| This dissertation offers a new theory that explains why marked shifts in the balance of power lead to war in some cases but not in others. This issue is the subject of rigorous academic debate. Offense-defense theory attributes variation on peace and war to military technology and geography. Dynamic differentials theory explains it in terms of the distribution of material capabilities, and power transition theorists focus on changes in the relative wealth of states.; In contrast, I argue that the declining state's military strategy is the key determinant of peace and war in the presence of power shifts. States can adopt one of two military strategies: maneuver and attrition. The possession of a maneuver strategy increases the prospect of war by enhancing the declining state's confidence in its military capability, accentuating its fear of losing a military opportunity, and reducing its susceptibility to compensation. If the declining state only has an attrition strategy available to it, on the other hand, war is less likely since the state has little confidence in its chance of victory and is more likely to be accommodating during a crisis.; I test my theory against its alternatives in two ways. First, I take the case universe of power shifts among major states over the past two centuries, and establish correlations between the indicators of each theory and the incidence of war and peace. Second, I conduct in-depth comparative historical analyses on three crucial cases: the First World War, the Second World War in the Pacific, and the Russo-German rapprochement during the Bismarckian era. |
