’s browser, by default. The bottom right icons link to the Github directory for the lecture (), the R Markdown document for the lecture (), and a PDF, embedded on Github, for the lecture ().

• Syllabus Day (i.e. Welcome)
  tl;dr: This lecture discusses the syllabus and outlines course expectations for the rest of the semester.      
• Whither War? An Empirical Assessment of the Patterns of War
  tl;dr: An overview of what inter-state war typically looks like, with a discussion of the 'decline of war' hypothesis.      
• Power and the Realisms
  tl;dr: Power is a core component of neorealist arguments, but neorealist arguments are poorly stated.      
• Power Transition Theory and an Empirical Analysis of Power and Conflict
  tl;dr: Power tranisition theory is an alternative to neorealism. Empirically, the relationship between power and conflict isn't so clear.      
• Contiguity as a Correlate of Conflict
  tl;dr: Contiguity is the classic control variable, and it's a correlate of conflict onset (not escalation/severity).      
• Territorial Conflict
  tl;dr: Most wars are fought over territory and contiguity is just a rough proxy for that.      
• The Democratic Peace
  tl;dr: Democracies do not fight each other, and almost never in war, but are not really more peaceful in general.      
• Critiquing the Democratic Peace
  tl;dr: The democratic peace is a fact still in search of a good explanation.      
• Alliances: What Are They and Why Form Them?
  tl;dr: Alliances exchange some autonomy for some security and are largely born from shared institutions/culture/threat.      
• Are Alliances Paths to Peace or Steps to War?
  tl;dr: Do defense pacts deter or provoke? Depends a lot on how you try to answer the question.      
• What is an Arms Race?
  tl;dr: An imporant topic with great historical interest, the 'arms race' is still a bit tricky to understand.      
• Do Arms Races Lead to War?
  tl;dr: Yes, they do, even if there is reason to doubt Wallace's (1979) methodology and results.      
• War Outcomes
  tl;dr: Most wars are not 'total wars'. Several end in stalemates. We know a bit why, but we could know more.      
• The Consequences of War
  tl;dr: The consequences of war are multifaceted, short-term and permanent... even positive and negative.      
• Rivalry and International Conflict
  tl;dr: Conflict is not IID and states that fight once are likely to see the other side as threats, or 'rivals', and fight again.      
• What Do We Know About Rivalry and International Conflict?
  tl;dr: Rivals are more likely to fight than non-rivals, but variation of conflict within rivalry is not as well understood.      
• Why Care About Leaders and Conflict?
  tl;dr: 'States' don't make decisions for war; leaders do. Recent research has sought to remove leaders from the proverbial error term.      
• Leader Turnover, Leader Attributes, and Conflict
  tl;dr: Beyond survival incentives, leader turnover and leader attributes also shape conflict patterns.      
• How Do States Pay for War?
  tl;dr: Debt, mostly, and there are reasons for that.      
• What is 'Cyber Conflict?'
  tl;dr: It's a tactic for weaker-but-still sophisticated states to signal discontent with their rivals.      
• Is 'Cyber Conflict' the Future of Inter-State Conflict?
  tl;dr: Sure? But don't expect a 'cyber war' in the conventional sense since cyber conflict has limited coercive value.      
• What Do We Know About War? Wrapping Up
  tl;dr: Let's review what we know about war after this semester and riff on future questions and future issues.