Extremism: Root Causes and Strategic Use in Conflicts

This paper examines the interaction between root causes, domestic policy considerations and the use of extremism as a strategic tool in an external conflict. Within a two-country three-stage game, we show that, in general, domestic policies will be used strategically to achieve the desired level of extremism. We also show that the level of extremism decreases and social/economic conditions improve when a country becomes wealthier, more powerful, more socially concerned, less nationalistic, relatively less concerned with external considerations and when the value of the contested asset decreases. These effects are due to external strategic considerations, rather than domestic ones.