Associate Professor, Azusa Katagiri, Osaka School of International Public Policy

"Understanding War and Peace: International relations offers meaningful insights into a world full of uncertainty"

Why do international conflicts escalate into international crises and even lead to war? And how will said wars end? This question is a fundamental concern of international relations, or IR. To address this, I apply statistical and computational methods to a variety of foreign relations documents and empirically test longstanding theories in policymakers’ decision-making and communication in conflict escalation/de-escalation. My ongoing project involves statistical analysis of declassified U.S. foreign relations documents to demonstrate the decision-making process to terminate the Vietnam War.

Research on interstate conflict has placed a significant emphasis on an informational mechanism during wars: warring states learn about their adversary’s private information (such as military capabilities and resolve) through fighting, and such information updates their expectations of military victory. This updating process narrows the gap of expectations between two warring states, with war eventually terminating when their expectations converge enough to open up an overlapping room for negotiation.

Even now, a major interstate war rages on

In February 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine despite all diplomatic efforts to avoid further conflict escalation. As of now, this deadly war has already continued for ten months, showing no sign of ceasefire or de-escalation. We all feel much distress at the prolonged war between Russia and Ukraine and are eager to know when and how this war will end, as well as any potential impediments to war termination. Recent theoretical and empirical developments in IR can offer meaningful insights into these puzzles of the contemporary world.

Given this informational mechanism, where does the ongoing war stand now, and how soon will we witness some form of ceasefire? Unfortunately, my prospect is rather depressing. Although Russia has already lost its strong momentum for territorial takeover with a series of losses in key battles in Eastern and Southern Ukraine, they are still more than willing to stay the course and continue denying any concessions to Ukraine. Ukraine is backed by a wide range of military and logistical assistance from NATO, which appears to be aimed at dispelling the Russians from Eastern and Southern Ukraine and even from the Crimean Peninsula. Both sides seem to be slowly updating their beliefs from the long-lasting war; however, their expectations of military victory or defeat have not yet converged enough for successful peace talks.

Even if they successfully reach a certain condition for a ceasefire at some point, numerous IR studies suggest that their implementation of a potential peace accord poses another layer of challenge in the conflict resolution process. This is because both Russians and Ukrainians have strong incentives to violate the peace accord and unilaterally attack the other side for changing the status quo that both sides are not necessarily satisfied with. As the international community does not have any world government to enforce the peace accord, the process after the ceasefire will face tremendous challenges as well and the peace accord will most certainly turn out to be unstable or even fragile.

Hoping for the best, expecting for the worst

Once a deadly war is initiated, we often find it difficult to terminate it. Given this, it is always wise for us to anticipate worst-case scenarios that may occur in a world full of uncertainty: Neither side can defeat the other as enormous financial and human costs continue to mount in a stalemate that will last perhaps even for several years. I personally and sincerely hope that such a forecast based on previous works in the field will prove false and the that war will come to an immediate end.

For more information
https://www.osipp.osaka-u.ac.jp/en/osipp-faculty/katagiri-azusa/
https://azusakatagiri.wixsite.com/mysite

References
Min, Eric. 2020. “Talking While Fighting: Understanding the Role of Wartime Negotiation.”
International Organization 74(3): 610-632.
Powell, Robert. 2004. “Bargaining and learning while fighting.” American Journal of
Political Science 48(2): 344-361.
Slantchev, Branislav L. 2003. “The Principle of Convergence in Wartime Negotiations.”
American Political Science Review 97(4): 621-632.
Wagner, R. Harrison. 2000. “Bargaining and War.” American Journal of Political Science
44(3): 469-484.
Weisiger, Alex. 2016. “Learning from the Battlefield: Information, Domestic Politics,
and Interstate War Duration.” International Organization 70(2): 347-375.

Edit: Mayumi Mochizuki, Christopher Bubb