Balancing Risks

Great powers often initiate risky military and diplomatic inventions in far-off, peripheral regions that pose no direct threat to them, risking direct confrontation with rivals in strategically inconsequential places. Why do powerful countries behave...

Jeffrey W. Taliaferro is Associate Professor of Political Science at Tufts University.

Taliaferro skillfully blends two lines of theorizing defensive realism and prospect theory, to explain the conditions under which leaders of great powers are more or less likely to adopt risky foreign military policies.... Balancing Risks is a thoroughly researched and well written addition to the literature.

Great powers have frequently become embroiled in costly wars in peripheral regions that pose no direct threat.... In this historically rich and theoretically elegant study, Taliaferro tackles the question of why states persist in such counterproductive interventions.... It provides a useful cautionary message as the United States embarks on far-flung counterterrorism operations in the periphery.

Michael Desch, Director, Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce, University of Kentucky:

Why do great powers persist in peripheral interventions? Challenging both offensive realism and domestic coalition theories, Jeffrey W. Taliaferro offers a plausible solution, arguing that prospect theory explains why great powers persist in otherwise counterproductive interventions. This book has much to recommend it: it is historically rich, methodologically well designed, and is well written.

Deborah Welch Larson, Professor of Political Science, University of California, Los Angeles:

Jeffrey Taliaferro's Balancing Risks is a creative synthesis of realism and psychological theory. His case studies on pre-World War I crises, Japan in 1940-41, and the Korean war combine richly detailed historical narrative with psychological insights and geopolitical observations. Through original archival research, he shows that leaders are most likely to choose risky options in a desperate attempt to recover declining prestige, status, or power. Psychological pressures overcome efforts at rational calculation of costs and benefits. Taliaferro uses prospect theory to explain a familiar paradox—foreign policy leaders who are reluctant to undertake bold foreign policy initiatives engage in costly, imprudent interventions in areas of relatively low strategic importance. His findings should be considered by U.S. policymakers who have committed vast resources to intervention in order to avert the possibility of further terrorist attacks.

Larry Berman, author of No Peace, No Honor: Nixon, Kissinger and Betrayal in Vietnam:

Balancing Risks offers a cogent analysis bearing on the lessons of great powers initiating military or diplomatic interventions outside of their security interests. Jeffrey W. Taliaferro provides three theories of foreign policy to explain why great powers risk serious consequences by intervening on the periphery. The theoretical argument is strong, the case selection masterful, and the policy implications should be required reading for all students and practitioners.

Steven R. David, Professor of Political Science, Director of International Studies Program, The Johns Hopkins University:

Balancing Risks marries international relations theory and psychology to produce a powerful argument that explains why great powers intervene in seemingly unimportant regions. Jeffrey W. Taliaferro makes a convincing case that it is fear of loss rather than hope for gain that drives these interventions. At a time when American intervention in the Third World again dominates the foreign policy of the United States, Taliaferro's views need to be given careful consideration both by scholars and policymakers.