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Victory and Defeat in International Relations
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primary and secondary documents, interviews, polling data analysis, counterfactuals, and, in ourfinal chapter, experiments, to test the extent to which specific biases shape people’s evaluationsof the war on terror
None of this is straightforward. Perceptions are one of the hardest areas of social science to argueconvincingly about. The contents of other people’s minds are difficult to define, identify andmeasure. Furthermore, to capture the battlefield result we have to understand the aims of leaders,but people’s objectives are notoriously hard to decipher. However, some of the methodologicalproblems in this study actually represent evidence for the overall argument. If motives aredifficult to discern for the scholar; then they must be more problematic for an observer who lacksthe same time and information to make a judgment. If the observer cannot build an evaluation onan accurate understanding of leader’s aims, this begs the question: what exactly is the evaluationbuilt upon?
Our conclusions to this question, explored throughout the book and especially in Chapter 8,argue that:
1. The asymmetry of outcome in a dispute explains whether people Scorekeep or Match-fix2. The victim of Match-fixing tends to be:
a. the most powerful state in the disputeb. the state perceived to be losing controlc. the beneficiary of Match-fixing in a previous dispute
3. There are differences in how Framework 2 factors operate between different regimes, but
Match-fixing is still very prevalent in democracies
4. Americans tends to judge the performance of the United States harshly in counter-
insurgency operations
5. The most consistently important Match-fixing factors are: expectations, symbolic events
and media and elite manipulation
In the absence of compelling information that one side triumphed, we try to understand whyobservers reach apparently firm opinions about winners and losers. If we can develop a goodunderstanding of the evaluation process, we can revisit history with a fresh perspective andsuggest new insights. We can also provide a framework for understanding judgments of politicstoday. We can provide a range of suggestions for policymakers. Finally we can, perhaps,challenge the reader to consider the basis for his or her evaluations, and enable a more reasonedset of judgments.
their consequences, and are not merely phenomena driven by those consequences). However, it should be noted thatFramework 2 factors are not independent of each other. Rather they have major interactions. Indeed they oftenreinforce and shape each other (a further twist which we explore in the Conclusion). John Gerring, Social ScienceMethodology: A Criterial Framework (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,2001), pp. 138-151.
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| | Authors: Tierney, Dominic. |
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49
primary and secondary documents, interviews, polling data analysis, counterfactuals, and, in our
final chapter, experiments, to test the extent to which specific biases shape people’s evaluations
of the war on terror
None of this is straightforward. Perceptions are one of the hardest areas of social science to argue
convincingly about. The contents of other people’s minds are difficult to define, identify and
measure. Furthermore, to capture the battlefield result we have to understand the aims of leaders,
but people’s objectives are notoriously hard to decipher. However, some of the methodological
problems in this study actually represent evidence for the overall argument. If motives are
difficult to discern for the scholar; then they must be more problematic for an observer who lacks
the same time and information to make a judgment. If the observer cannot build an evaluation on
an accurate understanding of leader’s aims, this begs the question: what exactly is the evaluation
built upon?
Our conclusions to this question, explored throughout the book and especially in Chapter 8,
argue that:
1. The asymmetry of outcome in a dispute explains whether people Scorekeep or Match-fix
2. The victim of Match-fixing tends to be:
a. the most powerful state in the dispute
b. the state perceived to be losing control
c. the beneficiary of Match-fixing in a previous dispute
3. There are differences in how Framework 2 factors operate between different regimes, but
Match-fixing is still very prevalent in democracies
4. Americans tends to judge the performance of the United States harshly in counter-
insurgency operations
5. The most consistently important Match-fixing factors are: expectations, symbolic events
and media and elite manipulation
In the absence of compelling information that one side triumphed, we try to understand why
observers reach apparently firm opinions about winners and losers. If we can develop a good
understanding of the evaluation process, we can revisit history with a fresh perspective and
suggest new insights. We can also provide a framework for understanding judgments of politics
today. We can provide a range of suggestions for policymakers. Finally we can, perhaps,
challenge the reader to consider the basis for his or her evaluations, and enable a more reasoned
set of judgments.
their consequences, and are not merely phenomena driven by those consequences). However, it should be noted that
Framework 2 factors are not independent of each other. Rather they have major interactions. Indeed they often
reinforce and shape each other (a further twist which we explore in the Conclusion). John Gerring, Social Science
Methodology: A Criterial Framework (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2001), pp. 138-151.
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