Regions of War and Peace By: Evan Kalikow

In his 2002 book Regions of War and Peace, Dr. Douglas Lemke attempts three things. First, he uses power transition theory, a theory describing interstate interaction among great powers, and revises it to apply to regional powers. Lemke calls this the multiple hierarchy model (Lemke, 15). After modifying power transition theory, the new theory is tested to see if parity and dissatisfaction lead to greater probabilities of war among regional hierarchies. Finally, the author observes that African regions have significantly lower levels of interstate conflict than other tested regions, and he proposes that there is perhaps an African Peace (Lemke, 17). After defining the multiple hierarchy model, Lemke applies the model to four regions: South America, the Middle East, the Far East, and Africa. Within each of these regions, he identifies several local hierarchies (four in South America from 1860 to 1990, three in the Middle East from 1960 to 1990, seven in the Far East from 1950 to 1990, and nine in Africa from 1960 to 1990). The author defines a local hierarchy based upon the ability of the states within the hierarchy to interact militarily with each other and that the members of each local hierarchy consider each other when developing their foreign policies and planning for various military contingencies (Lemke, 68). He determines the states abilities to interact based on the distance between each states capital city and their capabilities to travel that distance. Additionally, Lemke uses extraordinary military buildups as a way to measure a states dissatisfaction with the status quo, taken from research done by Werner and Kugler in 1996 (Lemke, 104). Thus, he is able to identify local hierarchies and conditions for war. To determine the effects of parity and dissatisfaction on war in the local hierarchies, Lemke measures dyads in each hierarchy, one member of which is always the local dominant power, in ten-year intervals. The power of states is determined by either military strength or GDP. As a dependant variable, he uses the occurrence or absence of war (as defined by the

Correlates of War), while power parity, dissatisfaction with the status quo, and an interaction term multiplying parity by dissatisfaction are the independent variables (Lemke, 117). After pooling the researched dyads, the author finds that parity and dissatisfaction each lead to a greater probability of interstate conflict in all regions, and that conflict is even more likely when both parity and dissatisfaction are present, all of which supports his original hypothesis. This research is bolstered with a case study of pre-World War II relations between China and Japan. Specifically, Lemke shows that China and Japan were around equal footing power-wise before the 1930s, but as China gained power in the 1930s, Japan underwent a military buildup, suggesting dissatisfaction and leading to conflict in the mid-1930s. Although this case happened outside of the defined timeframe, it is consistent with the authors hypothesis. In his conclusions, Lemke finds that, among each of the regions studied, African dyads had the lowest overall probabilities of conflict, even with both parity and dissatisfaction. Through further research, Lemke determines if his African Peace hypothesis is consistent with the multiple hierarchy model. In his first test, controlling for political instability (measured by successful coups) and underdevelopment (measured by United Nations Conference on Trade and Development data on underdevelopment) in all dyads (not just African dyads), Lemke finds that the African Peace still holds true, as Africas probabilities of war are still substantially lower than in other regions. However, a new test is then done of a hypothetical underdeveloped African state that has undergone three successful coups within the measured decade. In this case, the African peace disappears, and African probabilities of war begin to exceed those of great powers. Although Lemke acknowledges that these underdevelopment and instability values are larger than average, he states that these values are not uncommon in West African regions, suggesting that there is cross-regional variation in specific regions (Lemke, 182). Lemke concludes that

there is mixed support for an African Peace, and that further research is needed on the subject, perhaps using more refined measures of instability and underdevelopment. Scholars of the clash of civilizations theory would fundamentally disagree with both the way this research was conducted and with the conclusions. Lemkes distinction of regional hierarchies separated the Middle Eastern, Far Eastern, South American, and African states in such a way that nearly all dyads measured would be members of the same civilization, which is a critical flaw in the construction of the measurement of the data. Since these scholars contend that interstate war will be more likely when the members of a dyad belong to different civilizations, the conclusions of prevalent intra-civilizational war do not adhere to the clash of civilizations theory. However, these critics would likely agree with the notion of an African Peace, for the entire continent of Africa is considered its own civilization; therefore, African dyads will be more peaceful under clash of civilizations. Balance of power theorists, on the other hand, would likely agree with Lemkes research. The multiple hierarchy model, like the balance of powers, places a states power and survival (as well as relative gains compared to other states) as primary concerns for the possibility of warfare. Since both theories are under the same realist paradigm, they are likely to have the same assumptions and to take similar variables into consideration when measuring interstate conflict. However, balance of power proponents would disagree with the conclusions that war is more likely to occur due to parity and status quo dissatisfaction; rather, they would suggest that the observed conflicts arose because the non-dominant states within each dyad acted in order to balance the regions polarity in their favor. These scholars would also find the regions in which there was bipolarity to be the most peaceful.

From an interstate conflict standpoint, Lemkes arguments are persuasive. I have no major qualms with his data collection or criteria for parity and dissatisfaction. Lemkes research is geographically diverse, thorough, and an important evolution in power transition theory, shrinking the scope from a global hierarchy to several regional hierarchies. The greatest weakness Regions of War and Peace, however, is the lack of consideration of intrastate war. The only actors considered in the research are states, which leaves many holes in the study. Since dyads are considered peaceful if they have limited or no interstate interaction, does that mean that regions that are lacking in interstate conflict yet torn apart with civil wars are deemed peaceful? These details are briefly touched upon in the African Peace section, yet the work suffers as a whole due to the lack of focus on intrastate war. Moreover, Lemkes use of conflicts between China and Japan before World War II to demonstrate the strength of his multiple hierarchy model is flawed. During the time frame that Lemke uses for these conflicts (the early 1920s to mid 1930s), China had neither a consolidated government nor a consolidated military. The region was controlled by dozens of warlords, who acted as autonomous political entities by collecting taxes from the populations of their controlled territories and by organizing private militaries. Some of these warlords, such as Feng Yu-hsiang, had positive relationships with the Japanese government, while others, including Wu Pei-fu, did not have such benefits. The Japanese even influenced Feng to revolt against Wu Pei-fu by offering support of 1,500,000 yen (Sheridan, 141-145). It can therefore be determined that Japans pre-World War II relationship with China was actually several different relationships between several different regimes. The fact that Lemke lumps all of China together as a unified state during such a tumultuous period

severely hurts his argument and shows a major flaw in the way power transition research is conducted. Nevertheless, Regions of War and Peace provides a step in the right direction for future studies in power transition. In his work, Lemke recognizes that some of his research is incomplete or inconclusive, and that more region-specific data must be found, especially in regards to the African Peace hypothesis. To better address the exclusion of intrastate war, I propose another revision to power transition theory that examines power transitions within individual states. This would shift the main actors of the study from states to internal entities, such as autonomous political entities or warlords. A comprehensive study would take every region identified by Lemke and determine, for each individual state, if parity and dissatisfaction with the status quo lead to a higher probability of intrastate war. In a world where intrastate conflicts are superseding interstate conflicts, it is vital for theories that want to remain relevant to further their explanations of international relations to include intrastate conflicts. By shrinking the scope of power transition theory to apply to regional hierarchies, Lemke is taking an important step in more accurately describing how the world works. However, his hypotheses are not all-encompassing, and more research must be done to account for regions plagued by intrastate war. If these further considerations are taken into account, perhaps power transition theory will remain a pertinent theory in international relations for decades to come.

Works Cited Lemke, Douglas. Regions of War and Peace. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 2002.

Sheridan, James E. Stanford UP, 1966.

-hsiang. Stanford, Calif.: