Realism, Game Theory and Cooperation

Trustees of Princeton University
Realism, Game Theory, and Cooperation

Author(s): Robert Jervis
Source: World Politics, Vol. 40, No. 3 (Apr., 1988), pp. 317-349
Published by: Cambridge University Press
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REALISM, GAME THEORY, AND

COOPERATION
By ROBERT JERVIS *
VER sinceThucydides,
scholarshaveemphasizedthatinternational
politics is shaped by the anarchical contextin which it takes place.

The perniciouseffectof what JohnHerz called the securitydilemmathe factthatmost of the ways in which a countryseeks to increaseits securityhave the unintendedeffectof decreasingthe securityof othersalso is familiar,and indeed, also can be found in Thucydides: "What
made war inevitable was the growth of Athenian power and the fear
which this caused in Sparta." In view of such dynamics,how can states
cooperate? Recentanalyseshave formalizedtheseproblemsand analyzed
themby means of modern social sciencetechniques.'
The work arisesfromtheintersectionof Realism and game theory.Although common interestsare stressedmore than in some formsof Realism,the basic assumptionsclearlyfitwithinthisschool: thefocusis on the
stateas an actor2and on the strategiesthatcan rationallybe used to further its interests.The studies use simple game-theorymodels, or what
Barry O'Neill calls "proto-game theory,"3in order to gain the insights
* I am gratefulfor commentsby Robert Art, JohnConybeare,Jeffrey

Frieden, Joanne
Gowa, JosephGrieco, Ernst Haas, StanleyHoffmann,Stephen Krasner,Deborah Larson,
Fred Lawson, Helen Milner,RichardNelson, and JackSnyder.
JohnHertz, "Idealist Internationalism
and the SecurityDilemma," WorldPolitics2 (January I950), I57-80; Thucydides,The PeloponnesianWar,trans.by Rex Warner (Harmondsworth,U.K.: Penguin, I954), 25. The recentliteratureis summarizedand extendedin World
Politics38 (October i985), also published as Kenneth Oye, ed., CooperationunderAnarchy
(Princeton: PrincetonUniversityPress, i986). The frameworkused grows out of Robert
Axelrod, The Evolutionof Cooperation(New York: Basic Books, i984); RobertJervis,"CooperationundertheSecurityDilemma," WorldPolitics30 (JanuaryI978), i67-214; and Robert
Keohane, AfterHegemony(Princeton:PrincetonUniversityPress, i984). Related arguments
are made by Michael Taylor,Anarchyand Cooperation(New York: Wiley, I976). Although
the subject matteris the same as that treatedin Hedley Bull, The AnarchicalSociety(New
York: Columbia UniversityPress,I977), Bull's approachis different
and his work is notcited
in thisliterature.For argumentsthatBull providesa betterfoundationforunderstandinginternationalpoliticsthan does the work analyzed here, see Hayward Alker, Jr.,"The Presumptionof Anarchyin World Politics,"and RichardAshley,"Hedley Bull and theAnarchy
Problematique,"both in Alker and Ashley,eds.,AfterRealism:Anarchy,
Power,and InternationalCollaboration(forthcoming).
See Charles Lipson, "Bankers' Dilemmas: PrivateCooperation in ReschedulingSoverfor an analysisof non-stateactors
eign Debts," WorldPolitics38 (October i985), 200-225,
withinthisframework.
3 O'Neill, "Game Theory and theStudyof DeterrenceofWar," in RobertAxelrod,Robert
in Deterrence,
forthcoming.
Jervis,Roy Radner,and Paul Stern,eds.,Perspectives

318
WORLD POLITICS
and rigorthatstem fromformalization.But the formalizationis limited:

what is most importantis the basic structureof the game and the analogies thatare provided.4Game theoryand Realism are generallycompatible-both are structural,strategic,and rational-but each has its own
vulnerabilities.Thus, some of my criticismscan be tracedmore to problems with Realism, othersmore to problemswith game theory.But my
focus is on the work thatexemplifiesthe intersectionof the two; it is not
a full-blowncritiqueof the entiretyof eitherapproach.
Drawing on the conceptsof the iteratedPrisoners'Dilemma (PD) and
public goods,5the basic question posed by the recentwork is how selfinterestedactorscan cooperate in the faceof anarchyand importantconflictinginterests.By takingtwo actorsand positingthateach of themhas
only two choices (cooperatingwithor defectingfromtheother),an interestingworld emergesin which fouroutcomesare possible.They are preferredby the actorin the followingorder:first,theactordefectswhile the
other cooperates (DC), thus allowing the formerto gain an advantage;
second, both actors cooperate (CC); third,both may defect(DD), thus
producing competition;the fourthand worstoutcome would be forthe
actor to cooperate while the otherdefects(CD) and therebyexploitshim.
What makes thisconfigurationdisturbingis thateven ifeach side prefers
CC to DD (and each knows thatthisis the other'spreference),the result
can be DD because each is drivenby thehope of gainingitsfirstchoicewhich would be to exploit the other (DC) and its fear that,if it cooperates,the otherwill exploitit (CD).
When a good idea like thiscomes along,our exuberanceat findingnew
insightsleads us to extendand applyit widely,postponinga consideration
of problemsand limitations.To some extentthisis functional:as Albert
4 For contrastingevaluationsof thepotentialof higherformsofgame theory,see ibid.,and
Duncan Snidal, "The Game Theoryof InternationalPolitics," WorldPolitics38 (October
i985),
25-57.
For an excellentgeneraldiscussion,see Thomas Schelling,"What is Game Theory?" in Schelling,Choice and Consequence(Cambridge: Harvard UniversityPress, i984),
2I3-I4.
5 The relationshipbetweenPD and public goods is technical,complex,and subjectto dispute. See JohnConybeare,"Public Goods, Prisoners'Dilemma, and theInternationalPolitical
Economy,"International
StudiesQuarterly28 (March i984), 5-22, and RussellHardin, CollectiveAction(Baltimore:The JohnsHopkins UniversityPress,i982),
i6-30. The essentialsimilaritybetween the two thatis relevanthere is thatthe equilibriumsolutionis non-optimal.
That is, in the absence of devices to avoid thisoutcome,individualself-interested
rationality
leads each actor to be worse offthan he could have been ifall playershad acted differently.
This is true even thoughpublic goods are characterizedby non-rivalry
of consumptionand
non-excludability-two dimensionsthat can be distinguished:see Duncan Snidal, "Public
StudiesQuarterly
Goods, PropertyRights,and PoliticalOrganizations,"International
23
(DecemberI979), 532-66-in contrastto two-personPDs thathave bothrivalryand excludability.
When large numbersare involvedin a PD, as theyare in the Tragedy of the Commons,excludabilityis precluded and the situationcan be consideredas one of a public good thathas
of non-excludability
but not non-rivalry.
These distinctions
are important
the characteristics
in manyanalyses,but theyare not centralhere.

REALISM, GAME THEORY,
AND COOPERATION
319
Hirschman has noted,in many cases we would not startwhat will prove
at thebeginto be a fruitfulenterpriseifwe were aware of thedifficulties
ning.6But ifwe ignorethe problemsin theearlystages,we may overreact
and rejectthe entireapproach when theybecome obvious later.It would
be more productiveif scholars simultaneouslyexplored the potentialof
and the problems with the approach. Since the potentialhas been discussed elsewhere(see fn. I), I will concentrateon the problems.
Three strengthsthat have made thisresearchstimulatingand importantshould be noted,however.First,it builds upon centralcharacteristics
of internationalpolitics-anarchy, the securitydilemma,and the combination of common and conflictinginterests.Second, the approach is parsimonious and lends itselfto deductive theorizing.Third, it seeks to
bringtogetherthestudyof conflictand thestudyofcooperation,and tries
to explain a wide range of phenomena encompassingboth securityand
politicaleconomy.The deterringof exploitationmay be as relevantto the
stabilityof monetarysystemsas to armscontrol;strategiesbywhich states
can gain the benefitsof mutual cooperationmay be as importantfornuclear posturesas forinternationaltrade.Indeed, as thelinksto the theory
of public goods indicate, the propositionsproduced should apply to a
wide range of cases outside of internationalpolitics.
It is not a good sign,however,thatprisonersconfrontedby a District
Attorneydo not behave as the model would lead us to expect.7In order
to apply the framework,we have toassumemanyoftheelementsof world
politics that in fact are most problematical.The actor's values, preferences, beliefs,and definitionof self all are exogenous to the model and
must be provided before analysis can begin.8 If they were straightforward,the analysis of internationalpoliticswould be much simpler.
They thereforeneed to be investigatedand explained,nottakenas givens.
Adoption of stereotypicalRealist assumptionscan supplysome of the inputs the analysisrequires,but I will argue thatthisis not completelysatisfactory.
CHOICE AND CONTEXT
Perhaps the most importantlimitationof the work on anarchyis that

it looks at individual actors,theirpreferences,
and theirchoices,and thus
6 Hirschman'sdiscussionof what he calls the "hidinghand" is in hisDevelopment
Projects
Observed(Washington,DC: BrookingsInstitution,i967), 9-34.
7 Brian Forstand Judith
Lucianovic,"The Prisoner'sDilemma: Theoryand Reality,"Journal of CriminalJustice
5 (Spring I977), 55-64.
8 The model also assumesthatstatescan fruitfully
be consideredas unitaryactors.The debatesover thisissue,althoughimportant,
are so well knownthattheywill onlybe touchedon
here.

320
WORLD POLITICS
blindsus to thebroadersettingin whichbehavioroccurs.Problemsarise

in a contextand out ofa history,
and notall patterns
are theproductof
carefulor evenconsciouschoice.Justas in mostofoureveryday
liveswe
carryout routines,so statesalso continueestablished
policieswithlittle
calculationor thought.9
Each new daydoes notbringa new beginning;
severerestrictions
are placedon us by theexpectations-including
our
own expectations
about ourselves-thatconstitute
the contextwithin
whichwe mustbehave.
Whenclearpointsofchoiceoccur,theyareoftenstructured
bythesettingsin whichtheyarise.The timingofdecisionsand eventsis important
and at leastpartially
beyonda decisionmaker'scontrol.
For example,the
productionschedulefornew nuclearsubmarineshas periodically
presentedPresidentReaganwiththechoiceofwhetherto abidebytheunratifiedSALT ii Treatyand destroya usablebutoldermissle-launching
or tobreakat leastpartofthisagreement.
submarine,
The dateon which
thesedecisionshad tobe madewas in partan arbitrary
productofindustrialvagaries.'oFurthermore,
unexpectedeventsmayoccurat thesame
timeas thedecision,and forcethemselves
on thestatesmen's
feelings
and
calculations.Thus, by strainingthe NATO alliance,Reagan'sair strike
againstLibyain Aprili986 mayhavemadeitharderforhimtobreakthe
treatyat thedecisionpointsixweekslater.In turn,thisdecisiongreatly
on Reaganto takea tougherpositionat thenext
increasedthepressures
choicepointin late i986."1Similarly,
theUnitedStatesmighthavemade
more of an effortto cooperate with the Soviet Union in banning MIRVS
had it notbeensimultaneously
overABMS.Anotherexample
negotiating
is thatAmericancooperationwiththeMarielboatlift
of refugeesfrom
Cuba was reducedbytheaccidents
ofa changeinrelevant
laws-adopted
forunrelatedreasons-and a largesimultaneous
fromHaiti
emigration
to the U.S.12
More generally,issues arise in particularhistoricalcontextsthatshape
9 JamesRosenau stressesthe role of habitsin "BeforeCooperation: Hegemons, Regimes,

Organization40 (Autumn i986),
and Habit-Driven Actors in World Politics,"International
86i-70.
- Michael Gordon, "Air Force's Delay Said to Keep U.S. to '79 Arms Limit,"New York
Times,August 29, i986.
--Michael Gordon, "Reagan Declares U.S. Is DismantlingTwo Nuclear Subs," New York
Times,May 28, i986; also see Gordon, "U.S. Still Divided on I979 Arms Treaty,"New York
Times,April 23, i986. When the U.S. did break the limits,some criticsheld thatone motive
overtheIran armsdeal, whichhad justbeen revealed,would
was to show thatthecontroversy
not inhibitthe administrationfromactingdecisively.Michael Gordon,"U.S. Exceeds Limit
Set in I979 Accord on StrategicArms,"New YorkTimes,November29, i986.
12 JorgeDominguez, "Cooperating with the Enemy: U.S. ImmigrationPolicies toward
Policyand U.S. ForeignRelationswithLatin
Cuba," in ChristopherMitchell,ed., Immigration
America(forthcoming).For additional examples,see Glenn Seaborg with Benjamin Loeb,
StemmingtheTide (Lexington,MA: LexingtonBooks, I987), I2, I58.

