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European Great Power Pacta de Contrahendo and Interstate Imperial War, 1815-1939: Suggestions of Pattern

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 November 2009

William Brian Moul
William Brian Moul
Affiliation:
University of Waterloo
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Abstract

A great power in a dispute with a minor state does not require the weight which a coalition with a peer would provide, and may require peer toleration in order to throw its own weight around. An alliance with the rival is a prudent step fora predatory great power. This article examines nondefense alliances among the European great powers and activist wars with minor states during 1815–1939. Weak commitments favour activist war and strong ones induce such warfare. The strength of the commitment varies with the geopolitical location of the target.

Résumé

Une grande puissance lors d'un conflit avec un Etat plus faible n'a pas besoin du poids que la coalition avec un semblable pourrait lui conférer et peut néecessiter d'être tolérée par ses pairs pour jeter son propre poids dans la bataille. Une alliance avec le rival est un pas prudent pour une grande puissance prédatrice. L'auteur examine les alliances non-défensives entre les grandes puissances européennes et les guerres avec les Etats plus faibles entre 1815–1939. De faibles engagements favorisent la guerre active tandis que de forts engagements provoquent la guerre. La force de l'engagement varie avec la situation géopolitique de la cible.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 16 , Issue 1 , March 1983 , pp. 81 - 102
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association (l'Association canadienne de science politique) and/et la Société québécoise de science politique 1983

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References

1 Schroeder, Paul, “Alliances, 1815–1939: Weapons of Rawer and Tools of Management,” in Knorr, Klaus (ed.), Historical Dimensions of National Security Problems (Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 1976), 231. (Emphasis in the original.)Google Scholar

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3 Schroeder, “Alliances,” 230–31.

4 Ibid., 256.

5 There are many more studies of alliances and war at the “system level of analysis” and one other at the “national level of analysis”—Singer, J. David and Small, Melvin, “National Alliance Commitments and War Involvement, 1815–1945,” in Rosenau, James N. (ed.), International Politics and Foreign Policy (New York: The Free Press, 1969), 513–42.Google ScholarGood reasons for not discussing that study here are found in Moul, William B., “The Level of Analysis Problem Revisited,” this JOURNAL 6 (1973), 494–513.Google Scholar

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8 Schroeder, “Alliances,” 255. He refers (n. 75) to the studies by Singer and Small.

9 At the beginning of his essay Schroeder prefers the technical definition of an alliance as a treaty with provision for the use of armed force in specific circumstances. He writes: “alliances must involve some measure of commitment to use force to achieve a common goal” (ibid., 227). However, in his survey he discusses agreements which do not meet the technical definition and at the end refers to the peaceful possibilities of associative–antagonistic relationships such as “alliances and quasi–alliances” (ibid., 256–57).

10 “Imperialism” in the power politics sense of the word— “a policy that aims at the overthrow of the status quo” between states (Morgenthau, Hans J., Politics Among Nations [4th ed.; New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1967], 42).Google Scholar

11 For a summary of the contagion arguments and evidence, see Wilkinson, David, Deadly Quarrels: Lewis F. Richardson and the Statistical Study of War (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980)Google Scholar, chap. 5.

12 Singer, J. Davidand Small, Melvin, The Wages of War, 1816–1965: A Statistical Handbook (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1972).Google Scholar The strong were the great powers: the United Kingdom, for the 1815–1945 duration; France, until defeat in 1940; Germany, out of Prussia by war, removed from the ranks by defeat in 1918, and restored to great power status in 1925; Russia, transformed into the USSR, defeated by Germany in the First World War, and recognized once more as a great power in 1922; Austria, later Austria–Hungary, until dismemberment in 1918; and Italy after unification in 1860.

13 Established political arrangements, according to his operational criterion, are those in existence for more than one year (James Lee Ray, “Status Inconsistency and War Involvement Among European States, 1816–1970” [unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Michigan, 1974], 48–49).

14 They also conform to the results of attempts to make distinctions more precise. See Wallace, Michael D., “Clusters of Nations in the Global System, 1865–1964,“ International Studies Quarterly 19 (1975), 67–109CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Singer, J. David and Small, Melvin, “The Composition and Status Ordering of the International System: 1815–1940,” World Politics 18 (1966), 236–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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16 Because ententes are nebulous agreements they are often distinguished from alliances proper. Note the title of Helge Granfelt's book and Robert Kann's article: Alliances and Ententes as Political Weapons: From Bismarck's Alliance System to the Present Time (Lund: Fahlbeck Foundation, 1970)Google Scholar, and “Alliances Versus Ententes, ” World Politics, 28 (1976), 611–21. In her attempt to distinguish two types of agreement Granfelt notes a pertinent difference: “Ententes often contend [contain?] orders concerning the disturbing of status quo of weaker states” (15).

