How to Conciliate: Counterfactual Experiments on Pathways to Conciliation

• In Event: Public Opinion on War and Peace in Ukraine and Taiwan

Abstract

We construct policy counterfactuals through experiments that investigate how conciliation signals can help to conciliate two adversaries and their domestic publics. Fielding trilateral parallel experiments in China (receiver), Japan (sender), and the United States (observer), we randomized different types of war apologies from Japan and how China officially responds to them. We find that direct apologies can go a long way toward conciliation. We also find evidence of two distinct sender-receiver gaps: While the perception of sincerity is stronger at the sender end (Japan) than at the receiver end (China), the sender (Japan) also underestimates the receiver’s (China) willingness to conciliate. By pinning down different policy-and-reaction counterfactuals in the populations at stake, we provide causal evidence on the domestic dynamics underlying different pathways of conciliation in the shadow of deep historical grievance. Our work has important implications for other conflicts involving China that appear intractable, including the longstanding conflict between China and Taiwan.

Authors

• Kai Quek, University of Hong Kong

• Jiaqian Ni, University of California, Berkeley