AND COOPERATION
321
aregivennotonlyby
preferences
and behavior.The operating
incentives
but also by how thesecircumstances
the presentcircumstances,
came
about.Wheretheplayersare is strongly
influenced
bywheretheyhave
been.'3Thus theU.S. decisionto respondwithforceimmedately
to the
seizureof theMayaguezis to be explainedlargelyby thefactthatthis
afterthefallof Vietnam,whenU.S. leadersbeeventoccurredshortly
to showothersthatthepreviousdelievedthattheyhad toactforcefully
to use force.Similarly,
feathad not underminedAmericanwillingness
one reasonwhyBritaincouldnotcooperatewithGermanyand restrain
Russiain 1914 was thatshehad doneso in thepreviouscrisisand feared
thata repetition
woulddestroytheTripleEntente.In othercases,defecin one interaction
tionor cooperation
willlead to moreofthesame.Cooperationcan changethe situationtheactorsface,and theirbeliefs,in
ways that-makefurthercooperationmore likely.Perhapsmore frewill lead each side to fearand
quently,theprocessof mutualdefection
disliketheother,and to developdistorted
viewsof it,whichcannotbe
iftheothersuddenlybeginstocooperate.'4
Actorsdo not
quicklyreversed
stimulustheyface.'5
reactmerelyto theimmediate
Dilemma.ButthisforWe oftentalkofrepeatedplaysofa Prisoners'
and beliefsoftheactors,and
mulationis misleading
whenthepreferences
thenatureofthegameitself,
changeas it is played.Whatis at stakeand
thenatureof theissueis definedovertime,as actorsdeveloptheirpositions,in partin responseto thepositions
takenbyothers.As one Senator
explainedhisvotetopermittheexportofadvancedarmstoSaudiArabia:
The wholeissuechangedin thelastweekor io days.The mediabeganto
playit up as a questioninvolvingthepresident's
abilitytoconductforeign
policy.... Had it notbeenforthemediahype,theissuewouldhavebeen
the arms sale. And I would have been verycomfortable
strictly
voting
againstit."''6
I For a nice example taken fromthe patternof social relationswithina
communityof
chimpanzees,see JaneGoodall, The Chimpanzeesof Gombe (Cambridge: Belknap Press of
Harvard UniversityPress, i986), 337-38.
1 See the discussionof the "spiral model" in RobertJervis,
Perception
and Misperception
in
International
Politics(Princeton:PrincetonUniversityPress,I976), 62-84. For argumentsthat
one or two instancesof cooperationare not likelyto be sufficient
to break thesespirals,see
Charles Osgood, An Alternativeto War or Surrender(Urbana: Universityof Illinois Press,
I962).
15For a discussionof a parallel in biologicalevolution,see StephenJayGould, "Not Necessarilya Wing," NaturalHistory94 (November i985), 12-25. Also see Gould, "Of Kiwi Eggs
and the LibertyBell," NaturalHistory95 (November i986), 22-29. The argumentthatstructuresshape and limitlaterdevelopmentis in sharpcontrastto the standardevolutionaryassertionthat naturalselectionoperatesin a way thatprovidesthe bestfitbetweenorganisms
and theirpresentenvironment.
6 Quoted in RichardFenno, Jr.,"Observation,Context,and Sequence in theStudyof Politics,"AmericanPoliticalScienceReview 8o (March I986), I I-I2.

WORLD POLITICS
322
The moves in a game can change it. Chicken can become Prisoners'Dilemma if each side's behavior leads the other to believe that being exploited would be worse than mutual defection.Schellingnotes: "When a
boy pulls a switch-bladeknifeon his teacher,the teacheris likelyto feel,
whatever the point at issue originallywas, that the overridingpolicy
question now is his behavior in the face of a switch-bladechallenge."'7
Other objectionscan be grouped under threeheadings,each of which
has threecomponents.The firstsetof questionsconcernstheactors'preferences,which need to be probed and explained. The second deals with
the conceptsemployedby the framework,which may turnout to be ambiguous or troublesome. The third set involves the causes and consequences of the actors' perceptions,beliefs,and values. The representations of reality employed often beg crucial questions. Like many
experiments,the models oftengain internalvalidityat thecostof external
validity:the order theyimpose is too rigid to catch the realitytheyseek
to explain.
PREFERENCES
AND PREFERENCE
ORDERS
As noted, the central question for the work on anarchy is how cooperationis possiblewhen actorsare in a Prisoners'Dilemma-i.e., when
theyhave the followingpreferenceorder: exploitingor takingadvantage
of the other,mutual cooperation,mutual defection,and being exploited.
The most importantissue may be not what happens afterthese preferences have been established,but the preferencesthemselves.Much of the
explanatory"action" takes place in the formationof the preferences;we
cannot affordto leave thistopic offstage.Three questionsneed to be addressed: How do we know what the actors'preferencesare? What is the
patternof distributionof preferencesover large number of cases? How
are preferencesestablished?
WHAT
ARE THE ACTORS'
PREFERENCES?
The firstquestion is the most obvious one. How do we know whether

a situationresemblesa PD? The problem is even greaterforthose variantsof the frameworkthatcall forcardinalratherthanordinal utilities.'8
The danger, of course, is that we will inferthe actors' preferencesfrom
ofConflict(Cambridge:Harvard UniversityPress,i960),
I7Thomas Schelling,The Strategy
265.
i8
This is trueforJervis(fn. i).

AND COOPERATION
323
theirbehavior.Actorsrarelygive completestatements
of theirpreferences.In somecaseswe can usethemethodof"revealedpreferences,"
but
thistechniquecan be used onlywhenpreferences
are stableand consistent;if it is not to be tautologous,
we mustexaminea largenumberof
on behaviors
instancesin ordertotestthepreferences
thatwe did notuse
in thefirstplace.
toderivethepreferences
while the standardPD model pointsto fourpossible
Furthermore,
outcomesthatneed to be ranked,decisionmakersmaydefinethesituationdifferently-most
of mutual
frequently
byignoringthepossibility
In 1914, forexample,most leadersdid not ask themselves
restraint.
whethertheypreferred
peace to war becausetheydid not thinkthat
peace could be maintained.In somecases,a lack of cooperation
maybe
measurebytheactors'inattention
tothepossibilexplainedin significant
ityofsuchan outcome.
How COMMON Is PRISONERS'DILEMMA?
The secondproblemliesin determining

ofvartherelativefrequency
Dilemma?HarrisonWagnerand
iousgames.How commonis Prisoners'
GeorgeDowns and hiscolleaguesnotethatstatesoftenfailto cooperate,
thePD, butbecausetheyarein Deadnotbecausetheycannotsurmount
to mutualcooperation.'9
For example,
lockand prefermutualdefection
were the statesin I914 in PD or in Deadlock? (These are not,of course,

theonlyalternatives.)Are we in PD withtheSovietUnion today?Ronald
Reagan is not alone in answeringin thenegative;much of thedebate over
whetherAmerican threatshave deterredthe Soviet Union or createdunnecessaryconflictis a disagreementabout Soviet intentionsand preference orders,not a dispute betweentwo contendinggeneraltheories.20
To put the questions in theirmostgeneral form:How much of international conflictis caused by the states' inabilityto make and enforce
bindingagreements?How much of internationalpoliticsis drivenbythis
problem? The model of PD may be popular, not because it catches the
most importantdynamics of internationalpolitics,but because it is intriguingand lends itselfto interestingmanipulations.The "law of the instrument"may be at least partlyat work. Furthermore,themodel is congruentwith the Anglo-Americanbias of seeing world politicsas tragedy
19Harrison Wagner, "The Theory of Games and the Problemof InternationalCooperation,"AmericanPoliticalScienceReview70 (Junei983), 330-46; George W. Downs, David M.
Rocke,and Randolph M. Siverson,"Arms Races and Cooperation,"WorldPolitics38 (October
I 985), I I 8-46.
20 Jervis
(fn. I 4), 84-I I 3. Similarly,manyof theargumentsabout whetherthe failureof detentewas inevitableor a matterof errorscan be phrasedin termsof whethertherelaxationof
tensionswas Pareto-superiorto a highlevel of competition.

324
WORLD POLITICS
ratherthanas evil,ofbelievingthatmostconflicts
canbe ameliorated
for
the good of all concerned.21
The empirical problems in answering these questions are relatively

clear, although extremelydifficult.Perhaps equally troublesomebut less
obvious are two conceptualdifficulties.
First,are we concernedonlywith
situationsin which the agreementscannotbe enforced,or also withthose
in which no outside agency is available to forcethe actors to reach an
agreementin the firstplace? Even where enforcementis available, as it is
in domestic society,some mutually beneficialoutcomes may be missed
because of bargaining dynamics and miscalculations.Similarly,the dilemma of public goods is not that actors cannot ensure that otherswill
live up to their commitments,but that it is not rational for anyone to
make a commitmentto contributein the firstplace.
A second problem is thatwhetheror not a situationis a Prisoners'Dilemma depends in part on how we defineits boundaries.If we look at
Japanese-Americannegotiationsin the summer and fall of 1941, the
frameworkdoes not apply: both sides preferredmutual defection(in this
case, war) to the concessions that would have been necessaryto reach
agreement.Japanwould ratherfightthan give up the effortto dominate
China and South East Asia; the United States would ratherfightthan
permitthisto happen. But if we step back and ask why Japansoughtits
sphereof influence,anarchyand the Prisoners'Dilemma emergeas crucial. Domination was soughtprimarilyas a means to thegoal of autarky.
thatwould go along withunJapaneseleaders wanted theself-sufficiency
hindered access to Asian marketsand raw materialsin order to become
Had it been possibleforthe
relativelyimmune fromWesternpressures.22
West and Japanto make a bindingagreementgivingthe lattereconomic
freedom in Asia in returnfor renouncing the use of force,a bargain
mighthave been struck.
SOURCES
OF PREFERENCES
By taking preferencesas given, we beg what may be the most importantquestion on how theyare formed.When and why do actorsfindexploitationparticularlyattractive,or the danger of being taken advantage
of particularlyunacceptable?When and whydo decisionmakerssee mutual cooperation as desirable? Economic theorytreatstastesand prefer2-See Arnold Wolfers,Discordand Collaboration(Baltimore:The JohnsHopkins UniversityPress,I962), chap. I5.
JamesB. Crowleyjapan's QuestforAutonomy:
NationalSecurity
and ForeignPolicy,ig30Total
Preparesfor
1938 (Princeton:PrincetonUniversityPress,i966); Michael Barnhart,Japan
War (Ithaca, NY: Cornell UniversityPress,i987).
22

AND COOPERATION
325
ences as exogenous. Analysis is thereforefacilitated,but at the cost of

drawingattentionaway fromareas thatmay containmuch of theexplanatory"action" in which we are interested.23
Sometimes we can deduce preferencesfromthe structureof the system, as Realism suggests. But even a structuraltheoryof international
politicsas powerful as Waltz's has troubleproducingmany precise deductions.24As the endless argumentsabout the national interestremind
us, only rarelycan descriptionsand prescriptionsof what the statewill or
Conybeareis able to
should preferbe drawn fromitsobjectivesituation.25
but thisinference
deduce a state'seconomic interestsfromtradetheory;26
onlyapplies ifwe assume thatthe stateis an actor.Such an assumptionis
often a valid guide when overridingissues of national securityare at
stake; but the relevantactorsforeconomicissuesare oftenclasses,sectors,
and groups, or even smaller and more numerous units. In the security
area, the preferenceforprotectingthe statusquo ratherthan retreating
may be deducible fromthe externalsituation,but the choice forexpansion is often the result either of preferencesof importantsubnational
More broadly,one does not have to be
groups or of internalbargaining.27
a Wilsonian or a Marxistto argue thatthegoals statesseek,the coststhey
are willing to pay,and the instrumentsthatare believedappropriatecan
be deeply affectedby the natureof the state.
Transnational forcesare a thirdgeneral source of preferences.Thus,
JamesJollsees the prevalenceof Social Darwinism in the early20thcenturyas a major cause of the preferenceforcompetitionin world politics,
and Van Evera argues thatrampantnationalismstronglyinfluencedthe
utilitiesthat attached to various outcomes.28The maddeningly vague
"spiritof thetimes"may help to accountforthefactthat,duringtheyears
beforeWorld War I, all the major powers opted foroffensivemilitary
Ambiguity,and the
23See the discussionof tastesin JamesMarch,"Bounded Rationality,
Engineeringof Choice," Bell JournalofEconomics9 (Autumn I978), 593-604.
24 Kenneth Waltz, TheoryofInternational
Politics(Reading,MA: Addison Wesley,I979).
25 But see StephenKrasner,Defending
(Princeton:PrincetonUniversity
theNationalInterest
Press, I978). Also see David Lake, "Beneath the Commerceof Nations: A Theory of International Economic Structure,"InternationalStudiesQuarterly28 (June i984), I45-49, and
Lake, "Power and the Third World: Toward a Realist Political Economy of North-South
StudiesQuarterly3I (Junei987), 22I-28.
Relations,"International
26 JohnConybeare,Trade Wars(New York: Columbia University
Press,i987).
27See JackSnyder,MythsofEmpire,forthcoming.
JamesJoll,"19I4: The Unspoken Assumptions,"in H. W. Koch, ed., The Originsof the
FirstWorldWar (London: Macmillan, I972), 307-28; Koch, "Social Darwinismas a Factor in
the 'New Imperialism,'" ibid., 329-54; Stephen Van Evera, "Why Cooperation Failed in
I9I4," WorldPolitics38 (October i985), 8o-I 7. For a relatedgeneralargumenton thesource
of preferences,
see Aaron Wildavsky,"Choosing PreferencesbyConstructionInstitutions:A
Cultural Theory of PreferenceFormation,"AmericanPolitical Science Review 8i (March
28
i987), 3-22.

