IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/jocore/v27y1983i1p137-159.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Conceptualizing “Warâ€

Author

Listed:
  • Benjamin A. Most

    (Department of Political Science, University of Iowa)

  • Harvey Starr

    (Department of Political Science, Indiana University)

Abstract

The purpose of this discussion is to focus on two problems that appear to have hindered the development of a solution to what Zinnes (1978, 1980) has termed the “puzzle†regarding the war proneness of nations. Specifically, it suggests that scholars who are interested in understanding and explaining international conflict should recognize: (1) While many analysts have focused on factors internal to nations—“national attributes†—as possibly sufficient conditions for war, the existence of such relationships is logically precluded by the way in which analysts have defined wars. (2) While scholars are trained to search for generalizable patterns that hold both through time and across space and often seem to believe that the isolation of such associations is the sine qua non of the systematic analysis of international conflict, simple logic and already existing theory suggest that patterns of that variety may not in fact exist. While neither of these contentions is original or complex, it is argued that a general failure to understand or recognize such rather basic, logical problems has impeded the development of a base of verifiable, replicable, and generalizable knowledge about the causes of international conflict.

Suggested Citation

  • Benjamin A. Most & Harvey Starr, 1983. "Conceptualizing “Warâ€," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 27(1), pages 137-159, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jocore:v:27:y:1983:i:1:p:137-159
    DOI: 10.1177/0022002783027001005
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0022002783027001005
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0022002783027001005?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. de Mesquita, Bruce Bueno, 1980. "An Expected Utility Theory of International Conflict," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 74(4), pages 917-931, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Michael Nicholson, 1987. "The Conceptual Bases of The War Trap," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 31(2), pages 346-369, June.
    2. Phil Henrickson, 2020. "Predicting the costs of war," The Journal of Defense Modeling and Simulation, , vol. 17(3), pages 285-308, July.
    3. James Lee Ray, 1982. "Understanding Rummel," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 26(1), pages 161-187, March.
    4. Marandici, Ion, 2022. "Loss Aversion, Neo-imperial Frames and Territorial Expansion: Using Prospect Theory to Examine the Annexation of Crimea," MPRA Paper 117208, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. C. R. Mitchell & Michael Nicholson, 1983. "Rational Models and the Ending of Wars," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 27(3), pages 495-520, September.
    6. Bakaki Zorzeta, 2016. "Fossil Fuel Rents: Who Initiates International Crises?," Peace Economics, Peace Science, and Public Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 22(2), pages 173-190, April.
    7. Frank Lehrbass & Valentin Weinhold, 2016. "A rationalist explanation of Russian risk-taking," Economics of Peace and Security Journal, EPS Publishing, vol. 11(1), pages 5-11, April.
    8. Jason B Scholz & Gregory J Calbert & Glen A Smith, 2011. "Unravelling Bueno De Mesquita’s group decision model," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 23(4), pages 510-531, October.
    9. Kjell Hausken, 2018. "A cost–benefit analysis of terrorist attacks," Defence and Peace Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(2), pages 111-129, February.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:jocore:v:27:y:1983:i:1:p:137-159. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://pss.la.psu.edu/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.