Is Anyone Listening? Crisis Signaling by the British House of Commons, 1918-2004 (with Dennis Foster). pdf version.
Abstract: Several prominent theories suggest that legislative opposition to leadership policies in international crises can moderate governmental stances and/or embolden adversaries. However, empirical tests of these theories have looked only at indirect measures of both independent and dependent variables. We change this by employing large-scale, textual analysis software to examine all British Parliamentary debates concerning international crises, for the period 1918-2004. We account for variations in the levels of certainty, anger, and anxiety expressed by Members of Parliament during debates, and identify the level of agreement among party members. Our analyses of these debates suggest our measures perform well since both certainty and anxiety predict British crisis escalation quite well. However, potential signals of calculated risk-taking propensity on the part of the House of Commons do not, independently, influence the escalatory behavior of the UK’s primary adversaries in interstate crises. Certainty and anxiety in British Parliament are associated with increased escalation by adversaries, even when controlling for common predictors of crisis escalation. We discuss the implications of these arguments for theories of democratic signaling.
Abstract: Several prominent theories suggest that legislative opposition to leadership policies in international crises can moderate governmental stances and/or embolden adversaries. However, empirical tests of these theories have looked only at indirect measures of both independent and dependent variables. We change this by employing large-scale, textual analysis software to examine all British Parliamentary debates concerning international crises, for the period 1918-2004. We account for variations in the levels of certainty, anger, and anxiety expressed by Members of Parliament during debates, and identify the level of agreement among party members. Our analyses of these debates suggest our measures perform well since both certainty and anxiety predict British crisis escalation quite well. However, potential signals of calculated risk-taking propensity on the part of the House of Commons do not, independently, influence the escalatory behavior of the UK’s primary adversaries in interstate crises. Certainty and anxiety in British Parliament are associated with increased escalation by adversaries, even when controlling for common predictors of crisis escalation. We discuss the implications of these arguments for theories of democratic signaling.