326
WORLD POLITICS
strategieswhen defensiveones would have been more likely to make

them reach theirforeignpolicygoals.29
Preferencesalso stem fromthe ideologiesand beliefsof individualdecisionmakers.Some are "hard-line,"others"soft-line"in dealing withan
adversary.Whether these orientationshold across interactionswith a
range of adversarieswe do not know, althoughsome evidence indicates
that they do.30 The effectis that under circumstancesin which some
statesmenwill believe that mutual cooperationis beneficial,otherswill
see it as a trap. Thus, because of theirbeliefsabout the natureof the adversary,Ronald Reagan and his supportersbelievethatmanykindsof cooperationwiththe Soviet Union are likelyto producegreaterSovietpressures on the West ratherthan furthercooperation.
Herbert Simon's argumentabout Duverger's Law of the relationsbetween voting rules and party systemsapplies to theorizingin international politicsas well: "Most of the work is being done by propositions
thatcharacterizethe utilityfunctionof the [actor]and his or her beliefs,
expectations,and calculations.'31 Realism and game theoryare of limited
help here since thelattermustassume theactors'preferencesand utilities,
and Realism's generalizations,althoughpowerful,are oftenvague. Furthermore,theseapproaches implythatpreferencesare constantwhen, in
fact,they change and thus pose a range of challenges for the anarchy
framework.32
First, and most obviously,a state's preferenceschange as
one set of decision makers replaces another.Thus the dim prospectsfor
arms control throughoutmuch of the Reagan administrationare explained by the President'sbeliefthatagreementsthatotherssaw as advantageous are in factunacceptable.Game theoryfocuseson the prefer29 Van Evera (fn. 28); Van Evera, "The Cult of the Offensive
and the Originsof the First
World War," InternationalSecurity9 (Summer i984), 58-i07; JackSnyder,"Civil-Military
Relationsand theCult of theOffensive,I9I4 and i984," ibid.,i08-46; Snyder,The Ideologyof
theOffensive:
MilitaryDecisionMating and theDisastersof 1914 (Ithaca,NY: Cornell UniversityPress, i984). For a rebuttal,see ScottSagan, "1914 Revisited:Allies,Offense,and Instability,"International
Securityi i (Fall i986), I5I-76, and theexchangeof lettersbetweenSnyder and Sagan, ibid., i i (Winter I 986/87),I 87-98.
30 For a discussionof this issue in the domesticcontext,
see RobertPutnam,The Beliefsof
Politicians(New Haven: Yale UniversityPress,I973).
3 Simon, "Human Nature in Politics:The Dialogue of Psychology
and PoliticalScience,"
AmericanPoliticalScienceReview 79 (June i985), 298; also see William Riker,"The Herestheticsof Constitution-Making:The Presidencyin I787, with Commentson Determinism
and Rational Choice," AmericanPoliticalScienceReview78 (March i984), i-i6. In a different
intellectualtradition,Adam Przeworski comes to a similarconclusion:"Marxism and RationalChoice," Politicsand SocietyI4 (No. I, i985), 379-409.
32 For a general discussionof changingpreferences,
see JamesMarch and HerbertSimon,
Organizations(New York: Wiley, I958), I4I; Michael Cohen and RobertAxelrod,"Coping
with Complexity:The Adaptive Value of Changing Utility,"AmericanEconomicReview74
(March i984), 30-42; Barbara Farnham, "Value Conflictsand Political Decision-Making"
(Ph.D. diss. in progress,Columbia University).

AND COOPERATION
327
ences thatare held at any giventime,and therefore

simplyputsthis
questiontoone side;Realismimpliesthatpreferences
comefromthepositionof thestatein theinternational
system,
and therefore
impliesthat
changesin leadershipdo notmatter.Realismis lesstroubledbya second
sourceofchange:thatproducedbyshifts
in theexternal
situation.
On the
simplestlevel,a previously
desiredoutcomemaybecomeunacceptable
becausethestatewould no longergain by it. Thus, forinstance,states
as theircompetitive
beginto resistmutuallow tariffs
positiondeteriorates.Similarly,in the fallof i96i Americandecisionmakerscame to
doubtthewisdomoftheirown nucleartest-ban
proposalwhentheysuspected"thattheRussiansmighthavedrawnevenwithor evenpastus in
someaspectsofthermonuclear
weapons."33
In othercases,preferences
changethroughtheprocessoftheinteractionitself.When two statesare hostile,one will oftenassumethatanythingtheotherurgesmustbe bad; an outcomethatwas previously
favored will be viewed with skepticismif the adversaryendorsesit.
thefactthata statetakesa stronginterest
in an issuecan lead
Similarly,
theadversary
to developa contrary
The conflict
preference.
processthen
generatesinterests
and preferences
ratherthanbeingproducedbythem.34
It would otherwisebe impossibleto explainwhytheUnitedStatessupportsJonasSavimbiin Angola,or refusesto admitrefugees
fromCuba.
Unlike other communistregimes,Cuba wantsits internalopponentsto
leave;so theU.S., counterto itsnormalpolicyofacceptingsuchpeople,

keepsthemout.35
Althoughthisinterdependence
betweenstates'preferencesis compatible
withRealism,itleadstointerests
and maneuvers
that
if not contradict,
thenormalprescriptions
complicate,
producedby the
For example,splitting
anarchyframework.
intoa
up a largetransaction
seriesofsmallonesmaybe ineffective
in thesecircumstances.
Experienceand knowledgecan also changepreferences.
Although
suchprocessesaccountformanyimportant
outcomes,
theyareexogenous
to game theoryand theanarchyframework.
As actorsparticipate
in an
arrangement,
theymaycometo see thattheconsequences
are quitedifferentfromthosetheyexpected.Thus theexperienceof the follow-up
conferences
on the HelsinkiAgreementseemsto have convincedthe
Sovietsthatthe discussionof humanrights,whileannoying,does not
33Glenn Seaborg,Kennedy,Khrushchev,
and the TestBan (Berkeley:Universityof California Press, 198I), I 20.
34 Of course,each statewantsto limittheother'spower and influence
and will therefore
try
to see thatanyactortheadversaryis supportingdoes notwin; butfromthiswe cannotdeduce
preferencesforspecifiedcountriesor factionsto prevail.
35Linda Greenhouse,"U.S. Assailed Again on Curbing Cuban Immigrants,"New York
Times,September27, i986.

328
WORLD POLITICS
do as muchharmas theyoncebelieved.36
In othercases,theemergence
of
information
maybe thesourceofchange.The U.S. position
newscientific
in thetest-ban
negotiations
was alteredwhenpeoplerealizedthattesting
theblastand unmighttake place insidea largecavern,thusmuffling
dercutting
theverification
techniquesin whichtheWestpreviously
had
or newbeliefscanalso lead topreferences
faith.New information
forcoconoperation.RobertRothstein
argues,forexample,thatNorth-South
flictovercommodity
pricingdecreasedas thedevelopingstatescame to
see thattheirpreviousproposalsforpricestabilization
mightnotincrease
theirincome,as theyhad initiallybelieved.37
Negotiations
proceednot
but also bypersuasion;in somecases,thatleads to
onlyby bargaining,
ofand thateachcomes
solutionsthatneithersidehad previously
thought
to preferto itsoriginalproposal.38
Finally,preferences
maybe unstable.Becausetheintellectual
problems
are great,keydecisionsare oftendifficult,
and continuedthoughtmay
produceshiftingevaluations.Althoughsuch processesare difficult
to
degeneralizeabout,mostpeopleknowthemfromtheirownexperience:
cidingwhatcartobuy,whatjob totake,orwhomtomarry.
Mostsharply,
decisionmakersmaycome to prefermutualcooperation
to mutualdefection,
or viceversa.Thus, theSoviet-American
forarms
negotiations
controlin the Indian Ocean broke down largelybecausethe Carter
afterfirstfavoring
an agreement,
cameto believethatit
administration,
in theearlyi96os, the
would notbe in theAmericaninterest.
Similarly,
then(inSALT I) proposedproUnitedStatesfavoredland-mobile
missiles,
and has recently
hibitingthem,thenfavoredthemas stabilizing,
again
calledforbanningthem.The samekindofchangeshaveoccurredin the
U.S. stancetowardantisatellite
can onlyin partbe
weapons.Those shifts
or Sovietactivities.39
explainedbychangesin technological
possibilities
36 JohnMaresia, "Helsinki," in Alexander George, Philip Farley,and Alexander Dallin,
eds., U.S.-SovietSecurityCooperation:
Achievements,
Failures,Lessons(New York: OxfordUniversityPress, forthcomingi988). Also see Raymond Garthoff,Detenteand Confrontation
(Washington,DC: BrookingsInstitution,i985), 480. For an argumentthatpeople's preferences are oftenformedby theirbehavior,see Daryl Bem, "Self-PerceptionTheory,"in LeonVI (New York: Academic
ard Berkowitz,ed., Advancesin ExperimentalSocial Psychology,
Press, I972); foran applicationto internationalpolitics,see Deborah Larson, The Originsof
Containment
(Princeton:PrincetonUniversityPress,i985).
Collaboration:Some Lessons from
37Rothstein, "Consensual Knowledge and International
theCommodityNegotiations,"International
Organization38 (Autumn i984), 732-62.
38 See Mary Parker Follett,DynamicAdministration:
The CollectedPapersof Mary Parker
Follett,H. C. Metcalfand L. Urwick,eds. (New York: Harper & Row, I942); RichardWalton
and RichardMcKersie,A BehavioralTheoryofLabor Negotiations
(New York: McGraw-Hill,
i965), I26-83; ErnstHaas, BeyondtheNation-State(Stanford,CA: StanfordUniversityPress,
I 964), 86-I 25.

39For a discussionof the ways in which changesin technologyinfluencedAmericanatti-
tudes toward antisatelliteweapons, particularlyby providingsatelliteswithoffensiveas well

AND COOPERATION
329
In summary,
theresearchon cooperation
underanarchyassumesthe
in
not
be
actorsare PD, whichmay
correct.It further
takestheactors'
preferences
as givenand ignoreshow,why,and whentheychange.Game
theorycannothelphere;Realism'sanalysesofthesequestionsarelimited
at best.
CONCEPTS
The conceptsemployedbytheanarchyframework
seemunproblemand defense,and
aticat firstglance.Cooperationand defection,
offense
forrigorous
powerare fairlystandardconcepts,but the requirements
analysiswithina game-theoretic
approachdemandthatwe squeezesome
of therichnessout of theseterms.The admirablegainin precisionmay
haveto be purchasedat an unacceptably
highprice.
COOPERATION AND DEFECTION
The conceptsof cooperationand defectionare crucialto the framework.These termsworkwell fora laboratory
Prisoners'Dilemma,but
are morecomplex.To startwith,are thesetheonlytwo
mostsituations
alternatives?
Perhapswe shouldthinknotofa dichotomy,
butofa continuum.But can we add thismeasureof realismwithoutsacrificing
the
and deductivepowerof thetheory?Furthermore,
can most
parsimony
Somepoliciesexalternatives
reallybe arrayedalongsucha continuum?
pressa highdegreeof bothcooperationand defection
simultaneously;
thepolicyof isolation-expressneither.40
In
others-in some instances,
choicesare notevenon thiscontinuum.
manycasesthemostinteresting
Concretequestionsoftenariseabouthow to characterize
anyindividthese
down
towhether
ual outcomeor policy.Sometimes
questionscome
buteventhentheansweris notincontheglassis halffullor halfempty,
sequential.An exampleofan outcomeis the"chickenwar"betweenthe
UnitedStatesand theE.E.C. in theearlyi96os, whichConybeareseesas
on frozenpoultry
becauseEuroperaisedthetariff
and
mutualdefection
the U.S. retaliatedby raising tariffson some European products.40 But
thanthedeviationfrompure
one can arguethatwhatis moresignificant
cooperationis thefactthatthedisputewas heldto one roundof action
as defensivemilitarycapabilities,see Paul Stares,TheMilitarization
ofSpace (Ithaca,NY: Cornell UniversityPress, i985), and Steve Weber and SydneyDrell, "Cooperationand Discord
in the Militarizationof Space: U.S. Strategy,i960-i985,"
in George, Farley,and Dallin (fn.
36).
4? Thus it is not surprisingthatquantitativestudiesfindthatconflict
and cooperationare
notalways inverselyrelatedto each other.
4 Conybeare(fn.26).

