Statistical Analysis of Strategic Interaction with Unobserved Player Actions: Introducing a Strategic Probit with Partial Observability

2015 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 429-448 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark David Nieman
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Civil Wars ◽  
Comparative Politics ◽  
Statistical Approach ◽  
Data Availability ◽  
Parameter Estimates ◽  
Strategic Interactions ◽  
Science Data ◽  
Multi Stage ◽  
Stage Estimation

The strategic nature of political interactions has long captured the attention of political scientists. A traditional statistical approach to modeling strategic interactions involves multi-stage estimation, which improves parameter estimates associated with one stage by using the information from other stages. The application of such multi-stage approaches, however, imposes rather strict demands on data availability: data on the dependent variable must be available for each strategic actor at each stage of the interaction. Limited or no data make such approaches difficult or impossible to implement. Political science data, however, especially in the fields of international relations and comparative politics, are not always structured in a manner that is conducive to these approaches. For example, we observe and have plentiful data on the onset of civil wars, but not the preceding stages, in which opposition groups decide to rebel or governments decide to repress them. In this article, I derive an estimator that probabilistically estimates unobserved actor choices related to earlier stages of strategic interactions. I demonstrate the advantages of the estimator over traditional and split-population binary estimators both using Monte Carlo simulations and a substantive example of the strategic rebel–government interaction associated with civil wars.

scholarly journals A Method for Systemic Risk Estimation Based on CDS Indices

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-124
Author(s):  
Gabriel Gaiduchevici
Keyword(s):  
Goodness Of Fit ◽  
Risk Estimation ◽  
Multivariate Time Series ◽  
Tail Dependence ◽  
Dependence Structure ◽  
Parameter Estimates ◽  
Copula Models ◽  
Goodness Of Fit Tests ◽  
Multi Stage ◽  
Stage Estimation

AbstractThe copula-GARCH approach provides a flexible and versatile method for modeling multivariate time series. In this study we focus on describing the credit risk dependence pattern between real and financial sectors as it is described by two representative iTraxx indices. Multi-stage estimation is used for parametric ARMA-GARCH-copula models. We derive critical values for the parameter estimates using asymptotic, bootstrap and copula sampling methods. The results obtained indicate a positive symmetric dependence structure with statistically significant tail dependence coefficients. Goodness-of-Fit tests indicate which model provides the best fit to data.

Rationalizing Politics: The Emerging Synthesis of International, American, and Comparative Politics

1998 ◽  
Vol 52 (4) ◽  
pp. 759-786 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helen V. Milner
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Comparative Politics ◽  
Research Agenda ◽  
International System ◽  
Ir Theory ◽  
Strategic Interactions ◽  
The Past ◽  
Cross Fertilization ◽  
Separate Discipline

International relations has often been treated as a separate discipline distinct from the other major fields in political science, namely American and comparative politics. A main reason for this distinction has been the claim that politics in the international system is radically different from politics domestically. The degree of divergence between international relations (IR) and the rest of political science has waxed and waned over the years; however, in the past decade it seems to have lessened. This process has occurred mainly in the “rationalist research paradigm,” and there it has both substantive and methodological components. Scholars in this paradigm have increasingly appreciated that politics in the international realm is not so different from that internal to states, and vice versa. This rationalist institutionalist research agenda thus challenges two of the main assumptions in IR theory. Moreover, scholars across the three fields now tend to employ the same methods. The last decade has seen increasing cross-fertilization of the fields around the importance of institutional analysis. Such analysis implies a particular concern with the mechanisms of collective choice in situations of strategic interaction. Some of the new tools in American and comparative politics allow the complex, strategic interactions among domestic and international agents to be understood in a more systematic and cumulative way.

The Regional Path to Peaceful Change: What the Asian and European Experiences Tell Us

2020 ◽  
Vol 34 (4) ◽  
pp. 535-545
Author(s):  
Mark Beeson
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Comparative Politics ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
International System ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Security Challenges ◽  
Comparative Historical Analysis ◽  
State Of Affairs ◽  
The Eu

AbstractOne of the more striking, surprising, and optimism-inducing features of the contemporary international system has been the decline of interstate war. The key question for students of international relations and comparative politics is how this happy state of affairs came about. In short, was this a universal phenomenon or did some regions play a more important and pioneering role in bringing about peaceful change? As part of the roundtable “International Institutions and Peaceful Change,” this essay suggests that Western Europe generally and the European Union in particular played pivotal roles in transforming the international system and the behavior of policymakers. This helped to create the material and ideational conditions in which other parts of the world could replicate this experience, making war less likely and peaceful change more feasible. This argument is developed by comparing the experiences of the EU and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and their respective institutional offshoots. The essay uses this comparative historical analysis to assess both regions’ capacity to cope with new security challenges, particularly the declining confidence in institutionalized cooperation.

scholarly journals Detection of Allee effects in marine fishes: analytical biases generated by data availability and model selection

