Domestic politics and interstate disputes: Examining US mid involvement and reciprocation, 1870–1992

Abstract

Increasingly scholars have become interested in conflict behavior that falls short of war. Chan (1997), for example, has insisted that a concern for less intense engagements is crucial for fully understanding the conflict‐proneness of different regimes. Chan (1997) furthermore noted that scholars have generally failed to account for whether a state was the initiator or target of a dispute. Such a distinction, however, is crucial for discriminating the pacific effects of democratic culture and institutions. In this paper, I investigate the domestic determinants of US MID involvement and reciprocation from 1870 to 1992. I find that politics does not stop at the water's edge. Unlike Gowa (1998) who found no relationship between the use of force and dissatisfaction with the status quo, I uncover an association between US domestic conditions and whether the US was an initiator or target of a MID. Not only is the US more likely to be targeted during periods of domestic political weakness, but Democratic administrations also appear to be challenged to a greater extent than their Republican counterparts. Furthermore, when targeted, the US is much more likely to reciprocate when the initiating state is a non‐democracy suggesting that regime type continues to play an important role in conflict propensity even after a demand has been made.