http://hdl.handle.net/1903/2775 2013-06-20T04:17:25Z 2013-06-20T04:17:25Z Bock, Ryan E. http://hdl.handle.net/1903/13215 2012-10-12T02:33:23Z 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Bilateral Intelligence Cooperation: Theory Development within the 'Missing Dimension' of International Politics Authors: Bock, Ryan E. Abstract: Bilateral intelligence cooperation has received increased attention in recent years, thanks in part to its publicly acknowledged role in supporting sovereign states in their efforts to counter transnational threats. Until recently most of the scholarship on this topic has been descriptive and atheoretical, with a tendency to treat known examples of cooperation as unique occurrences, rather than as instances of a broader phenomenon. The aversion to theory surrounding bilateral intelligence cooperation has inhibited efforts to develop generalized and contingent explanations about it, such as why it occurs in the first place and under what conditions it is most likely to flourish and atrophy. This dissertation seeks to address these gaps in the Intelligence Studies literature by leveraging insights from two theoretical traditions from International Relations--the dyadic democratic peace and relational contracting perspectives--to develop candidate explanations of why certain pairs of states engage in greater degrees of intelligence cooperation over time than others. Two historical case studies--the Anglo-Soviet and Anglo-American military intelligence relationships during World War II--are presented and analyzed with a view to assessing the relative strengths and weaknesses of each explanation. Through the use of qualitative research methods (i.e., the congruence method and testing of observable implications) and the development of new numeric measurements to capture the depth of intelligence cooperation over time, the author finds that the normative dyadic democratic peace hypothesis and its posited causal mechanism of the regime recognition dynamic are largely corroborated in both cases, thus suggesting that they warrant further consideration as an explanation of the depth of bilateral intelligence cooperation. By contrast, the relational contracting hypothesis and its posited causal mechanism of willful hierarchy are not well supported in either case, thus raising questions about their applicability and generalizability to the larger universe of cases.

2012-01-01T00:00:00Z Brown, Jonathan Nathan http://hdl.handle.net/1903/13214 2012-10-12T02:32:34Z 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: The Sound of Silence: Power, Secrecy, and International Audiences in U.S. Overseas Military Basing Negotiations Authors: Brown, Jonathan Nathan Abstract: This dissertation poses two basic questions: (1) Under what conditions are leaders more or less likely to publicly acknowledge cooperative security negotiations or to pursue talks secretly? (2) What impact does this decision have on leaders' subsequent bargaining behavior and their overall prospects of achieving cooperation? To answer these questions, I develop a realist-inspired theoretical framework that advances two main arguments about leaders' management of national security information. First, international audiences - namely, third-party states - rather than domestic audiences often constitute the principal targets of official secrecy and public acknowledgement. Second, leaders' control of information is shaped primarily by the international strategic context and the scope of their states' national security interests rather than domestic political incentives and institutions. My central claim and finding is that states' power positions in the international system fundamentally influence not only the way that leaders control information during cooperative security negotiations but also the impact that information management has on leaders' subsequent willingness to make concessions during talks and their likelihood of reaching an agreement. I evaluate these arguments empirically by studying leaders' control of information during negotiations for foreign military base rights. Based on extensive archival research, I have constructed an original comprehensive dataset of 218 negotiation rounds and 59 agreements for U.S. overseas base rights during 1939 - 1971. I use this dataset to test seven novel hypotheses through rigorous statistical analyses that produce strong support for my argument about international power position and strategic context while systematically controlling for the effects of important domestic political factors. Additional support comes from rich historical examples and comparative case studies based primarily on declassified government records that illustrate the causal processes underlying each of the main quantitative findings.

2012-01-01T00:00:00Z Lowery, Todd R. http://hdl.handle.net/1903/13116 2012-10-11T02:33:59Z 2010-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: In Trepidis Rebus: The Constitutional Basis of the Executive War Power Authors: Lowery, Todd R. Abstract: Traditional approaches to questions of executive war power emphasize presidential-congressional relations, and focus on the meaning and implications of specific constitutional clauses. This dissertation offers an alternative approach by examining executive war power through the higher, more normative purposes to which the Constitution aims. It views executive war power from the perspective of Constitution's basic but essential goal of self-preservation, and argues that the Presidency has a unique duty to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution. Presidential power, therefore, should be viewed in light of its duties to preserving the constitutional order. Presidential power, however, should not be viewed as "anything goes" for, true to republican principles, the people ultimately are sovereign and have multiple constitutional means by which to hold their leaders accountable. The dissertation focuses its analysis on the Constitution's text, examining Publius and other writings of the Founding era, to help uncover the explicit purpose and implicit principles for understanding the Constitution. Understanding "to what end" the Constitution aims provides the lens through which we should view the actions of its institutions and officers. The dissertation then offers an interpretative analysis of President Washington's words and deeds during the Whiskey Rebellion, demonstrating that his construction of the executive war power offers an important contribution to U.S. constitutionalism. It also focuses on Lincoln's construction of the executive war power during the Civil War, arguing that although Lincoln exercised extraordinary power in meeting the necessity of the situation, he did so while remaining true to both the spirit and the letter of the Constitution. This counters conventional opinions that Lincoln's conduct was un- or extraconstitutional, or that he had to act outside of the Constitution in order to save it. The dissertation suggests that the constitutionalism and statesmanship of Washington and Lincoln offer much perspective for understanding issues surrounding the executive war power today.

2010-01-01T00:00:00Z Marshall, Shana R. http://hdl.handle.net/1903/12970 2012-10-11T02:34:34Z 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: The New Politics of Patronage: The Arms Trade and Clientelism in the Arab World Authors: Marshall, Shana R. Abstract: In states without robust democratic institutions, public resources are often allocated on the basis of patronage. This distribution of patronage, along with the manipulation of official institutions (such as electoral systems and the judiciary) and the deployment of the coercive arms of the state provided the formula for authoritarian longevity in the Arab World. However, much regional scholarship continues to focus on the process through which patronage is distributed with little reference to how the underlying resources accrue to Arab regimes in the first place. Such studies fail to interrogate the organizational and financial interests of the external institutions (such as oil markets and aid organizations) that mediate this transfer of resources, and how those interests shape methods and patterns of resource distribution within Arab States. This paper is an attempt to identify some of these institutions and patterns by focusing on the array of patronage resources made available through the arms purchases executed by regional governments. The specific class of resources examined here is reciprocal investment contracts that U.S. defense firms negotiate with procuring country governments in order to facilitate arms sales, known in industry parlance as `defense offsets.' Procuring states design their own offset policies, including the amount of investment that foreign arms manufacturers are required to make and the domestic enterprises where those funds must be allocated. The procuring state's discretion over the process allows us to draw some conclusions about how these governments distribute offset investment to strengthen incumbents' patronage-based support networks. This analysis also reveals how U.S. defense firms are able to influence the negotiation process in order to secure their own financial benefits. By examining how defense firms and their customers in the Middle East collude to structure weapons contracts in order to generate offset agreements that are mutually beneficial, we gain a better understanding of how patronage politics operates in the contemporary regional context. We are likewise alerted to the subtle ways in which influential external actors can insinuate their own interests into the process, and how the interactions between these groups create ever-evolving new opportunities for patronage politics.

2012-01-01T00:00:00Z