Why, how, and to what effect do states use disinformation in their foreign policies? Inductive accounts variously address those questions, but International Relations has yet to offer a theoretical account. I propose Putnam’s two-level game (1988) as a candidate theory. A rationalist approach that jettisons the unitary actor assumption, the model accounts for previous accounts’ observations and suggests their interrelation and four overarching objectives. The model also generates novel implications about disinformation in foreign policy, two of which I test via separate survey experiments.The primary implication is that states can use disinformation to encourage polarization and in turn can reverberate into commitment problems. A survey experiment tests the first link in that chain, arguing that disinformation’s effects could be underestimated due to focus on belief outcomes; potential selection bias in active-exposure studies; and probable pre-treatment effects. It hypothesizes that passive exposure to novel political dis/misinformation has ripple effects on trust, affective polarization, and participation-linked emotions even among those that disbelieve it. It thus tests both the implication that disinformation can encourage polarization and that disinformation can be used to impact multiple potential outcomes at once. The second empirical paper tests the latter links in the disinformation-commitment problem chain. Building on a study that found U.S polarization decreases U.K. ally confidence (Myrick 2022), it argues that polarization uniquely increases chances of voluntary defection and does so not only due to government changeover risk but also weakened leader accountability. It employs a causal mediation analysis on survey experiment data to test whether a potential partner’s polarization increases their perceived unreliability and in turn decreases public cooperation preference. The commitment problem implication receives mixed support. The first experiment evidences no impact of partisan mis/disinformation on affective polarization, though that may be due to floor effects. The second experiment finds that polarization modestly increases perceived defection risk, but this increase is not necessarily strong enough to change public cooperation preference. Beyond those findings, the first experiment also uncovers that polarization may indeed have sociopolitical impacts on even those that disbelieve it, consistent with the multiple-outcomes implication.

Army Futures Command (AFC) has the implicit mission of ensuring that the Army does not get locked into a technology that might be ineffective in a future of competition and conflict. In this dissertation I develop insights and tools that can help assess and inform AFC’s efforts to understand and avoid undesirable technological lock-in. I started with three historical case studies of the interactions between technology and military strategy. The first examined the German Army’s strategic commitment to using railroads before World War I, forcing them into a military answer to rapidly increased diplomatic tensions in 1914. The second explored how the US Army Air Corps became locked into a doctrine of strategic bombing before World War II, affecting their ability to support ground troops during the Cold War. The third studied why the US Army was able to avoid becoming locked into a tactical nuclear doctrine in the 1950s, despite initial efforts to change Army structure and tactics to accommodate the nuclear battlefield. I identified three factors: 1) rapid changes in the strategic environment; 2) lack of civilian analogues to nuclear weapons; 3) the novelty of tactical nuclear technology, and availability of operational alternatives. The second part of my research sought to identify applicable theories from the fields of science, technology and society studies (STS). I identified five theories (technological systems, co-production, technological lock-in, path dependence, and economic growth theory), each with a brief case study. I sent my initial analysis to eighteen professionals at AFC and used their feedback to determine the utility of these theories for military planning. Finally, I analyzed AFC's current initiatives via semi-structured interviews, gaining insight into AFC's operations to identify three classes of issues that they face: complicated, exterior, and complex. Complicated issues are manageable through organizational methods. Exterior issues require planning to accommodate irreducible uncertainties (such as budgeting processes). Complex issues involved unpredictable interactions among technology and military strategy. I focused on three AFC programs, (artificial intelligence, robotics, and autonomous systems) demonstrating how STS theories can offer additional tools to help guide technological and strategic planning for an uncertain future.

In the preface to On War, Clausewitz describes his work as a series of loosely connected pure nuggets of knowledge. He then states his hope that his nuggets would eventually be connected and consolidated into what he calls a “final casting without dross”. It is the goal of this work to begin that consolidation and take steps towards a final casting and a more comprehensive understanding of war, combining Clausewitz’s models with modern findings not available at the time of On War’s conception. Using Clausewitz’s combat equation as a foundation for a framework on the nature of war, this work will synthesize many of On War’s central concepts, while also expanding upon the terms and mechanics presented in Book One. It is hoped that the resulting model will combine the best of Clausewitz’s findings in a way that makes the sum of the parts greater than the whole, and allows previous findings which were isolated to a particular silo of study to be cross examined for exponential application to the study of war. This may in due time, with additional contributions, result in the ever desired revolution in military affairs and enhance the military sciences for years to come.

