Who Responds to Costly Signals? Attribution and the End of Detente

• In Event: Security Dilemma and War

Abstract

Assessments of states' motives are central to bargaining in international politics. However, foundational questions about the assessment of motives remain, including the question of why the substance of belief-updating and the timing of belief-change about motives vary across decision makers. Focusing on costly signals of resolve, I develop a theory of attribution to explain this variation. Integrating costly signaling arguments with attribution research in psychology, I argue that recipients' inferences from costly signals depend on the interaction between a signal's informational structure and recipients' 'implicit theories', i.e. their assumptions about group agents in international politics. I derive a typology of implicit theories from two underlying dimensions, mutability and unity, and provide predictions for how each type will shape attribution. As an initial test of the theory, I examine the responses of three key decision makers to three costly Soviet signals during the Carter Administration. The findings support the theory, suggesting that decision makers' inferences about motives are subjective, yet they are neither static nor idiosyncratic: decision makers are responsive to costly signals, but the timing of belief-change systematically varies, with significant implications for interstate communication and the risk of conflict escalation.

Author

• Paola Solimena, Columbia University