Recent research on the sources of individual attitudes toward trade policy comes to very different conclusions about the role of economic self-interest. The skeptical view, expressed most pointedly by Mansfield and Mutz (2009), suggests instead that longstanding symbolic predispositions and...

Most research on congressional consideration of foreign and defense policy concludes that ideology is the most important influence on roll call voting and that constituent economic interests are not very important. This paper challenges this conclusion on two grounds. First, most previous...

This research note evaluates the effect of economic interests on public support for American global activism. Those who were relatively well-positioned to benefit from the American-supported postwar international order should be more likely to support it. An analysis of American National...

This paper evaluates the effect of economic interests and security concerns on American intervention in international conflict. Generalizations about the relative importance of these considerations have played an important role in the historiography of American foreign relations. Although...

Alliances are usually understood as a way for states to aggregate military capabilities in the face of a common threat. From this perspective, the willingness of relatively powerful states to form alliances with much weaker partners is puzzling. The weaker ally often adds little to the stronger...

The domestic politics of American military spending during the Cold War confronts scholars with an important but often overlooked puzzle: the two major parties appear to have switched positions on the issue. During the early Cold War era, Democrats were generally supportive of increased military...

Research in international relations commonly finds that major powers behave differently than do other states. Indeed, the assumption that major powers are potentially active anywhere on the globe is the basis for treating dyads that include them as politically relevant in many studies. In spite...

Liberal theorists have long held that the value of trade lost due to military conflict will lead states to avoid such conflict with their trading partners. Previous research has found support for this line of argument, but has focused on state behavior rather than the attitudes of those actually...