330
WORLD POLITICS
It did not producea spiralof conflict,

and counteraction.
and relations
werenotembittered.
betweenthecountries
An exampleofan ambiguous
military
policyis thequestionwhethertheU.S. cooperated
or defected
in
itsstrategic
armsprocurements
betweenthemid-ig6osto thelate 1970s.
On theone hand,theUnitedStates,unliketheSovietUnion,did notdeployadditionalmissiles.On theother,itdid makemajorqualitativeimprovements,
mostnotablyin theformofmultiplewarheads.
How we judgea policymayalsodependon thetimespanwe examine.
Defectionin one instancecan producemutualcooperationover the
longerrun.Indeed,one implication
of thetheorizing
aboutanarchyis
thatcooperationis enforcedbythepossibility
of defection.
Thus, PresidentReaganarguesthathispolicywillinduceSovietcooperation,
which
willthenbe mutual.If he turnsoutto be correct,
is itmoreusefultocall
thewholepolicyone of cooperation,
or to divideit intodiscreterounds
and label theinitialAmericanbehavioras defection?
And iftheSoviets
in orderto weakentheWest,and willultimately
havebeenconciliatory
shouldthe
returnto an uncooperative
stancefroman improvedposition,
as defection?
A simplerversionofthisambipolicynotbe characterized
guityis revealedin theCuban missilecrisis.This episodeis oftenconsidered an American victory;in fact,mutual cooperationgreatlyincreased
in themonthsthatfollowed.If we takean evenlongerperspective,

however,we mightlabel the outcomeas mutualdefection,
becauseof the
Sovietarmsbuild-upthatwas causedpartlybythehumiliation
in Cuba.
In gametheoryor in thelaboratory,
we can definewhateach playofthe
we are trying
toanalyze,thesedistinctions,
gameis. But in thesituations
and theanswerto thequestionwhetherthebehavioris seenas cooperativeor not,are subjectiveifnotartificial.
In othercases,theverymeaningof cooperation
is unclear.It usually
buthowdo we characterize
denotesdoingwhattheotheractorprefers,
a
responsethatis undesiredbutis designedto benefit
theother,and/orhas
thateffect?How do we classifybehaviorwhenone side desiresa high
withtheotherand theotherrespondswiththesoughtdegreeoffriction
forhostility?
What do we sayaboutcases in whichneitherside thinks
abouttheimpacton theother?Does thenotionofdefection
implysomeThe labels may
thingmore than,or different
from,noncooperation?
to catch.A recentexsqueeze out muchoftherealitythatwe are trying
of
these
In
several
ample displays
ambiguities. April i986, theUnited
thetravelofLibyandiplomatswho
StatesaskedEast Germanytorestrict
in theWest.In response or whattheyasmightbe aidingterrorism
sertedto be response theEast Germansdemandedthatall diplomats
as they
exceptthoseofBritain,France,and theU.S. showtheirpassports

AND COOPERATION
331
crossed fromEast to West Berlin. (Previously,only special passes issued

by the East German Foreign Ministryhad been required.)The U.S. took
this action, not as cooperation,but as "a clearlyunfriendlynegativeact
that is intended to undermine the four-powerstatus" of Berlin.42This
is not unreasonable,but neitheris itcompelledbythe facts.
interpretation
The problemof the subjectiveand politicalnatureof definitionsof cooperationis compounded in the cold war because thetwo sides have very
differentperspectives.Most Americansthinkabout cooperatingwiththe
U.S.S.R. to maintainthe statusquo or to bringabout mutuallybeneficial
changes, particularlyin arms control.But the Soviets not only consider
the statusquo in the sense of the currentdistributionof influenceas disadvantageous,but believe thatit cannotbe maintainedbecause it is being
moved by the forcesof history.Thus, fortheSoviets,CC consistsof managing the changes in a peaceful way. While the United States would
steadilylose ground, the Soviets argue that Washington should accept
thisprocessbecause the alternativewould be even worse.43
Even when such problemsare absent,it is easy to overlookthefactthat
what is deemed a defectionis in partrule-governed.The United Statesand mostof the world-considered theSovietemplacementofmissilesin
Cuba in i962 as stronglynoncooperative;the Soviet arms build-up of the
late i96os, which had a much greaterinfluenceon the militarybalance,
was seen as less of a defection.Although what Waltz calls "internalbalancing" may not be welcomed byothers,it is acceptedas a normal partof
internationalpolitics.It is seen as legitimate;indeed,coerciveattemptsto
block it would be perceivedas illegitimateand highlythreatening.These
distinctionscannot be understoodby measuringtheobjectiveharm done
to the state.The factthatthe actorsusuallygive littlethoughtto the rules
does not reduce theirimportancein definingthe crucialconceptswe use.
Some of these difficultiesare summarized by the question a student
raised when I played a version of multipersonPrisoners'Dilemma in
class: what, she asked, are we to cooperateabout? For decision makers,
the question is never cooperationor defection,but ratherwhat goals to
seek and the tacticsthatwill be mostapt to reach them.Of courseit is not
illegitimateto impose our categorieson the behaviorof actors and the
notions of cooperation and defectionare hardly foreignto them but
42
JamesMarkham,"Allied Diplomats DefyEast GermanControls,"New YorkTimes,May
see Paul Schroe28, i986. For paralleldiscussionof an importantcase in thelate i8thcentury,
der,"Old Wine in New Bottles:RecentContributionsto BritishForeignPolicyand European

InternationalPolitics,1789-I 848,"JournalofBritishStudies26 (JanuaryI987), Io.
43See Garthoff(fn.36), 38-50, i069. The Japanesehad a similarconceptionof cooperation
withthe Britishin China in the I930s: see Paul Haggie, Britanniaat Bay (Oxford:Clarendon
Press,i98i), I26.

WORLD POLITICS
332
fromthe
when actorsdefinetheirproblemsand choices quite differently
theoreticalmodel, we may be forcingdisparatebehaviorintoan inappropriateframework.
OFFENSE
AND DEFENSE
Questions can also be raised about the conceptsof offenseand defense.

Both logic and evidence indicate that the prospectsforcooperationare
increased to the extentthatdefensivemilitarysystemsand strategiescan
be distinguishedfrom,and are strongerthan,offensiveones.44In principle, the differencebetween offenseand defense is clear: the formerinthe latterthe
volves the abilityto attack the otherand seize his territory;
The issue
abilityto repel such an attack and protectone's own territory.
of whetherattackingor defendingis preferablecomes down to whether
a decision maker who believed that war was inevitablewould preferto
attack the other side, as in I914, or be on the defensivewhile the other
side attacked which,as the historyof World War I shows,would have
been a betterstrategy.45
But questions arise. Even if it is possible to say whetherthe offenseor
the defensehas the advantage,can one distinguishbetweenoffensiveand
defensiveweapons and strategies?Much of theinterwardisarmamenteffortswere devoted to doing so. The factthatstatesmenworked hard on
this question indicates that theybelieved that a positiveanswer was attainable; thatsuch effortsyieldsuccessonlyoccasionallyindicatesthatthe
endeavor may be doomed althoughin the interwarcase thereasonmay
have been the refusalto forgooffensiveoptions ratherthan the inability
to make the relevantdistinctions.Similarly,George Downs and his colleagues findthatarms races are not terminatedby the shiftto defensive
systems46 which indicatesthatstatesmenare eitherunwillingor unable
to avoid threateningotherswhile seekingto maximize theirown security.
Can the conceptsof offenseand defensebe applied to nuclear weapons? A frequentargumentis thatthe common-sensedefinitionshave to
be turnedon theirheads. That is,offenseis the abilityto take one's cities
out of hostage; conversely,the abilityto destroythe otherside's population and othervalues, previouslyassociated withthe offense,is now conSysand Defensein theInternational
44See Jervis(fn. i), at I86-2I4; George Quester,Offense
Balance of Military
tem (New York: Wiley, I977); Jack Levy, "The Offensive/Defensive
28 (June
StudiesQuarterly
Technology: A Theoreticaland HistoricalAnalysis,"International
2I9-38; Van Evera (fns.28 and 29); Snyder(fn.29); BarryPosen,The SourcesofMilitary
i984),
Doctrine(Ithaca, NY: Cornell UniversityPress,i984); Weber and Drell (fn.39).
45See the literaturecited in fn.29 above.
46 Downs, Rocke, and Siverson(fn. i9).

AND COOPERATION
333
sidered defensive(as long as the other side has a similarcapability)because such an act could be crediblythreatenedonly as retaliationforthe
other's attack. The obvious implicationsare that superpowerstrategies
designed to deterwar by developing counterforcecapabilitiesexacerbate
the securitydilemma and make cooperation more difficult,and that
countervaluetargetingwould permitmutual security.But such paradoxical reasoninghas not been accepted by all analysts,with the resultthat
thereis no consensusabout how the conceptsfitthe currentsituation.
Even if the distinctionbetween offenseand defenseworks,at least to
to otherdimensome extent,in the militaryarena, can it be transferred
To findtheanswer,one would have
sionsof internationalrelationships?47
to ask under which conditionsbandwagoningas opposed to balancing is
likely to take place.48The formerdynamicsmake the offensivepotent;
the lattersupportthe defensive.When initialgains are expectedto create
positive feedback,each state will have strongincentivesto defect,irrespective of whether its ultimate intentionsare aggressive;moving first
may endanger the other,but it is necessaryin order to protectthe state.
As a result,mutual restraintwill be difficultto maintaineven ifbothsides
are satisfiedwith the statusquo. By contrast,when balancingprevailsand
gains by one side call up counteractingpressures,states can affordto
await developments,making major effortsonlyon the relativelyrare occasions when another power poses a direct threat.Cooperation should
thus be more prevalentwhen bandwagoning is neitherfearednor hoped
for.
The most obvious example of bandwagoning-or at least the expectationof it-is the "domino theory."When a defeatin one countryis expected to have major and deleteriousconsequences forthe state'sinfluence in other areas, then even minor threatsmust be met swiftlyand
firmly.On the other hand, when one side believes thatthe other side's
local victoryis likely to be contained-for example, by the effortsof
neighborswho are alarmed by the new threat-then it can affordto try
cooperatingwith the otherbecause the costsof being taken advantage of
are relativelylow. The politicaldefensiveis potent;the securitydilemma
47For one effortat doing so, see RobertJervis,"From Balance to Concert:A Studyof InternationalSecurityCooperation,"WorldPolitics38 (October i985), 58-79,at 62-64. For a further discussion,see Jervis,"Cooperation Under Anarchy: Problems and Limitations,"in
Alker and Ashley(fn. i).
48 Arnold Wolfers,"The Balance of Power in Theory and Practice,"in Wolfers(fn. 2I),
I22-24;
Waltz (fn. 24), I25-28;
Stephen M. Walt, "Alliance Formationand the Balance of
World Power," International
Security9 (Spring i985), 3-43,and The OriginsofAlliances(Ithaca, NY: Cornell UniversityPress,i987); JackSnyderand RobertJervis,
eds.,Strategic
Beliefs
and SuperpowerCompetition
in theAsianRimland,forthcoming.