While recruitment of middle and upper-class Bangladeshis by Islamic jihadist terror groups and Iranian mobilization of Afghan Hazaras to fight in the Syrian civil war present two extremely different regional challenges, this study shows how these movements are linked in the ways in which state and non-state actors deploy similar narrative strategies to mobilize support. I argue that narratives that capitalize upon the failure of upward social mobility and governance failures are highly useful for recruiting individuals to join either state or non-state organizations when appropriately and specifically linked to the particular historical, cultural, and political environment. I will demonstrate this by comparing and contrasting the use of recruitment narratives playing off of grievances for Iran's IRGC recruitment of poor Afghan Hazaras with low-levels of formal educational achievement and Islamist terrorist groups’ recruitment of middle- and upper-class Bangladeshis. The study argues that while the contexts and life experiences between IRGC Hazara and Bangladeshi terror group recruits are quite distinct, they are similarly motivated by narratives that emphasize the creation of a strong ideological and religious community based on alienation defined by a lack of desired and expected upward social mobility and profound failures of basic governance.

ABSTRACT

Although the US government has been using remotely piloted aircraft (RPA), more commonly referred to as drones, to conduct military strikes against terrorists and insurgents since at least 2001, only around 2011 did media outlets and polling organizations began assessing the attitudes of Americans towards the use of drones as a weapon of war. Initially, public support for drone strikes was robust with nearly 70 percent of Americans expressing approval. As the discussion of drone strikes intensified however, public support declined over 10 percentage points.

Only a handful of studies have examined public opinion and drone strikes, and all have focused exclusively on explaining support. This study seeks to fill this gap in the literature and explain opposition to drone strikes. The primary argument put forth in this dissertation is that people’s beliefs determine their opinions, and their morality determines their beliefs. Although independent opinion formation is often considered a cognitive process, I argue that, at least in the case of drone strikes, the opinion formation process is largely an affective one.

By examining media coverage and elite discourse surrounding drone strikes, I isolate three narratives which I believe communicate certain messages to the public regarding drone strikes. I argue that the messages produced by elite discourse and disseminated by the media to the public are only influential on opinion formation once they have been converted to beliefs. I further argue that conversion of message to belief is largely dependent on individual moral attitudes.

To test my arguments, I conduct a survey-experiment using subjects recruited from Arizona State University’s School of Politics and Global Studies student subject pool. My research findings lead to two key conclusions. First, opposition to drone strikes is largely the product of the belief(s) that drone strikes are not necessary for protecting the United States from terrorist attack, and that drone strikes kill more civilians than do strikes from conventional aircraft. Second, whether an individual expresses support or opposition to drone strikes, moral attitudes are a relatively good predictor of both beliefs and disposition.

There are two main motivations for conducting this analysis. The first motivation is to understand the Social Credit System (SCS) itself: what it is, why it’s being developed, and what implications it may have for China and the rest of the world. The Social Credit System is a novel idea—it’s the first ever use of AI and machine learning technology by a government for the purposes of social engineering. The long-term consequences of this technology will have a monumental impact on the Chinese peoples’ well-being. Potential implications of the system range from impacts on privacy and activism to whether other countries are inspired to develop a similar technology. There are also many different implementations for this system, each with its own outcome. This system is a consequence of the increasing capabilities of technology and an experimental approach influenced heavily by China’s culture and history, which leads to the second motivation.
Confucianism’s historical influence on China’s culture has made the Social Credit System seem like a good solution to many of China’s major societal problems. As such, the second motivation is to evaluate the impact Confucianism has on the development of the system; this involves understanding what Confucianism is, identifying parallels between it and the SCS, and analyzing how it may affect the Chinese people reaction to a full-fledged SCS. Understanding Confucianism may also illuminate why the government believes this is a good idea, what direction it may want to take this, and what boundaries, if any, the Chinese citizens have. We chose to analyze the SCS from a Confucian perspective because it has played a large role in influencing Chinese culture and history for over 2000 years. The Chinese people have been especially drawn to it in recent years due to increasing corruption, increasing inequality, decreasing trust, and increased social instability.
Although Confucianism may have a significant influence on the development of the SCS, there are also other influences in the mix. One of these influences is China’s AI competition with the US; relaxing privacy protections has given China an enormous amount of data to feed its AI. This system is also another avenue for China to develop their algorithms. There are also the motivations of the Communist party of China. These motivations include market reform, governmental reform, authoritarian interests and bureaucratic interests.

Following the 2008 financial crisis, two social movements emerged in the United States, both attempting to address economic anxieties and grievances, though from very different ideological positions. The Tea Party Movement and the Occupy Movement arose within a few years of one another, and both sought to explain the failure of the existing economic system, whether in terms of overregulation and government overreach, or in terms of political corruption and the failures of capitalism. Despite both movements seeking to address economic failures and anxieties, and both movements emerging within two years of one another, the Tea Party Movement and Occupy Movement had very different trajectories and outcomes. Putting aside the question of how to measure the success of a social movement, it is clear that the lasting effects of these two movements were quite different despite substantial similarities in the timing of these movements, and the economic anxieties which helped fuel them. While there are likely a constellation of factors which contributed to the differing outcomes between these two movements, the factors of interest in this analysis are the narratives espoused by these movements, and the relationship between narrative, and the organization and political activities of these movements.