Multidimensional Reputation in International Politics

• In Event: International Reputation Reimagined: Cooperation, Complexity, and Contestation

Abstract

International politics is characterized by enduring uncertainty about the intentions of other actors. Audiences scrutinize state behavior to infer a range of underlying traits, including the state’s tendency to stand firm in a crisis (resolve) and abide by international commitments (compliance). Despite this, existing studies of international reputation tend to analyze specific traits in isolation. In this project, we explore how foreign policy choices affect multiple dimensions of an actor’s reputation. We examine the relationship between two reputational attributes, resolve and compliance, that have been of primary interest to scholars of international security and international cooperation. We develop a theoretical framework that explains when state behavior generates multiple, simultaneous reputational effects, as well as how these effects interact with each other. We test the theory in a survey experiment examining the use of military force in the presence of international legal commitments that sanction or prohibit such behavior.

Authors

• Michael Goldfien, Naval War College

• Tyler Pratt, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

• Keren Yarhi-Milo, Columbia University