17 Singer and Small, “Formal Alliances,” 5. They are, however, less cautious with contaminating the independence of observations when analyzing the data. Examine Table 15 in “Foreign Policy Indicators.” The unit of analysis is the major–power–year and interdependent observations are manufactured by counting each state's entry into war within three years of any observation. Furthermore, if a state is allied in yearT and not allied in year T +1 and entered war in year T+2, the observations at T and T+1 contribute error, not information, to the cross–tabulation. Close should not count: at any year a state is in an alliance or is not, enters a war or does not. More to the point, Singer and Small evaluate the association between alliance participation and war entry with a test of the statistical significance of the proportions in a cross–tabulation of 887 major–power–years. The test assumes independent observations but all the major–power–years are combined in the one table. Therefore, the tacit assumption is that in any one year state A's alliance with state B is independent of B's alliance with A and that state B's war against state C is independent of C's war with B. Finally, presuming independent observations of major–power–years turns temporal continuity into a technical distraction to be overcome rather than a welcomed fact of history to be accommodated. Common statistical procedures inhibit the study of relations between states and the relations between states corrupt statistical analysis.

18 These are: Russia–France, 1859: Austria–Prussia, 1863–1864: Austria–France, 1866; and the USSR–Germany, 1939. The second mentioned is discussed in Pottinger, E. Ann, Napoleon HI and the German Crisis, 1865–1866 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966)Google Scholar. My sources for the others are listed in footnotes 24, 34 and 43.

19 Text in Pribram, Alfred F., The Secret Treaties of Austria–Hungary. 1879–1914, Vol. I (1920; New York: Howard Fertig, 1967), 184–95.Google Scholar

20 This is very different from Levy's inference that “alliances were rarely followed by war, and wars were rarely preceded by alliances” during the nineteenth century. The two analyses are not directly comparable. First, “preceded” and “followed” are operationally restricted to within five years of alliance formation. Second, Levy does not distinguish activist wars against non–great powers from other great power wars. Third, he includes but does not distinguish between defense and neutrality pacts and excludes ententes and nonaggression agreements because they “do not formally specify the conditions under which force will or will not be employed'' (588). Fourth, a small point. Levy tabulates observations on states and not on alliances. His table describes the number of states which had various proportions of their alliances followed by wars and of their wars preceded by alliances. Consider an example: States A and B form a neutrality pact; B fights a war with another state; and A keeps to the agreement to remain neutral. The observations on A and B would contribute differently to the table and the inference from individual states to alliances would not be proper. Alliance relations between states are turned into attributes of individual states.

21 So begins a classic account. Morley, John cited in Marriott, J. A. R., The Eastern Question: An Historical Study in European Diplomacy (4th ed.; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1940), 1.Google Scholar

22 Text in Hurst, Michael (ed.), Key Treaties for the Great Powers, 1814–1914, Vol. I (1814–1870) (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1972), 183.Google Scholar See also, Crawley, C. W., The Question of Greek Independence: A Study of British Policy in the Near East, 1821–1833 (1930; New York: Fertig, 1973), 76–78.Google Scholar

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34 The alliance between France and Russia marked in Figure 2 helped prepare the way for the War of Italian Unification between France and Austria and was separate from the entente between France and the United Kingdom. See Sumner, B. H., “The Secret Franco–Russian Treaty of 3 March 1859,” The English Historical Review 89 (1933), 65–83CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and for an analysis of nondefense alliances and wars between great powers see my “Balances of Power and Great Power War, 1815–1939: A Suggestion and Some Evidence.” This article began as a footnote in the latter.

35 Text in Bock, Carl H., Prelude to Tragedy: The Negotiation and Breakdown of the Tripartite Convention of London, October 31, 1861 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1966), Appendix L.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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37 Ibid., 452.

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39 Text in Manhart, Alliance and Entente, 1871–1914 (New York: F. S. Crofts, 1932), 62.Google Scholar This was contrary to the separate entente between Italy and Austria–Hungary concerning Article X of the Triple Alliance.

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44 Randolph M. Siverson's and Joel King's findings differ when they examine alliances and wars in general, and differ less when they examine attributes of alliance memberships. Compare “Alliances and the Expansion of War,” in Singer, J. David and Wallace, Michael D. (eds.), To Augur Well: Early Warning Indicators in World Politics (Beverly Hills: Sage, 1979), 37–49;Google Scholar and “Attributes of National Alliance Membership and War Participation, 1815–1965,” American Journal of Political Science 24 (1980), 1–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

45 The apparent successes in doing so should not be taken as signs of alliance unreliability as they are taken to be in Alan Ned Sabrosky, “Interstate Alliances: Their Reliability and the Expansion of War,” in Singer, J. David (ed.), The Correlates of War 11: Testing Some Realpolitik Models (New York: The Free Press, 1980), 182–83.Google Scholar

46 Cited in Crabb, Cecil V. Jr., The Elephants and the Grass: A Study of Nonalignment (New York: Praeger, 1965), 2.Google Scholar

47 This is also the thrust of Brian Job's recent review ' 'Grins Without Cats: In Pursuit of Knowledge of Intemation Alliances,” in Hopmann, P. Terrence, Zinnes, Dina A. and Singer, J. David (eds.), Cumulation in International Relations Research (Denver: Graduate School of International Studies, 1981), 39–64Google Scholar and the conclusion to Alexandroff's, Alan S.The Logic of Diplomacy (Beverly Hills: Sage, 1981), an events data analysis of great power alliances during 1870–1890.Google Scholar