334
WORLD POLITICS
is ameliorated; and a statecan gain a high degree of protectionwithout

proportionatelyunderminingthe interestsof itsadversary.
Argumentslike theseneed much more developmentbeforewe can be
sure thatthedistinctionbetweenoffenseand defenseis possibleand helpful in the politicalarena. What we have so farare essentiallyexploratory
probes; the results,while suggestive,are hardlydefinitive.Furthermore,
we have not even tried to apply such an extensionto the realm of international economic relations.
THE NATURE OF POWER
A third conceptual difficultyis created by the factthat in many encountersthe main stake is power-a notoriouslydifficult
concept.But in
almost all formulations,power in internationalpoliticsis relativerather
than absolute.49When statesthinkabout the possibilityof an armed conflict,theyhave to judge how theirforcescompare to thoseof theiradversaries; the absolute sizes of the forceson each side are irrelevant.This is
trueformanypoliticalconflictsas well. Knowing how much leverageone
state has over anothertells statesmenand analystsverylittleunless they
also know how much leveragetheotherstatehas. Thus, itcan be rational
forstatesmento act in ways thatreduce theabsolutelevel of benefitsthey
receive.
This view is not only compatiblewith Realism, but is embedded in it.

But it shows that,as long as power is central,an elementof inherentconflictwill be involved,thus complicatingstatesmen'sattemptsto establish
cooperation and undercuttingsome of the prescriptionsthatcan be deduced from the anarchy framework.When statescare primarilyabout
maximizing their power advantage and not about absolute gains and
losses,many of the strategiesand conditionsthatshould lead to cooperationin a Prisoners'Dilemma no longerproduce thisresult.5o
Thus Robert
49 Nuclear weapons mayhave changedthis,as is indicatedbythetitleand essaysin Bernard
Brodie et al., The AbsoluteWeapon(New York: HarcourtBrace, I946).
5? The implicationsof the factthatstatesoftenseek relativeratherthanabsolutegains have
been discussed by ArthurStein,"The Hegemon's Dilemma," International
Organization38
(Spring i984), 355-86.Also see JoanneGowa, "Anarchy,Egoism,and Third Images: The Evolutionof Cooperationand InternationalRelations,"InternationalOrganization40 (Winter
1986), 176-77, and JosephGrieco,"DistributionalUncertainty
and theRealistProblemof InternationalCooperation,"paper presentedto the i986 APSA meeting.For a discussionof the
issuesand a summaryoftheexperimentalliterature,
see Deborah Larson,"Game Theoryand
the Psychologyof Reciprocity"(unpub., Columbia University),25-3I. More generally,Fred
Hirsch, in Social Limitsto Growth(Cambridge: Harvard UniversityPress, 1976), brilliantly
demonstratesthatmany goods in societyare "positional"-that is, theyare inherently
competitive.Only a fewpeople can be at the top of an establishedhierarchyof power or prestige.
Certaingoods-such as livingin an uncrowdedarea-cannot be sharedwithlarge numbers
of others.More fundamentally,
in many aspectsof lifewe judge how well we are doing by
comparingourselvesto others.

AND COOPERATION
335
Axelrod points to the ironythatthe strategyof reciprocity(Tit-for-Tat)

that proves so effectivein computertournamentsof PD can never win
any individual game.51The strategyworks well, however,because it accumulates large numbers of points when matched against fellow cooperatorsand is not terriblybadly exploitedwhen matchedagainstmore
competitivestrategies.But if the main rewards in internationalpolitics
are for relativegains, a strategythatcan, at best,only tie will not be attractive.52
The conditionsunder which statesseek to maximize theirrelativeas

These concerns
opposed to theirabsolute gains need more exploration.53
are likelyto be greaterin the securityarea than in internationaleconomics, but theyare presentin the latteras well, especiallybecause military
and economic strengthsare closelylinked. Third-worldstatesoftenseek
greatereconomic equality with the developed countriesas well as absolute economic growth.Furthermore,the drive to increasetheirpolitical
power vis-a-visthedeveloped stateswould make relativegains even more
important.54
Even among allies, concern forrelativegains is rarelycompletelyabsent.For example, would the United Statesgain or lose (or both) ifJapan
The U.S. would benefitby
made new breakthroughsin microelectronics?
importingbettergoods, but would fall furtherbehind Japan in various
technologies.This, in turn,mightenable Japanto keep wideningtheproductivitygap with America. More than national pride is involved,especiallysince no one can guaranteethatJapanwill maintainitspoliticalorientation in the future.Indeed, Stein has shown that the "hegemon's
dilemma" operates in the economic arena because a dominantstatethat
cares only about absolute gains is more likely to be overtakenby other
powers.55Aaron Friedberghas similarlydemonstratedthe importanceof
this issue in the debate about the decline of Britain'seconomic power at
theturnof thecentury.Those who were leastconcernedstressedthecontinuinggrowthof the Britisheconomy; those who feltthe situationwas
dangerous concentratedon the factthat othereconomies were growing
even faster.56
Axelrod (fn. i).
See the discussionof strategiesin Axelrod's computertournamentin Roy Behr, "Nice
Guys Finish Last-Sometimes," JournalofConflictResolution25 (Junei981), 289-300.
53 The relevantliteraturefromexperimentalpsychology
is summarizedin Larson (fn.50),
52
28-29.
54 See RobertW. Tucker, The Inequalityof Nations(New York: Basic Books, I977);
Stephen Krasner,StructuralConflict(Berkeley:Universityof CaliforniaPress,i985).
55 Stein (fn.5?)56 Friedberg, The WearyTitan: Britainand the Experienceof RelativeDecline, i895-I905
(Princeton:PrincetonUniversityPress,forthcoming
i988), chap. 2.

336
WORLD POLITICS
Waltz's argumentraises similardifficulties.

He denies thatstatesseek
to maximize eitherabsolute or relativepower. Instead,theytryto maximize their security.57
But since the state's securitycan be influencedpositivelyor negatively,depending on the situation by the power and
securityof others,this concept is likelyto be inherentlyinteractive.Unlike the desire to maximize relativegains, thismay increasecooperation,
but the result still will complicate the standard proto-gametheoryformulations.
PERCEPTIONS,
VALUES,
AND SELF-INTEREST
The finalset of problemsconcernspsychology,beliefs,and values. In

increasingorder of conceptual difficulty,
the issues are the psychological
impedimentsto cooperation,the role of values and the autonomyof beliefs,and the question of whethernarrow self-interest
can explain most
international behavior. Realism has generally ignored the decisionmaking level of analysis;game theorycan incorporatetheempiricalfindings in thisarea only at the costof parsimonyand a revisionof manycurrentconclusions.To understandwhen cooperationoccurs,we need to see
how differentbeliefsand values can affectthe actors' evaluation of the
outcomes.A relatedquestion is whetherself-interest
is definedcoollyand
atomisticallyor is drivenbypassionsand care forwhat happensto others.
If the latteris the case, the importantfactorswill be outsideof,ifnot denied by,the anarchyframework.
PSYCHOLOGICAL
IMPEDIMENTS
TO COOPERATION
Robert Keohane has noted thatcooperationmay be explained in part

by the factthatpeople can operate with only bounded rationality;statesmen need to conservecognitiveresources,and shared normsand principles can be extremelyuseful in easing the burdensof prediction,choice,
and coordination.58But cooperationis decreased by otheraspects of the
way people think. People do not mechanicallyreciprocateconciliation
and defection.Instead, their behavior is mediated by their analysis of
what the otherdid and why it did it. The interpretation
of others'action
is rarelyself-evident,but it is almost always important.Most behavioris
ambiguous; even more so are the underlyingintentions.Since actors' responses are linked to theirpredictionsof how the otherwill react to alternativepolicies theycan pursue, theirattributionsof the causes of the
57Waltz (fn.24); see also Waltz, "Reflections
on TheoryofInternational
Politics:A Response
to My Critics,"in Robert0. Keohane, ed., Neorealismand Its Critics(New York: Columbia
UniversityPress, i986), 334.
58 Keohane, After
Hegemony(Princeton:PrincetonUniversityPress,I984), II0-32.

AND COOPERATION
337
other's behavior will be crucial. Thus, how they react is influencedby

their inferencesas to whetherthe other intended the resultsthat were
produced and whetherthe behavioris bestexplained by the transientsitFurthermore,
uation the other was in or by its enduring dispositions.59
since internationalpoliticsis an interactiveprocess,a statesman'sunderstandingof the other's behavior is influencedby how he thinkshis own
state is behaving toward the other.Indeed, perhaps the most important
psychologicalfactorthat interfereswith cooperationis thatstatesmen
and people in theireverydaylives greatlyunderestimatethe extentto
which their actions threatenor harm others. They think they are cooperatingwhen an objectiveobserverwould say thattheyare, at least to
some extent,defecting.
Part of the reason is thatmost statesmenare only dimlyaware of the
securitydilemma. When theyare peaceful,theythink that theirintentionsare clear and thatotherswill not be threatenedbythemeasuresthey
are taking in theirown self-defense.Former AssistantSecretaryof DefenseRichard Perle once said thatif we are in doubt about Soviet intentions, we should buy arms: if the Soviets are aggressive,the build-up
will be needed, and iftheyare not, the only consequence will be wasted
money.Similarly,when U.N. troopswere movingtoward the Yalu, Secretaryof State Acheson statedthattherewas no danger thatthe Chinese
would interveneout of self-defensebecause theyunderstoodthattheU.S.
was not a threatto them.60
Statesmenwho thinkwell of themselvesgenerallybelievethattheiractionsare compatiblewith the reasonableinterestsof others.For example,
Raymond Garthoffshows that, during the period of detente,Americans leaders and general public alike believed thattheircountrywas
restrainedand cooperativetoward theU.S.S.R.; actually,theU.S. continued to seek unilateraladvantage by freezingitsadversaryout of the Middle East, courtingChina, and developingadvanced militarytechnology.6'
As a resultof thisfaultyself-image,any hostilereactionby the adversary
is likelyto seem unprovoked.
This problem is compounded by a second and better-knownbias:
statestend to overestimatethe hostilityof othersand will oftensee as de59For furtherdiscussionof theinferenceprocessesand evidenceoftheirimportancedrawn
fromexperimentsand case studies,see Jervis(fn. I4), 32-48, and Larson (fn.50).
60 Daniel Yergin, " 'Scoop' JacksonGoes forBroke,"Atlantic Monthly 233 (JuneI974),
8i.
(The same erroris made, even more crudely,by Secretaryof Defense Weinbergerin Annual
Reportto the Congress,FY 1988 [Washington,DC: GovernmentPrintingOffice,i987], i6.)
Acheson's views are presentedin JohnSpanier,The Truman-MacArthur
and the
Controversy
Korean War (New York: Norton, i965), 97. Similarexamplesare discussedin Jervis(fn. I4),
67-76, and Seaborg (fn. I2), 30-3 I.
61 Garthoff(fn. 36). Also see Van Evera's discussion(fn. 28) of the role of nationalismin
preventingstatesmenfromobjectivelygaugingthe behaviorof theirown states.

338
WORLD POLITICS
fectionactionsthata disinterestedobserverwould recordas at leastpartly

cooperative.Dulles's view of Khrushchev'sarms cuts in the mid-I95os is
one such example; Reagan's view of most Soviet arms proposalsmay be
another.62
These two biases often operate simultaneously,with the result that

each side is likelyto believe that it is cooperatingand thatthe otherhas
responded by defecting.Thus, the United States says that while it has
been restrained,the Soviet Union has accumulatedmanymore arms than
it needs fordeterrence.The Sovietsprobablyhave a similarperceptionof
the American defensepostureand may thinktheyhave limitedtheirown
arms. The breakdown of detenterevealsthe same patternof perceptions
(although thatmay not provide the primaryexplanationforthe inability
of the superpowersto maintain cooperation).To take just one example,
when Brezhnev told Nixon in the springof I973 thatthe statusquo in
theMiddle East was unacceptable,and when Gromykolaterwarned that
"the fireof war [in the Middle East] could break out onto the surfaceat
any time," theymay well have thoughtthattheywere fulfillingtheirobligationsunder the Basic PrinciplesAgreementto consultin the eventof
a threat to peace. The Americans perceived the Soviets to be making
threatsand, by failingto restrainthe Arabs or to notifythe U.S. of the
impending attack,to be violatingthe spiritof detente.63
The same effect
oftenappears during bargainingwhen each side thinksthatthe concessions it has made are greaterthan thoseit has received.64
Furthermore,when statesmenrealize that the otherside has cooperated, theyoftenbelieve that it did not have much choice. Thus, decision
makers underestimatethe abilityof othersto defect,and thereforefrethat theycan get away with some exploitaquently believe, incorrectly,
tion.This factorplayed a role in the deteriorationof the recentdetenteas
well as in the cooling of relationsbetween England and France in the
i840s.65 The Soviet Union in the I970s, and both sides in the earlier inSee the classic essay by Ole Holsti, "Cognitive Dynamics and Images of the Enemy:
Dulles and Russia," in David Finlay,Ole Holsti,and RichardFagen,Enemiesin Politics(Chicago: Rand McNally, i967), 25-96. Michael Sullivan,International
Relations:Theoriesand Evidence(Englewood Cliffs,NJ: Prentice-Hall,i976), 45-46,questionsthelinksbetweenDulles's
beliefsand Americanbehavior,however.
63 Gromykois quoted in Galia Golan, YomKippurand After
(London: CambridgeUniversityPress, I977), 68. The treatmentof the I973 war is a good litmustestforone's views on
detente:compare,forexample,the discussionsin HarryGelman, The BrezhnevPolitburoand
theDecline ofDetente(Ithaca, NY: Cornell UniversityPress,i984), chap. 4; Garthoff(fn.36),
chap. ii; and Alexander George, Managing U.S.-SovietRivalry(Boulder, CO: Westview
Press, i983), chap. 7.
64 For experimentalsupportforthisproposition,
see Michael Ross and Fiore Sicoly,"EgocentricBiases in Availabilityand Attribution,"
and Social Psychology
37
JournalofPersonality
(March I979), 322-36.
65 Roger Bullen,Palmerston,
Guizot,and theCollapseoftheEntenteCordial(London: Athlone, I974), 8i, 93.
62

AND COOPERATION
339
stance,thoughttheycould safelyact against the otherside's interestsbecause theyexaggeratedthe constraintsinhibitingthe rival'sretaliation.

