The Political Economy of Alignment: Great Britain's Commitments to Europe, 1905–39

TLDR: A number of scholars have explored second-order factors that affect great power alignments, including offensive-defense balance, revisionist motives, domestic regime characteristics, and intra-alliance bargaining dynamics as mentioned in this paper.

Abstract: deeply to the core of international relations theory as the origins of diplomatic alignments. If only one of the great powers had chosen a different alliance strategy at any of several critical junctures over the past century, the course of world history might have been radically altered. Germany might have succeeded in the conquest of Europe, or it might have been deterred from hostilities altogether. Much depended on Great Britain, which avoided entangling itself in continental crises until each world war had already become inevitable. By making a stronger commitment to France in the early 1910s, or by forging a close partnership with the Soviet Union in the late 1930s, Britain might have been able to persuade German leaders that military conoict would not have been worth the risk. Given the enormous stakes of great power politics, it is of vital importance for the aeld of international relations to provide a compelling account of how states choose their allies and adversaries. The academic debate over alignment has centered on two schools of thought within the realist paradigm. One view posits that states tend to balance against the most powerful actor in the system; the other asserts that states concern themselves only with speciac threats to their national security. Using these theories as a point of departure, many scholars have also explored secondorder factors that affect great power alignments, including offense-defense balance, revisionist motives, domestic regime characteristics, and intra-alliance bargaining dynamics. Such works have not directly challenged the core asThe Political Economy of Alignment