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Change and Stability in Superpower Rivalry

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 December 1989

Michael D. McGinnis  and
John T. Williams
Michael D. McGinnis
Affiliation:
Indiana University
John T. Williams
Affiliation:
University of Illinois Chicago
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Abstract

We investigate the dynamics of superpower rivalry. Participants in policy debates within each state use information about expected future threats and economic costs to influence other policy actors, and this process of sophisticated reaction links the security policies of these two states into a single rivalry system. Analysis of vector autoregression models of U.S. and Soviet military expenditures and diplomatic hostility and U.S. gross national product supports the hypothesis that these policies approximate the behavior of unitary rational states capable of forming rational expectations of each other's future behavior. The dynamic response of this system to a wide range of exogenous shocks (or innovations) reveals the underlying stability of this rivalry system. The military expenditures of both states exhibit a cyclical response to innovations, with a shorter U.S. cycle. This lack of synchronization creates several problems for analysis and for policy change.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 83 , Issue 4 , December 1989 , pp. 1101 - 1123
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1989

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