Because of biases like these,analysesthatassume both sides to be perceivingeach otheraccuratelyare likelyto be incorrect;strategiesthatare
based on thisassumptionare likelyto be ineffective.
Axelrod shows that
the strategyof Tit-for-Tatworks quite well when thereis a one-percent
of the other'sbehavior.66
errorrate in the correctidentification
But such
a figureis drasticallylower than that which can be expected in political
interactions;George Downs and his colleagueshave shownthatwhen the
errorrate is higher,thisstrategyis not likelyto yieldstablecooperation.67
It is partlyforthisreason thatLarson argues thatCharles Osgood's GRIT
(Graduated Reciprocationin Tension-reduction),which makes a major
effortto break through the adversary'sperceptual biases, may induce
more cooperationthan Tit-for-Tat.68
Strategiesthatare not tightlyconditional on what the otherdoes, and thatdo not require immediateand
matchingreciprocation,may produce a change in the other's attitudes,
and so may be more effectivethan game-theoreticanalyses would suggest. Strictreciprocitymay fare less well than expected. Put in slightly
differentterms,cognitivebiases decrease transparency,
thus making regimes harder to establishand maintain.
Cooperation is more likelyto come about when actorscorrectforthese
conflict-inducingbiases or are willing to toleratea higherlevel of perceived cheatingby the otherside. But such conditionsand strategiesalso
increasethe chances thattheotherside will, in fact,cheat.One of the reasons whyIsrael was taken by surprisein I973 was thatitsdecisionmakers
were highlysensitiveto the securitydilemma and believed thatthe most
probable cause of war would be Egyptianpreemptiongrowingout of an
incorrectbeliefthatIsrael was about to strike.They thereforeinterpreted
Egypt's behavior precedingthe war as evidence,not thatEgypt was defecting,but that its decision makers thoughtIsrael mightbe planningto
do so. As a result,Israel did not respond by increasingits own military
The problemsof misperceptionthusheightenthestatesman's
readiness.69
dilemma in deciding whetherto cooperateor not.
Axelrod (fn. i), i82-83Downs, Rocke,and Siverson(fn.I9), I33-34. Also see JonathanBendor,"In Good Times
and Bad: Reciprocityin an UncertainWorld,"American
JournalofPoliticalScience3I (August
i987), 53I-58. Downs and Rocke discussthe implicationsof thisfindingin "Tacit Bargaining
and Arms Control,"WorldPolitics39 (April i987), 297-325.
68 Deborah Larson, "Crisis Preventionand theAustrianStateTreaty,"International
Organization4I (Winter i987), 30-34.
69 JaniceStein, "Calculation, Miscalculation,and ConventionalDeterrenceII: The View
fromJerusalem,"in RobertJervis,RichardNed Lebow, and JaniceStein,Psychology
and Deterrence(Baltimore: The JohnsHopkins UniversityPress, i985), 6o-88. This is part of the
broaderdifficulty
statesmenfacein decidingwhethertheotherside is an aggressorwho must
66
67

WORLD POLITICS
340
Strategiesthat are robust in the face of misperceptionare extremely

valuable, but it is far fromcertainthattheyexist.70Stable cooperationis
most likely to resultwhen the decision makers' preconceptionsprovide
an accurate fitwith what the otherside is like; thatmay be as much the
productof luck, however,as of sensitivity
and statesmanship.It is clearly
importantto determinethe extentto which strategiesthat would work
well when informationis accuratecan also servein a world permeatedby
ambiguity and strong perceptual and decision-makingbiases. Neither
scholars' analyses nor statesmen'spolicies can safelybe based on the assumptionthateitherside understandsthe other.
BELIEFS AND VALUES
Expected utilitiesare thevaluationan actorplaces on a courseofaction

or outcome; theyinvolve both estimatesof consequencesand judgments
about intrinsicworth.Contraryto the implicationsof manyRealist writings,theseestimatesand judgmentsare notobjective,and theyshould not
be accepted withoutinvestigatingtheirformation,as is done in most of
the work on game theoryand anarchy.In many cases, what is crucial in
determiningwhetherthe actorscooperateis theirbeliefsabout the effectivenessof alternativepolicies beliefsthatoftenprove to be eitherlacking in evidentiarysupportbeforethefactand/orwrongafterthefact.The
most obvious and consequentialexample is the greatexaggerationby decision makers of the efficacyof the offensivebeforeWorld War I, which
meant thata crisiswas likelyto lead to war.
The general question raised by thiscase is theextentto which (and the
circumstancesunder which) the main impedimentsto cooperationare
rooted in potentiallymalleable beliefsabout the situationratherthan in
itsstructure.7'
For example,manyhistorianshave argued thattherecould
have been much greatercooperationbetween Britainand Russia in the
i9th centuryif the formerhad not greatlyexaggeratedthe hostilityand
capabilityof the latter.72More generally,decision makers are oftenunbe met withfirmness(ifnot force),or a morereasonablestatethatcan be conciliatedor,to use
the older term,appeased. See Jervis(fn. I4), chap. 3.
7? Ibid., 109-13;
RichardNed Lebow, "The DeterrenceDeadlock: Is therea Way Out?" in
Jervis,Lebow, and Stein (fn.69), i80-202.
7' See Ernst Haas, "Why Collaborate? Issue-Linkage and International
Regimes," World
Politics32 (April i980), 357-405; RobertRothstein(fn.37); RobertJervis,
"SecurityRegimes,"
International Organization 36 (Spring
i982),
359-60,
373-75; Jack Snyder, "Perceptions of the
SecurityDilemma in I94I," in Jervis,Lebow, and Stein(fn.69).

72 See, forexample,Norman Rich, WhytheCrimeanWar?(Hanover,NH: University
Press
of New England, I 985), and R. W. Seton-Watson,Disraeli,Gladstone,
and theEasternQuestion
(New York: Norton, I972).

AND COOPERATION
341
awareofthesecurity
actin waysthatcompound
dilemma,and therefore
it. Is it possibleto altersuchperceptions,
and thusalterbehavior?One
reasonwhytheKennedyand Carteradministrations
werefavorably
predisposedtowardarmscontrolwas thatmanyofthetopofficials
believed
thatarmsraceswereoftendrivenbyaction-reaction
cycles.Similarly,
can
oftherelativeefficacy
ofoffense
perceptions
and defensebe alteredwithIf military
out changingtechnology?
leadersare drivento favortheoffensivebecauseoforganizational
and ifcivilianleadersarealso
interests,
thepowerofthedefensive,73
disposedto underestimate
thenperhapsthe
security
dilemmaand theresulting
DD is morea creatureofbiasesand
domesticinterests
thanofthestructure
oftheinternational
system.
This questionariseswiththecurrentconcernthatWorldWar III is
mostlikelyto startthrough"crisisinstability"
approximating
thatwhich
prevailedin I9I4. The vulnerability
ofcommand,control,
and communicationsfacilities
mightlead statesmen
to believethat,eventhoughany
nuclearwar wouldbe dreadful,therewouldbe realadvantagesto striking firstif the choicewere betweendoing so and beingattacked.On
closerexamination,
however,itdoesnotappearthatevena well-executed
first
strikewouldgreatlyreducedamagetothestate;so thedangerofcrisisinstability
maylie lessin theobjectivesituation
thanin decisionmakers incorrect
beliefs.74
Mosttheorists
whouse theframework
ofanarchytakeforgrantednot
beliefsbutalso thevaluesthattheyplace on
onlypeople'sinstrumental
outcomes.Althoughwe realize thathow the Prisoners'Dilemma is
played-and indeed,whetheritis a dilemmaat all-is deeplyinfluenced
by thevalue each actorputson theother'swell-being,75
scholarsknow
littleabouttheprocessesbywhichthisevaluationis established
and by
whichitcan change.It is a centraltenetin international
politicsthatpeoand well-beingof theirown statemorethanthey
ple value thesecurity
do thatofothers.The selfis definedas thenationalself.Butthisneednot
73Snyder (fn.29); Posen (fn.44).
74For a furtherdiscussion,see RobertJervis,The IllogicofAmericanNuclearStrategy
(Ithaca, NY: Cornell UniversityPress, i984), I26-29; Jervis,"PsychologicalAspectsof CrisisSta-
bility,"in Jervis,The Implicationsof theNuclear Revolution(Ithaca, NY: Cornell University

Press, forthcoming);Richard Ned Lebow, Nuclear CrisisManagement:A DangerousIllusion
(Ithaca, NY: Cornell UniversityPress, i987); AshtonCarter,JohnSteinbruner,and Charles
Zraket,ManagingNuclear Operations(Washington,DC: BrookingsInstitution,i987).
75Morton Deutsch, "Trust and Suspicion,"Journalof ConflictResolution2 (December
1958), 265-79; Deutsch, "The Effectof MotivationalOrientationupon Trust and Suspicion,"
Human RelationsI3 (May i960), I23-39. Similarly,rationalchoice analysesof politicians'behavior would yield verydifferent
resultsif it were assumed thatthe value being maximized
was theindividual'seconomicprospectsratherthanhispoweror votes.We would thenexpect
politiciansto caterto popularor constituency
interestsonlyto amass enoughpowerthatcould
be efficiently
traded upon forpecuniarygain.

342
WORLD POLITICS
It maybe in thenatureofhumanbeingstoputfirst
their
be trueforever.
own well-beingand thatofotherswhocarrytheirgenes,butitis notinevitablethatpeoplewillalwayscaremoreaboutthefatesofthoseon their
side of a nationalborderthantheydo aboutsimilarindividualson the
otherside.76
versusaltruism,
butit
The issueis oftenput in termsof self-interest
maybe moreusefulto thinkofhow theselfis defined.Whyshouldour
towardothersbe basedon theirgeographic
locationratherthan
attitudes
on thevaluestheyhold?77Sharedvaluescan be one reasonfornational
butanyindividualcan havemorein commonwithmanypeople
identity,
inothercountries
thanwithmanyinhisorherown.(Indeed,howAmerseemslessdetermined
bytheirraceand ethicansregardfellow-nationals
Similarly,
nicitythanby theextentto whichtheysharetheirvalues.)78
of the "scopeand depthof
Alker and Shermanstressthe importance
in theinternational
normative
systemas
insecurity-relevant
integration"
offoreignpolicy.79
a determinant
The degreeofvalueintegration,
and therefore
thescopeofthedefinibe largerthanwe assume.Statestionoftherelevantself,maysometimes
men usuallylike to presentthemselves
as "hard-headed"and as caring
But policyis in factoften
almostexclusively
about theirown country.
For examdrivenbymotivesthatare hardforRealiststoaccommodate.
ple,how can we explainthefactthattheUnitedStatesdid notconquer
A Realistaccountwould
Canada sometimein thepasthundredyears?80
76 Some observershave attributed
the relativelack of concernin the home countryforthe
German hostagestaken in Beirutin Januaryi987 to theweak German nationalidentity.See
JamesMarkham, "West Germans Low-Key About Abductions,"New YorkTimes,January
i9, i987. Compare the reactionof Japan,a countrysome describeas "a huge tribalsociety,"
in a similarsituation:Clyde Haberman, "JapanOutragedat Manila AbductionofExecutive,"
New YorkTimes,FebruaryI5, i987.
77This question is an ancientone and can be tracedback at leastas faras Aristotle'sadvice
that Alexander distinguishamong his subjectsaccordingto whethertheywere Greeks or
see The Politics
non-Greeksratherthanaccordingto theirpersonal,individualcharacteristics;
ed. and trans.byErnestBarker(London: OxfordUniversityPress,I958), 388. For
ofAristotle,
an attemptto use sociobiologyto explainnationalloyalty,see R. Paul Shaw and Yuwa Wong,
"Ethnic Mobilizationand the Seeds of Warfare:An EvolutionaryPerspective,"International
StudiesQuarterly3I (March i987), 2I-26.
78 MiltonRokeach and Louis Mezei, "Race and Shared Beliefin Social Choice," ScienceI5I
and Values (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass,
(Januaryi966), i67-72; Rokeach, Beliefs,Attitudes,
i968). Similarly,in the view of the Ottomans,"the communityof truebelievers,. . . not the
state,constitutesthe basic Muslim policy,transcendingall boundaries."See Thomas Naff,
"The OttomanEmpire and theEuropean StatesSystem,"in Hedley Bull and Adam Watson,
Society(Oxford:Clarendon Press,i984), I43.
eds., The ExpansionofInternational
79 Hayward Alker, Jr.,and Frank Sherman,"CollectiveSecurity-Seeking
PracticesSince
Crises(BeverlyHills, CA: Sage, i982), I4Iin Daniel Frei, ed., ManagingInternational
I945,"
44. This essay draws on the work of Karl Deutsch, esp. Deutsch et al., PoliticalCommunity
and theNorthAtlanticArea (Princeton:PrincetonUniversityPress,I957).
Apart:The UnitedStatesand Canada in WorldPolitics(To80 William T.R. Fox, A Continent
ronto:Universityof Toronto Press, I985).

