Trust, Reassurance, and Cooperation

2000/01/01 by Andrew Kydd · 11 citations
Social Sciences · Economics, Econometrics and Finance · #International Relations and Foreign Policy #Political Conflict and Governance #Economic Sanctions and International Relations

paper · doi:10.1162/002081800551190

Abstract

Many scholars have argued that mistrust can prevent cooperation. These arguments often fail to adequately address the possibility that states can take steps to reassure each other, build trust, and thereby avoid conflict. I present a rational choice theory of reassurance focusing on costly signals and identify the conditions under which players can use costly signals to reassure the other side. The central result is that reassurance will be possible between trustworthy players in equilibrium if trustworthy actors are more willing to take risks to attain mutual cooperation than untrustworthy actors. I discuss the implications of the model in the context of the reassurance strategies pursued by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev at the end of the Cold War.

Citations

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• The Critical Barrier to Civil War Settlement

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• `To Put Oneself into the other Fellow's Place': John Herz, the Security Dilemma and the Nuclear Age
• Winning Hearts and Minds? How the United States Reassured During the Russo-Ukrainian War
• Unpacking the Paradoxes of Trust in Uncertain Times
• Trust, cooperation, and the tradeoffs of reciprocity
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• Ukraine’s Strategic Interactions with the EU and Russia during the Turbulent Month of the Crimean Annexation

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• Credibility in Crises: How Patrons Reassure Their Allies
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• The Domestic Sources of International Trust
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