When Backing Down Is the Right Decision: Partisanship, New Information, and Audience Costs

2012/03/28 by Matthew Levendusky, Matthew S. Levendusky, Michael C. Horowitz · 249 citations
Business, Management and Accounting · Psychology · Social Sciences · #Argument (complex analysis) #Economics #Electoral Systems and Political Participation #Framing (construction) #Law #Law and economics #Media Influence and Politics #Political Influence and Corporate Strategies #Political economy #Political science #Politics #Positive economics #Psychology #Public relations #Social psychology

paper · doi:10.1017/s002238161100154x

published in The Journal of Politics 74(2), 323-338 (University of Chicago Press)

openalex publication_date 2012/03/28 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/04

Abstract

How do domestic political conditions shape when leaders get punished for backing down in international crises? We explore how three factors—the president’s partisanship, the reaction of other elites, and whether the president justifies his decision on the basis of new information—influence the size of domestic audience costs. While standard theories in American politics suggest that partisanship should exert a large effect over voter behavior, we offer an alternative theory explaining why the president’s unique informational advantage following a crisis will mute partisanship’s effect on audience costs. We argue that the president’s justification for why he backed down, however, will have a large effect on audience costs. Using a series of original survey experiments, we find strong support for our theoretical argument. We conclude by discussing the implications of these findings for the role of partisanship, framing, and the audience costs literature more broadly.

Citations

• Domestic Political Audiences and the Escalation of International Disputes
• Autocratic Audience Costs: Regime Type and Signaling Resolve
• Domestic Audience Costs in International Relations: An Experimental Approach
• Diplomacy and domestic politics: the logic of two-level games
• Assuming the Costs of War: Events, Elites, and American Public Support for Military Conflict
• Crossing the Water's Edge: Elite Rhetoric, Media Coverage, and the Rally-Round-the-Flag Phenomenon

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Related

• Audience Costs: An Historical Analysis
• Politicians, the Media, and Domestic Audience Costs
• Autocratic Audience Costs: Regime Type and Signaling Resolve
• Domestic Political Audiences and the Escalation of International Disputes
• Avoiding Audience Costs: Domestic Political Accountability and Concessions in Crisis Diplomacy