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This paper surveys the uses and abuses of quantitative social network analysis (QSNA) in international relations scholarship and its potential for use in theory and in practice by relationalists. In theory, QSNA is fully compatible with methodological relationalism, although the need to assume the existence of discrete nodes at some level of analysis makes it a more problematic match for ontological relationalism. In practice, QSNA has often been implemented at odds with relational sensibilities. Networks are being imputed from common characteristics or affiliations (that are assumed to be static and concrete rather than dynamic and contingent) instead of being directly measured; new measures are being created without reference to existing theories or tools; and network characteristics are reduced to units of analysis compatible with methodological individualism, leading to a reduction of a rich, relational analysis to single-variable systemic, simple dyadic, or even monadic analyses. Tools are being applied without regard for the nature of the underlying qualities of the data, leading to shallow analyses that disregard the social nature of the data. Yet some studies are beginning to carefully and slowly adopt the full analytic structure of social network analysis (SNA), including underlying theories. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PTAs (Preferential Trade Agreements) are spreading rapidly - hundreds have already been notified to the WTO and more are being created. Are these agreements bad news, not just for global prosperity, but also for global political equality? We do not adopt the standard economic refrain that a rise in absolute global economic prosperity offsets the importance of how those gains are distributed (Wolf 2004). Rather, we accept that the world economy is characterized by substantial distributional inequalities between states, generating material power politics and shaping development. But the apparently increasing gap between the poor and the rich is not the whole story, and international institutions are not uniformly making the problem worse, as some have argued, or better, as others think. Preferential trade arrangements like NAFTA more and more govern economic exchange, shaping material power relations derived from sums of money or financial transactions - although there is some debate whether these organizations have an appreciable effect on material wealth and power or not (Frankel 1998); yet the same PTAs also create and sustain social power politics created by group dynamics. Like other organizations (Ingram, Robinson, and Busch 2005; Hafner-Burton and Montgomery 2006; Dorussen and Ward 2008), these institutions form social network structures, creating ties between states. The distribution of these ties endows certain states with more social capital than others, creating social power relationships that significantly affect international politics, shaping issues like whether or not states go to war or use economic sanctions (Hafner-Burton and Montgomery 2005, 2008). While states' material power is determined by the relative size of their material capital, social power is determined by the relative social capital created by and accessed through ties with other states in the international system such as ties through mutual membership in PTAs. In this paper, we demonstrate that while inequality in material power has increased over time,inequality in social capital among states due to PTAs has decreased quite substantially. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increasingly dense worldwide network of international organizations (IOs) has generated social power relationships among states that significantly affect global politics. And while many maintain hope that this pervasive institutionalization of global governance through IOs has offset threats posed by international anarchy and national sovereignty, we find this view to be incomplete. IOs do more than referee power relations between states; they also create them by forming social networks characterized by substantial inequality, dividing states into social groups and awarding some states greater prestige than others. This paper pursues three aims: (1) to setapart relational concepts of power created by the social network of IOs-prestige and group membership-from standard military and economic concepts of power in international relations; (2) to generate empirical indicators to measure each concept that can be widely applied to the study of world politics; and (3) to map the evolution of structural inequality in these attributes over time globally and across several prominent states. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many policy options have been proposed for slowing or halting the spread of nuclear weapons; yet all rely on sound intelligence on the progress of nuclear aspirants. Historically, the United States has had an uneven record of estimating weapons programs, overestimating the progress that some proliferators have made, while underestimating others. A comparative historical cataloging and evaluation of intelligence failures on nuclear weapons can therefore contribute major insights to public policy. This paper seeks to detail the circumstances and intelligence work surrounding sixteen of the twenty-five states that are thought to have attempted to develop nuclear weapons and derive conclusions about the political causes of distorted nuclear intelligence estimations. In particular, we evaluate specific hypotheses related to policy, culture, organizations, and institutions. We find that the US has overestimated much more frequently than it has underestimated or correctly estimated states' programs, and that this is primarily due to policy-related causes, although cultural, organizational, and institutional biases also make significant contributions. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is growing evidence that preferential trade agreements (PTAs) provide strong institutional incentives to prevent international conflict among member states, often creating the anticipation of economic gains that outweigh the benefits of militarized aggression. We provide an alternative social network approach to the study of how international institutions influence conflict behavior. PTAs do more than create expectations of economic gains and reduce opportunism; they also create hierarchical social networks between states, which can suppress or encourage conflict under different conditions. We theorize these conditions for militarized international disputes (MIDs) and test our positive expectations on new PTA data during the period 1950 to 2000. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A growing number of international relations scholars argue that intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) promote peace. Existing approaches emphasize IGO membership as an important causal attribute of individual states, much like economic development and regime type. We provide an alternative social network approach to the study of IGOs and conflict that borrows from social psychological work regarding the relationship between aggression and the social network positions of schoolchildren. We argue that conflicts between states, like children, are shaped by social positions; in the international system, these positions are constituted by IGO membership. Membership not only constitutes ties between states, but determines clique membership, and establishes hierarchies of prestige and influence in the international system. We introduce new IGO relational data and test our claims during the period 1885 to 1992. We demonstrate that common membership of IGOs and clique size increase conflict, while high prestige and in-group favoritism decrease it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A long intellectual tradition suggests that economic interdependence prevents militarized conflict between states by increasing the benefits of trade, resolving disputes, and promoting like-minded security communities. By the logic of this tradition, international trade institutions should also prevent economic sanctions. The authors argue otherwise: wisdom about the pacifying effects of trade institutions is too optimistic and one-dimensional, since these institutions can create power imbalances as well as plenty. Rather, preferential trade agreements (PTAs) are vehicles for power politics that can exacerbate conflict in two ways: (1) market power, increased by gains from trade, can create competition and capacity for conflict and (2) social power, increased by institutional membership patterns in the population of PTAs, can create animosity. We offer the first systematic test of the proposition that mutual membership in PTAs significantly decreases the propensity of member states to sanction each other. We test our hypotheses on sanctions onset using a dataset of sanctions episodes from 1947 through 2000; we find that mutual membership in PTAs has no clear effect on the propensity of states to sanction each other. Increases in trade dependence independent of PTAs does decrease sanctioning behavior, while relative differences in social power structures (created by PTA membership) or economic power (GDP) make sanctioning more likely. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A long intellectual tradition suggests that interdependence through trade and international institutions prevents militarized conflict between states by increasing the benefits of trade, resolving disputes, and promoting like-minded security communities. We consider whether and how a growing population of international trade institutions affects a different form of conflict: economic sanctions. We approach this question with the concern that common institutional theories do not gain adequate purchase on the relationship: liberal wisdom about the pacifying effects of trade institutions is too optimistic, since these institutions can create power imbalances as well as plenty. We accordingly offer the first systematic test of the liberal proposition that mutual membership in preferential trade agreements (PTAs) significantly decreases the propensity of member states to sanction each other. We also test two alternative perspectives that view PTAs as vehicles for power politics: realism and social networks. From these perspectives, PTAs can exacerbate conflict by placing states into various relative positions of power in the international system; specifically, realism argues that asymmetries in market power caused by gains from trade can cause conflict, while social network approaches hold that affiliations can cause asymmetrical social power relationships that create animosity as well as community. We test our hypotheses on sanctions onset using a dataset of sanctions episodes from 1947 through 2000; we find that mutual membership in PTAs has no effect on the propensity of states to sanction each other. We do find secondary support for our three theories, however: our most robust findings demonstrate that increases in trade independent of PTAs (liberalism) do decrease sanctioning behavior, while increases in economic power (realism) or social prestige (social networks) from PTA membership make sanctioning more likely. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]