Levels of Analysis

Lecture 2
 Levels of Analysis

• Individual level-------------------Options/decisions
– Study of leaders, personalities, perception, framing
and problem representation, group interactions
• State level--------------------------Behaviours
– Factors internal to states
• Institutional framework, domestic constituencies,
economic conditions, history, culture
• System level----------------------Outcomes
• Focuses on interaction between states by studying
relative power capabilities, Opportunities,
Constraints
• Assumption
• States pursue national interests (to maintain the
integrity of states’ borders)
• Insight into capabilities and explains outcomes, but
can not explain decisions or behaviors
 Two-level game

• Foreign policy decision makers try to satisfy both

domestic constituencies and international imperatives
simultaneously
– E.g. Protectionists policies vs. Free market policies
 Analysis of Causes of Events

• Precipitating Cause Individual level

• Intermediate Cause State level
• Deep Cause System level
– E.g. Causes of the beginning of WW 1

• Precipitating Cause Assassination of Archduke

Ferdinand
• Intermediate cause Domestic nationalist agitation and
class conflict
• Deep cause Changing BOP in Europe
 Comparative FPA
• Goal
– To gain general applicable knowledge
• Aim
– Compare and contrast systematically
– Use of analogies based upon single observation can be
problematic
– Need for additional observations to evaluate weather the
expectation of same action, same outcome would have
been warranted
– Systematic understanding of foreign policy events as alike
or different can help decision makers to fashion appropriate
responses
 Comparative Method

• Important queries
• Why decisions were made?
• What options were considered and what were ignored and
why?
• Who or what explains behaviors as well as outcomes?

• To think in Cause and Effect relationship

 Cause & Effect Relationship

• Cause
• Independent variable
– Factors that contribute to the occurrence of decisions,
behaviors, outcomes
• Effect
• Dependent variable
– Decisions, behaviors, outcomes (things to be
explained)
 Investigations

1) To study many crises and investigate how often, and under

what circumstances, these led to war or resolved peacefully
(focus on Similarities)
2) A detailed comparison of the known facts of the current and
previous crises by focusing on Similarities and Differences
also
 Research Strategies

• Large-N Comparisons
• Comparisons of large number of cases help to evaluate
general cause-and-effect patterns
• Needs information on all states in a given period of time, if
one could get the information
• Possible to make general statements
• E.g. weather democracies are less likely to initiate war than
non-democracies
• Small-N Comparisons
– Allow for more detailed analyses of similarities and
differences
– Possible to make finer distinctions between nature of states
– Selected states must reflect the variation found in the larger
set of countries
• Alternative Strategy
– Counterfactuals
• What might have happened if some aspect of the
situation had been different
• To evaluate whether we have accurately determined the
independent variable