2017 ◽  
Vol 284 (1861) ◽  
pp. 20171284 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tommi Perälä ◽  
Anna Kuparinen
Keyword(s):  
Statistical Approach ◽  
Positive Association ◽  
Scientific Basis ◽  
Marine Fishes ◽  
Clupea Harengus ◽  
Data Availability ◽  
Allee Effects ◽  
Methodological Issues ◽  
Data Limitations ◽  
Colonization Success

The demographic Allee effect, or depensation, implies positive association between per capita population growth rate and population size at low abundances, thereby lowering growth ability of sparse populations. This can have far-reaching consequences on population recovery ability and colonization success. In the context of marine fishes, there is a widespread perception that Allee effects are rare or non-existent. However, studies that have failed to detect Allee effects in marine fishes have suffered from several fundamental methodological and data limitations. In the present study, we challenge the prevailing perception about the rarity of Allee effects by analysing nine populations of Atlantic herring ( Clupea harengus ), using Bayesian statistical methods. We find that populations of the same species can show either strong evidence for Allee effects or compensation. We explicitly demonstrate how the evidence for Allee effects is strongly provisional on observations made at low population abundances. We contrast our statistical approach with previous attempts to detect Allee effects and illustrate methodological issues that can lead to erroneous conclusions about the nature of population dynamics at low abundance. The present study demonstrates that there is no substantive scientific basis to support the perception that Allee effects are rare or non-existent in marine fishes.

scholarly journals The Communication of Ideas across Subfields in Political Science

2014 ◽  
Vol 47 (02) ◽  
pp. 468-476 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erin R. Graham ◽  
Charles R. Shipan ◽  
Craig Volden
Keyword(s):  
Network Analysis ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Comparative Politics ◽  
Diffusion Processes ◽  
Methodological Approach ◽  
Journal Articles ◽  
Insight Into ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
Levels Of Integration

ABSTRACTWhat factors inhibit or facilitate cross-subfield conversations in political science? This article draws on diffusion scholarship to gain insight into cross-subfield communication. Diffusion scholarship represents a case where such communication might be expected, given that similar diffusion processes are analyzed in American politics, comparative politics, and international relations. We identify nearly 800 journal articles published on diffusion within political science between 1958 and 2008. Using network analysis we investigate the degree to which three “common culprits”—terminology, methodological approach, and journal type—influence levels of integration. We find the highest levels of integration among scholars using similar terms to describe diffusion processes, sharing a methodological approach (especially in quantitative scholarship), and publishing in a common set of subfield journals. These findings shed light on when cross-subfield communication is likely to occur with ease and when barriers may prove prohibitive.

Political Asylum in Germany: International Norms and Domestic Politics

1998 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 32-49
Author(s):  
John Bendix ◽  
Niklaus Steiner
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Expected Utility ◽  
Comparative Politics ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
National Interest ◽  
Political Asylum ◽  
German Politics

Although political asylum has been at the forefront of contemporaryGerman politics for over two decades, it has not been much discussedin political science. Studying asylum is important, however,because it challenges assertions in both comparative politics andinternational relations that national interest drives decision-making.Political parties use national interest arguments to justify claims thatonly their agenda is best for the country, and governments arguesimilarly when questions about corporatist bargaining practices arise.More theoretically, realists in international relations have positedthat because some values “are preferable to others … it is possible todiscover, cumulate, and objectify a single national interest.” Whileinitially associated with Hans Morgenthau’s equating of nationalinterest to power, particularly in foreign policy, this position hassince been extended to argue that states can be seen as unitary rationalactors who carefully calculate the costs of alternative courses ofaction in their efforts to maximize expected utility.

(Discussant)

1991 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 40-43
Author(s):  
Allen Lynch
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Comparative Politics

Please bear with a specialist in international relations commenting on a series of presentations in comparative politics and economics. I will first try to identify a set of issues that arise from the presentations, and then I will spend a few minutes giving some of my own reflections on those issues.

The effects of bigger rewards in individual tournaments on efforts and risk taking: evidence from chess

2018 ◽  
Vol 71 (4) ◽  
pp. 979-995
Author(s):  
Rasyad A Parinduri ◽  
Yoong Hon Lee ◽  
Kung Ming Tiong
Keyword(s):  
Research Design ◽  
Risk Taking ◽  
Fixed Effect ◽  
Strategic Interactions ◽  
Incentive Schemes ◽  
Multi Stage ◽  
Standard Rule ◽  
Chess Players

Abstract We examine the effects of bigger rewards in individual dynamic tournaments on efforts and risk taking using the three-point rule in chess. Most chess tournaments use the standard rule while some tournaments use the Bilbao rule, which is identical to the three-point rule in soccer: We observe the same pairs of chess players playing under both rules, a research design that fits fixed-effect models. We find the Bilbao rule makes games 33% more decisive, mostly to white players’ advantage, who win 50% more games. We identify two mechanisms why the Bilbao rule works: It encourages players to play longer and discourages them from using drawish openings. These results suggest incentive schemes that provide bigger rewards for better performances work in individual multi-stage tournaments in which efforts and financial rewards are directly linked, and in which strategic interactions among teammates and with competitors are less complex.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document