War and Happiness: The Role of Temperament in the Assessment of Resolve

Description

“Jenkins’ rare combination of psychological theorizing and archival research in several countries and time periods yields a fascinating new take on the central question of when states over-estimate or under-estimate others’ resolve. The biases that leaders and elites fall prey to appear to vary with their emotional states and senses of well-being, factors that most scholars have ignored.”—Robert Jervis, author of How Statesmen Think This groundbreaking book explains how the happiness levels of leaders, politicians and diplomats affect their assessments of the resolve of their state’s adversaries and allies. Its innovative methodology includes case studies of the origins of twelve wars with Anglo-American involvement from 1853 to 2003 and the psycholinguistic text mining of the British Hansard and the U.S. Congressional Record. Front Matter ....Pages i-xiii Introduction (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 1-10 Explanatory Style Explained (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 11-23 Theories of Reputation for Resolve—From Thucydides to Prospect Theory (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 25-39 Text Mining the British Hansard (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 41-53 Text Mining the U.S. Congressional Record (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 55-73 The Four Crises Leading to the First World War (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 75-154 The Appeasement of Nazi Germany (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 155-176 The Crimean War Versus the Suez Crisis (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 177-202 The Falkland Islands War Versus the Spanish–American War (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 203-226 Pearl Harbor (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 227-238 The Korean War Versus the Gulf War (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 239-274 The Vietnam War Versus the Iraq War (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 275-300 The Yom Kippur War and the Soviet-Afghan War (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 301-317 Donald Trump and the Future of American Foreign Policy: Syria, Iran and North Korea (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 319-329 The Leader and the Emotional Climate (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 331-340 Conclusion (Peter S. Jenkins)....Pages 341-348 Back Matter ....Pages 349-378