AND COOPERATION
343
be strained,
havingtoconjureup power-based
disincentives
thatarehard
to find.Americancooperationis betterexplainedby focusingon value
in threesenses.First,theuse offorceis negatively
integration
valuedby
mostAmericansunlesstheobjectis to removea menacetoAmericansecurityor to establisha democraticregime.Second,manyvalues are
sharedbetweencitizensofCanada and oftheUnitedStates.Even ifconthefactthat
questwould havegiventheU.S. greaterwealthor security,
Canadiansocietyresembles
Americanmeansthatmostofwhatwe want
to see in a countryis alreadyin place in Canada. Third,largelybecause
Americansprizethe
of thecommonvaluesbetweenthetwo countries,
well-beingofCanadians.Thus,usingforceagainstthemwould,byconan offenseagainstCanadians,diminishtheutilitiesof Ameristituting
cansas well.
valuesalso helptoexplainwhoma statewill
Commonand conflicting
offerto protectand whom it will oppose.8'Karl Deutschand his colofthemainvaluesheldbythe
leaguesstresstheroleofthe"compatibility
relevantstrataof all participating
units"in theformation
of
politically
what theycall security-communities
i.e., groupsof nationsamong
This factoris also important
whomwar is unthinkable.82
in lessdrastic
The Americancommitment
to Europe and still
formsof cooperation.
more,to Israel cannotbe accountedforapartfromthecommonheritageand valuesthatmake Americanscareaboutthefatesof thesepeoare insufficient
to explainAmericanties,
ples. Securityconsiderations
ifEuropeor Israelwereto becomefaswhichwould be deeplyaffected
Americanoppositiontocommunism
in thethirdworldis
cist.Similarly,
butalsoon an identification
basednotonlyon nationalsecurity
concerns,
whomwe do notwanttoliveunder
withhumanbeingsinothercountries
It maythenbe quitewrongto see Realpolitikas thesourceof
tyranny.83
thedecisionto fightin Vietnamand to dismissas cantthedesireto save
ofthewar
thatcountry
frommisery.Is itan accidentthattheproponents
of widespread"dominoeffects"
of an
were wrongin theirpredictions
in theirargument
thatmillionsofpeoAmericandefeat,butwerecorrect
or die froma NorthVietnamesevictory?
ple in Indochinawouldsuffer
The most far-reachingchanges in international
politicsinvolve
changesin nationalgoalsand values.Japanis nowa muchmoresuitable
thanit was intheI93os, and notonlybecauseterpartnerforcooperation
8"For a discussionof the role of ideologyin alliances,see Ole Holsti, P. Terrence Hopin International
mann, and John Sullivan, Unityand Disintegration
Alliances(New York:
Wiley, I973), and Walt (fn.48), i8-26.
82 Deutsch (fn.79), 46.
83 For discussionsof thisargument,see RobertJervis,
The Logic ofImagesin International
Relations(Princeton: PrincetonUniversityPress, I970), 244-50; George Quester,American
ForeignPolicy(New York: Praeger,i982).

344
WORLD POLITICS
ritorialexpansion is neitherpossible nor economicallynecessary.Somethinghas occurredthatis more basic thanchangesin instrumentalbeliefs.

Rabid nationalism and the drive to dominate have been transmuted.A
Japanese nationalistof the I930S who saw his countrytoday would be
horrified,as Mishima was. Because it took a cataclysmto produce such a
change, this patterndoes not provide an attractiveroute to a more cooperativeworld. But it does show boththeimportanceand themutability
of values.
A less dramatic alterationmay be a more hopefulmodel. In the late
i960s, West Germans came to accept the existenceof the East German
regime. The division of the country,while stilldeeply regretted,was no
longer completelyintolerable.With the territorialstatusquo generally
accepted,tensionsand the danger of war were reduced,and cooperation
in the formof the Quadripartiteand the Helsinki Agreementsbecame
possible.
In Realism, values are generallytaken as unproblematicand constant;
theyare givens in game-theoreticstudies.Thus, althoughanalysiswithin
the frameworkof anarchycan produce accurateresults,it may make our
treatmentexcessivelystatic and distractus from importantquestions.
How values are developed, maintained,and changed may be crucial to
internationalpolitics,and may stronglyinfluencethe extentof cooperation; it is a matter,however,thatcannotbe explained withinthe anarchy
framework.
NORMS: Is NARROWSELF-INTERESTENOUGH? HATRED ANDNORMS
Utilitiescan reflectpassions as well as interests.Considerationsof theoreticalparsimonyspeak forignoringgreed,hatred,and envy,as well as

but thatdoes not mean thatsuch motivesare
moralityand self-sacrifice;
absent in the world. Witness Lord Salisbury'sanalysis of Prussia's demands on France in I870 (which, it can be argued, laid the foundations
forWorld War I):
Unless[theGermans]enjoythepleasingsensationofwitnessing
themorofFrance,theywillthinkthattheobjectsofthewarareonlyhalftification
attained.... [I]t is revenge that theydesire: not a strategicfrontier,or the
recoveryof lost "brothers"-but termsof peace which shall drive the iron
well into theirenemy's soul.84
These are the sort of impulses thatolder Realist scholarsfromThucydides to Morgenthauwarn of.They lead to destructivepoliciesand are dif84 Lord Robert Salisbury,"Count Bismarck'sCircular Lettersto Foreign Courts, i870,"
Review 129 (October i870), 553. I am gratefulto Marc TrachtenbergforpointThe Quarterly
ing me to thisarticle.

AND COOPERATION
345
ficultto theorize about. Although Realism recognizesthat cool, narrow

self-interest
may fail to guide behavior,it providesfew grounds forpredictingwhen it will failor what behaviorwill followifit does.
A related issue is the role of norms in furtheringcooperation.In one
sense, norms indicate behavior that is expected,standard,or normal. In
another sense, theyindicate behavior that is approved and valued positively.85
But when do normsin thefirstsense become normsin the second
sense? If theydo not,can theyreallyproduce a greatdeal of cooperation?
One of the themesof the anarchyliterature,of course,is thatnarrowselfinterestis sufficientunder many conditions,but the evidence is not very
For example, many
strongand the conditionsmay be veryrestrictive.86
scholarshave argued that in the balance of power, stabilitycan arise out
of the interplayof the states'narrownationalinterestsin survivaland expansion. The resultsare not always peaceful,but theydo maintain the
system.Paul Schroeder'sfascinatinghistoricalstudiesdenythatthisis an
accurate pictureof European balance-of-powerpolitics,however.He argues that mediating structuresof smaller states,a common understanding of internationallaw, and a shared sense of the appropriatebehavior
to thedomwere required ifwar was not to grow froma tool of statecraft
inatingfactof internationalpolitics.87
In tracingmuch of thecause of World War I to thedecline in Austria's
position,Schroeder pointsto Britain:althoughit had a greatstake in the
85Kratochwil and Ruggie argue thatour standardmethodologyis inappropriteforverifying theexistenceof normsin thelattersensebecause pointingto instancesin whichnormsare
violated does not establishthat theydo not existor are not important.See FriedrichKratochwiland JohnGerard Ruggie,"InternationalOrganization:A Stateof the Art on an Art
of the State,"International
Organization40 (Autumn i986), 766-69.A moregeneraltreatment
of normsalong theselines is FriedrichKratochwil,Rules,Norms,and Decisions:On theConditionsof Practicaland Legal Reasoningin International
Relationsand DomesticAffairs(Cambridge:Cambridge UniversityPress,forthcoming
i988).
86 This question is raised,among otherplaces, in Alker's analysesof how people play and
thinkabout Prisoners'Dilemma in the laboratory.See Hayward Alker,Jr.,and Roger Hurwirtz,"ResolvingPrisoner'sDilemmas" (unpub., M.I.T.); Alker,"ReflectiveResolutionsof
SequentialPrisoner'sDilemmas," presentedat themeetingoftheSocietyforGeneral Systems
Research,May 30, i985; and Alker, "From Quantityto Quality: A New ResearchProgram
on ResolvingSequential Prisoner'sDilemmas," presentedat the i985 meetingof the American Political Science Association.The incentivesand settingsof laboratorysituationsare so
different
fromthoseoperatingin internationalpolitics,however,thatit is farfromclear that
theseexperimentstell us much thatcan be directlytransferred.
87 See the followingessays,all by Schroeder:"The Lost Intermediaries:
The Impactof i870
on the European System,"International
HistoryReview 6 (Februaryi984), 1-27; "Containment Nineteenth-Century
Style: How Russia Was Restrained,"SouthAtlanticQuarterly82
(Winter i983), i-i8; "World War I as Galloping Gertie,"JournalofModernHistory44 (September1972), 319-45; "The Nineteenth-Century
Balance of Power: Language and Theory,"
paper deliveredat the 1977 meetingoftheAmericanPoliticalScienceAssociation;"The i9thCenturyInternationalSystem:Changes in theStructure,"WorldPolitics39 (October i986), i26. Also see FriedrichKratochwil,"On the Notion of 'Interest'in InternationalRelations,"
International
Organization36 (Winter i982), 1-30.

346
WORLD POLITICS
statusquo and in avoiding conflict,it neveracted to limitor controldangerous shiftsin the Balkans. Others also failed to maintainthe necessary
balance, although theirbehavior was logical to the extentthattheywere
willing to toleratea high risk of war. Aftershowing how much Austria
was weakened by Rumania's realignmentin i9i3, Schroederstressesthat
despite its importance,
no government
addresseditselftothemostobviousand criticalquestionof
to be managed?How, thatis,
all: how was thisnew,crucialdevelopment
could it be harmonizedwiththeoverallEuropeanbalance,incorporated
intotheprevailinginternational
withoutraisingthealreadyfearful
system
strainsto thepointof explosion?No one thoughtaboutthisproblemor
aboutit.88
suggesteddoinganything
Without conscious management-without at least some states seeking
the common interestof the membersof the system-stability,peace, and
the best interestsof the individual statescould not be maintained.A similar argumentwas made by Lord Salisbury,laterto become Foreign Secretary,when he criticizedthe refusalof the Britishgovernmentto counteractthe harsh termsPrussia imposed on defeatedFrance:
If [theleaders']intention
is ... to drawall theprofit
theycan fromthearof thegreaterinternational
rangements
republic,and yetto bearno share
ofthecostand dangersofitsgovernment,
we doubtnotthattheyare prefora severecondemnation
fromtheEnglishpeople.We
paringthemselves
forEnglandthenationaldoom
onlytrustthattheyare notalso preparing
thatalwayswaitsfortheselfishand timid.89
A parallel pointarisesfromone of Axelrod's computersimulations.He
finds that stable cooperation is much more likely to occur when actors
follow "metanorms" that call for punishing those who fail to enforce
norms.In otherwords,actorsmust not onlybe preparedto punish those
who defect,but also to act againstthosewho failto punishthem.90In the
same way, cooperation can be powerfullyreinforcedby injunctionsto
help others,or at least to limit the harm done to them.Thus "although
prescriptivemoralityis not usuallyexpressedin laws, in a numberof Eu88Paul Schroeder,"Romania and the Great Powers before1914," Revue RoumaineD'HisAs Schroederputs it in "World War I as Galloping Gertie":
52-53.
toire 14 (No. I, I97,
"Everyonewanted a payoff;no one wanted to pay" (fn.87), 345.
89
Salisbury (fn. 84), 556. During the Eastern Crisis of i877, William Gladstone asked:
"What is to be the consequence to civilisationand humanity,to publicorder,ifBritishinterestsare to be the rule forBritishagentsall overtheworld,and are to be forthemthemeasure
of rightor wrong?" (Quoted in Seton-Watson,fn.72, p. 69.) For a relatedgeneralargument,
see ArmatyaSen, "Rational Fools: A CritiqueoftheBehaviorFoundationsofEconomic Theory," Philosophy and Public Affairs6 (Summer 1977), 326-41 .
9?RobertAxelrod,"Modeling the Evolutionof Norms,"AmericanPoliticalScienceReview
8o (December i986),
1095-11
1I.

