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The conventional wisdom suggests that states with nuclear energy programs are more likely to seek or acquire nuclear weapons. Yet there is a dearth of systematic empirical work that directly assesses this proposition. A systematic analysis of the historical evidence suggests that the link between nuclear energy programs and proliferation is overstated. Although such programs increase the technical capacity of a state to build nuclear weapons, they have important countervailing political effects that limit the odds of proliferation. Specifically, nuclear energy programs increase the likelihood that parallel nuclear weapons programs will be detected and face counterproliferation pressures; they also increase the costliness of nonproliferation sanctions. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, states with nuclear energy programs historically have not been significantly more likely to seek or acquire nuclear weapons. A combination of qualitative and quantitative evidence supports the plausibility of the countervailing political effects of nuclear energy programs.

How has the United States behaved historically toward friendly states with nuclear weapons ambitions? Recent scholarship has demonstrated the great lengths to which the United States went to prevent Taiwan, South Korea, and West Germany from acquiring nuclear weapons. Yet seemingly on the other side of the ledger are cases such as Israel, South Africa, and Pakistan, where the United States failed to prevent proliferation, and where many have argued that the United States made exceptions to its nonproliferation objectives given conflicting geopolitical goals. A reexamination of the history of U.S. nonproliferation policy toward Israel, South Africa, and Pakistan, based on declassified documents and interviews, finds that these cases are not as exceptional as is commonly understood. In each case, the United States sought to prevent these states from acquiring nuclear weapons, despite geopolitical constraints. Moreover, once U.S. policymakers realized that prior efforts had failed, they continued to pursue nonproliferation objectives, brokering deals to prevent nuclear tests, public declaration of capabilities, weaponization, or transfer of nuclear materials to other states.

Do foreign occupiers face less resistance when they increase the level of native governing authority? Although this is a central question within the literature on foreign occupation and insurgency, it is difficult to answer because the relationship between resistance and political devolution is typically endogenous. To address this issue, we identify a natural experiment based on the locally arbitrary assignment of French municipalities into German or Vichy-governed zones during World War II. Using a regression discontinuity design, we conclude that devolving governing authority significantly lowered levels of resistance. We argue that this effect is driven by a process of political cooptation: domestic groups that were granted governing authority were less likely to engage in resistance activity, while violent resistance was heightened in regions dominated by groups excluded from the governing regime. This finding stands in contrast to work that primarily emphasizes structural factors or nationalist motivations for resistance.

Building on the rationalist literature on sanctions, this article argues that economic and political sanctions are a successful tool of nonproliferation policy, but that selection effects have rendered this success largely hidden. Since the late 1970s—when the United States made the threat of sanctions credible through congressional legislation and began regularly employing sanctions against proliferating states—sanctions have been ineffective in halting ongoing nuclear weapons programs, but they have succeeded in deterring states from starting nuclear weapons programs in the first place and have thus contributed to a decline in the rate of nuclear pursuit. The logic of the argument is simple: rational leaders assess the risk of sanctions before initiating a nuclear weapons program, which produces a selection effect whereby states highly vulnerable to sanctions are deterred from starting nuclear weapons programs in the first place, so long as the threat is credible. Vulnerability is a function of a state's level of economic and security dependence on the United States—states with greater dependence have more to lose from US sanctions and are more likely to be sensitive to US-sponsored norms. The end result of this selection effect is that since the late 1970s, only insulated, inward-looking regimes have pursued nuclear weapons and become the target of imposed sanctions, thus rendering the observed success rate of nonproliferation sanctions low. I find support for the argument based on statistical analysis of a global sample of countries from 1950 to 2000, an original data set of US nonproliferation sanctions episodes, and qualitative analysis of the South Korean and Taiwanese nuclear weapons programs.

How effective are states at assessing and predicting the nuclear intentions of foreign countries? Drawing on close to 200 US assessments of foreign countries’ proliferation intentions between 1957 and 1966, this research note finds that close to 80 percent of testable US assessments were correct and that they shifted from highly inaccurate in the late 1950s to highly accurate in the 1960s. Based on quantitative and qualitative analysis, I conclude that learning from early failures led the intelligence community to achieve higher accuracy.

We examine the effect of nuclear weapons on interstate conflict. Using more appropriate methodologies than have previously been used, we find that dyads in which both states possess nuclear weapons are not significantly less likely to fight wars, nor are they significantly more or less belligerent at low levels of conflict. This stands in contrast to previous work, which suggests nuclear dyads are some 2.7 million times less likely to fight wars. We additionally find that dyads in which one state possesses nuclear weapons are more prone to low-level conflict (but not more prone to war). This appears to be because nuclear-armed states expand their interests after nuclear acquisition rather than because nuclear weapons provide a shield behind which states can aggress against more powerful conventional-armed states. This calls into question conventional wisdom on the impact of nuclear weapons and has policy implications for the impact of nuclear proliferation.