AND COOPERATION
ropean countries and now also in some [American] states
347
...,
helping
othersin certainkinds of extremeneed is requiredby law."9'

Applying the same reasoning,Robert Trivers argues that evolution
should selectforpeople who reciprocatealtruism.Emotionssuch as anger
at those who do not reciprocate,and guilt over one's own cheatingare
also functionalbecause they bolster reciprocity.Short-runcalculations
might lead people to ignore the transgressionsof others(or to replyto
them only mildly),or to shirk reparationswhen theyhave been caught
cheating.But over the long run,such behavioris destructive.Disproportionate retributionfor cheating,called up by anger, can induce future
compliance: "it seems plausible ... thatthe emotionof guilthas been selected forin humans partlyin order to motivatethe cheaterto compensate his misdeed and ... thus to preventthe ruptureof reciprocalrelationships." Because these emotions may sustain long-run cooperation
more than calculationwould,
selectionmayfavordistrusting
thosewho perform
altruistic
actswithout
theemotionalbasisofgenerosity
or guiltbecausethealtruistic
tendencies
ofsuchindividualsmaybe lessreliablein thefuture.
One can imagine,for
fora misdeedwithoutanyemotionalbasisbutwith
example,compensating
a calculating,
motive.Such an individualshouldbe distrusted
self-serving
becausethecalculatingspiritthatleadsthissubtlecheaternowto compensatemayin thefuturelead him to cheatwhencircumstances
seemmore
advantageous.92
The issue is by no means closed. It is possiblethatnarrowself-interest

may be able to explain most instancesof cooperationin the absence of
binding authority.But we should note thatin Gouldner's classic article,
reciprocityis not only a common empirical patternand a way out of a
dilemma; it is also a moral imperative:"people should help those who
have helped them."93 Such a sense of obligation-if shared-may well
9- Ervin Staub,PositiveSocial Behaviorand Morality,I
3-
(New York: Academic Press, 1978),
92 Trivers,"The
Evolutionof ReciprocalAltruism,"Quarterly
JournalofBiology46 (March
On p. 52, TriversanticipatesAxelrod'sargumentsabout metanorms.A similar
argumentabout deterrenceis made by Dean Pruitt,"Some RelationshipsBetweenInterpersonal and InternationalConflict,"in Axelrodet al. (fn.3).
93 Alvin Gouldner, "The Norm of Reciprocity,"
AmericanSociologicalReview 25 (April
i960), i69-71 (emphasis added); also see Larson (fn. 50), 20-22.
For a nice summaryof the
normativehold of reciprocity,
see RobertCialdini,Influence(Glenview,IL: Scott,Foresman,
i985), 20-34, and especiallythe marvelousstoryon page 27. Staub notesthatexperiments
indicate "thatwillingnessto ask forhelp is reducedwhen people do not expectto have an opportunityto provide help in return"(fn. 91, p. 346). The reverseshould have been foundif
rationalcalculationwere the drivingforce.Also see Charles Kindleberger'sreviewofAfter
Hegemony,"Hierarchy vs. Inertial Cooperation," InternationalOrganization40 (Autumn
1971),
50-51.
I986), 844-46.

348
WORLD POLITICS
have great "practical value," as JohnMackie notes.94Considerationsof

morality,fairness,and obligationare almost surelylarge partsof the explanation for the fact that individuals in societycooperate much more
than the Prisoners' Dilemma would lead us to expect. Only economists
behave as the theorysays theyshould; othersare likelyto contributeto
public goods, especiallywhen theybelieve thatfairnesscalls forthem to
do so.95 Indeed, it is possible thatmoralityprovidestheonlyway to reach
many mutual cooperativeoutcomes. In part because of the tendencyfor
people to be self-righteousand to see theirown acts as cooperativeand
those of others as hostile,temptationsand fearsmay produce mutually
is dominant.At a minundesiredoutcomesas long as narrowself-interest
imum, the feelingthat one is morallyobligated to reciprocatecooperation and thatotherslive under the same code-permits a wider range
and scope formutuallybeneficialexchanges.In fact,the actorsmay gain
exmostwhen theydo not regardthe interactionas one of self-interested
change at all. Even if thisextremeis not approached (and it is not likely
to be in internationalpolitics),withoutthe power of at least some shared
values, without some identificationwith the other,withoutnorms that
carrymoral force,cooperationmay be difficultto sustain.96
CONCLUSIONS
The queries and objections raised here are not all of the same type.
Some are assertionsthat the anarchyframeworkleads us to concentrate
JohnMackie,Ethics:InventingRightand Wrong(Harmondsworth,U.K.: Penguin,1977),
see also Keohane (fn. 58), 126-27, and Keohane, "Reciprocityin InternationalRelations,"International
Organization40 (Winter i986), 20-24.
95Gerald Marwell and Ruth Ames, "EconomistsFree Ride, Does AnyoneElse?" Journal
ofPublic Economics15 (Junei981), 295-310. I am gratefulto JoanneGowa forreferring
me
to thisinstructivearticle.Also see Charlan Nemeth,"A CriticalAnalysisof ResearchUtilizing the Prisoner'sDilemma Paradigm forthe Studyof Bargaining,"in Leonard Berkowitz,
ed., Advancesin Experimental
Social Psychology,
VI (New York: Academic Press, 1972), 20334; Daniel Kahneman, JackKnetsch,and RichardThaler, "Fairnessand the Assumptionsof
Economics,"JournalofBusiness59 (October i986), S285-300; Sen (fn.89). Transcriptsof the
deliberationsduring the Cuban missilecrisisreveal PresidentKennedy'sconcernwith perceived fairness:McGeorge Bundy,transcriber,
and JamesBlight,editor,"October 27, i962:
Transcriptsof the meetingsof the ExComm," International
Security12 (Winter i987/88), 3094
I19-20;
92.
96 In his presidentialaddress to the Public Choice Society,Dennis Mueller made a similar

point:contraryto the logic of PD, in thesesituations
most of us choose the cooperativestrategymost of the time. Why? Because we were

taughtto do so. ... One is almost embarrassedto make theseobservationswere it not
thatso manyof us who work with rationalegoistmodels continuallybuild our models
on assumptionsthatignorethesetruismsfrompsychologyand everydaylife.
Mueller,"Rational Egoism vs. AdaptiveEgoism as a FundamentalPostulatefora Descriptive
Theory of Human Behavior,"Public Choice5I (No. I, i986), 5-6.

AND COOPERATION
349
on questions thatare not central.That is true forthe discussionof preferences. Even if my argumentsabout the importanceof the preference
ordersand of changes in themare correct,the frameworkcan stillbe applied, albeit at the cost of requiringus to treatas given what may be crucial and problematical.But if this objection is not fatal,it also applies
more broadlyto the use of game-theorymodels in general ratherthan to
Prisoners'Dilemma in particular.Otherproblemscomplicatethepicture.
Basic conceptssuch as cooperation,offense,and power are notas straightforwardas theyappear in many analyses,and we may lose a great deal
when we squeeze behavior into the categoriesthe formertwo provide.
Strongperceptualbiases also underminemany of the centralpredictions
derivedfromthe PD. Althoughthenationalbehaviorthatactuallyoccurs
is oftenconsistentwith the general Realist emphasis on conflict,the reasons are differentfromthose stressedby thistradition.Game theorycan
accommodate both uncertaintyand differencesbetween the perceptions
of the two sides,97but we must know what these perceptionsare; they
may be more importantand difficultto understandthanthe resultinginteraction.Problems thatare even more fundamentalarise ifnarrowselfinterestis not the drivingforcebehindnationalbehavior:althoughgametheorymodels could be built around differentpremises,many of the
Realist argumentsabout anarchywould be undermined.
While I have discussed the problemsinherentin the anarchyframework, I have said littleabout its numerousstrengths.To do so would be
to recapitulatefamiliararguments;but I do want to note thatthe framework is usefulforremindingus thathuman action is oftendrivenby the
twinimpulsesof fearand temptation.It providestoolsforanalyzinghow
theseimpulsescan be harnessed(ifnot tamed) in a way thatleaves all parties betteroff.The conceptsof anarchyand the securitydilemma lead us
to see thatthe internationalsystemnot onlypermitsconflict,but can create it: actors may refuseto cooperate with others,not so much because
they seek the positive gains of exploitation,but because they fear that
theirown cooperativeinitiativeswill be mistreated.For purposesof both
analysis and prescription,the frameworkyields significantpropositions
on theconditionsand strategiesthatincreasethelikelihoodofcooperative
can be misleading,its asbehavior and outcomes. But its simplifications
sumptionsrequire scrutiny,and it relegatesmanyimportantquestionsto
the background. Understandingand exploringboth the uses of the approach and its limitations,without being overwhelmed by either,will
lead to a bettergrasp of world politics.
97See, for example, JohnHarsany, "Bargaining in Ignorance of the Opponent's Utility
Function,"Journalof ConflictResolution6 (March I 962).


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Realism, Game Theory, and Cooperation

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REALISM, GAME THEORY, AND

politics is shaped by the anarchical contextin which it takes place.

* I am gratefulfor commentsby Robert Art, JohnConybeare,Jeffrey

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and rigorthatstem fromformalization.But the formalizationis limited:

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REALISM, GAME THEORY,

Perhaps the most importantlimitationof the work on anarchyis that

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blindsus to thebroadersettingin whichbehavioroccurs.Problemsarise

9 JamesRosenau stressesthe role of habitsin "BeforeCooperation: Hegemons, Regimes,

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REALISM, GAME THEORY,

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ARE THE ACTORS'

The firstquestion is the most obvious one. How do we know whether

This is trueforJervis(fn. i).

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REALISM, GAME THEORY,

The secondproblemliesin determining

were the statesin I914 in PD or in Deadlock? (These are not,of course,

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The empirical problems in answering these questions are relatively

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REALISM, GAME THEORY,

ences as exogenous. Analysis is thereforefacilitated,but at the cost of

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strategieswhen defensiveones would have been more likely to make

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REALISM, GAME THEORY,

ences thatare held at any giventime,and therefore

leave;so theU.S., counterto itsnormalpolicyofacceptingsuchpeople,

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I 964), 86-I 25.

tudes toward antisatelliteweapons, particularlyby providingsatelliteswithoffensiveas well

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REALISM, GAME THEORY,

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It did not producea spiralof conflict,

in themonthsthatfollowed.If we takean evenlongerperspective,

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REALISM, GAME THEORY,

crossed fromEast to West Berlin. (Previously,only special passes issued

JamesMarkham,"Allied Diplomats DefyEast GermanControls,"New YorkTimes,May

see Paul Schroe28, i986. For paralleldiscussionof an importantcase in thelate i8thcentury,

der,"Old Wine in New Bottles:RecentContributionsto BritishForeignPolicyand European

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Questions can also be raised about the conceptsof offenseand defense.

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REALISM, GAME THEORY,

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is ameliorated; and a statecan gain a high degree of protectionwithout

This view is not only compatiblewith Realism, but is embedded in it.

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REALISM, GAME THEORY,

Axelrod points to the ironythatthe strategyof reciprocity(Tit-for-Tat)

The conditionsunder which statesseek to maximize theirrelativeas

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Waltz's argumentraises similardifficulties.

The finalset of problemsconcernspsychology,beliefs,and values. In

Robert Keohane has noted thatcooperationmay be explained in part