In the 1950s, the United States and Soviet Union abandoned secrecy and began sharing nuclear technology internationally. Soon thereafter, the two superpowers worked together to create the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to place safeguards on nuclear assistance and eventually added other nonproliferation measures. What explains these decisions? We argue that an international hierarchy framework offers a robust explanation for the superpowers’behavior. We identify three distinct mechanisms through which rival hierarchies can influence the internal workings of one another: competitive shaming, outbidding, and interhierarchy cooperation. We then probe the plausibility of our argument by investigating multiple observable implications in our case study of nuclear politics. We show that Soviet competitive shaming motivated the United States’ Atoms for Peace program, which sought to strengthen the loyalty of client states or attract new ones. In response, the Soviet Union attempted to outbid the United States with its own technology-sharing program. Ultimately, Moscow and Washington cooperated on the IAEA to limit the risks that nuclear sharing posed to their own dominant positions vis-à-vis subordinate states.

All major pharmaceutical companies have speed-to-market efforts which are driven by the need to deliver innovation to patients, the changing face of the industry, and the advent of new research technologies. Lilly's program was undertaken in the early 1990s and has achieved significant progress. One recent speed-to-market initiative was the construction of a Projects Management Workbench designed to facilitate the flow of information to those involved in drug development. Three types of information are available through this electronic knowledge management tool: project-specific information, data on the performance of the portfolio, and project management tools. Lilly's Projects Management Workbench was accessed globally through the corporate intranet over 10000 times in its first six months. Use of the workbench has led to a greater understanding of project plans and has accelerated the deployment of project management tools to drug development teams, leading to improved performance as compared to the plan.

In many ways, competition between the United States and China is just that-a rivalry between two powerful countries. But it is also much more than that. This is a contest not only between two rival states but also between two rival hierarchies. As the United States and China square off against each other, they are also vying for the allegiance of countries across the globe.The broad arena of competition does increase the number of potential points of friction and raise the odds that countries wishing to remain outside the contest will be dragged into it. But the main effect is to force the United States and China to outdo each other, to the benefit of the states they are trying to woo. Just as competition between the United States and the Soviet Union contributed to remarkable accomplishments-such as sending humans to the moon, developing civilian nuclear power, and lifting millions out of poverty-so, too, could a new era of international rivalry. Already, U.S. and Chinese efforts to win over other countries mimics the patterns of Cold War competition between Washington and Moscow. The two superpowers are engaging in competitive shaming, attempting to attract or retain partners by drawing attention to the abuses of their rival. And they are trying to outbid each other, bestowing economic benefits on countries to win them over to their side. They also, however, sometimes pursue institutionalized cooperation when facing common threats. To combat the influence of authoritarianism and illiberal economics-and to intelligently compete against a rising China-U.S. policymakers must understand how these three styles of engagement work.At stake is leadership of the global order and its rules for the world economy. To prevail, Washington will need to understand how far to press its competition with Beijing. As the war in Vietnam and other Cold War proxy conflicts demonstrated, it is possible for U.S. leaders to become so obsessed with the potential influence of a rival superpower that they walk into a quagmire of their own making. Washington will also need to manage the domestic responses to such competition, so that electoral politics does not sabotage national strategy.The twenty-first century version of superpower competition is important for a variety of issues but perhaps none more consequential than climate change. New environmental conditions create new threats and opportunities for many countries, altering the geopolitical landscape. The United States can use its recent domestic accomplishments on climate change, most notably the adoption of the Inflation Reduction Act, to pressure China to do more to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions and contribute to climate solutions. Working with European partners, the United States can force China to either clean up its act or become a climate villain in the court of world opinion.

Working Paper No. 23904 Why do wars occur? We exploit a natural experiment to test the longstanding hypothesis that leaders declare war because they fail to internalize the associated costs. We test this moral hazard theory of conflict by compiling data on the family composition of 3,693 US legislators who served in the U.S. Congress during the four conscription-era wars of the 20th century: World War I, World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. We test for agency problems by comparing the voting behavior of congressmen with draft-age sons versus draft-age daughters. We estimate that having a draft-age son reduces legislator support for pro-conscription bills by 10-17%. Legislators with draft-age sons are more likely to be reelected subsequently, suggesting that support for conscription is punished by voters. Our results provide new evidence that agency problems contribute to political violence, and that elected officials can be influenced by changing private incentives.