The Modern World and Diplomatic Risk

 Cassie Lawler

International Politics: POLS 170-03

Professor Shirk

Due: Wednesday, May 4, 2022


Blog Post #5

The Modern World and Diplomatic Risk

Our seemingly trivial simulation of diplomatic risk did a great deal to accurately reflect the ongoings of international relations on a global scale today and in places where it lacked in representing the many complexities and nuances of today’s world, it raised interesting questions as to what our world may look like if it was more like “Risk.” The game was certainly a valuable learning experience and despite the fact that I enjoyed it very much, it failed to take into account the idea that many states participate in collective action while working to achieve their own respective goals. To preface, the five teams were tasked with a goal each. My team, the yellow team had the objective to take over Ukraine with World Sanctions, which was in direct opposition to the red team’s goal, which was also looking to control this territory. 

The simultaneous most difficult and most paramount part of this simulation was to balance meeting your objective, preventing other teams from doing so with their objectives, and preserving your troops on the board. Although today's political attitude is less imperialistic and more diplomacy-oriented, I found this part to be quite similar to the reality of the duty states are expected to fulfill. Our team’s primary focus was on meeting our objective and as the game progressed we became more cognizant of anticipating what the other teams were trying to do, specifically the red team who was directly competing against us for control over Ukraine. However, this limited tunnel vision kept us from the realization that our strongest ally, the yellow team was using our protection and support as a vehicle to achieve their goal of controlling twelve territories. With mass media, fake news, cybersecurity, and an increasingly polarizing political climate among all the other nuances that make a state's balancing act even more onerous in the mix, this vision is further convoluted in real life. Our blindside reminded me of how often states and their government can have knee-jerk reactions to events, attacks, or other interactions they aren't expecting. In moments when our territories were attacked, the most sensible thing in the heat of the moment did not align with what we would’ve done with more careful thought on the matter. This prompted me to look back on our terrorism discussion and the short and long-term effects of 9/11. It is a common conception that invading Iraq was an emotional reaction to the attacks but for longevity, the nation changed forever in productive and positive ways. However, in some aspects, this can be perceived as overcorrection which I saw time and time again during our simulation as many of the teams overcorrected after an attack they didn’t see coming all in the interest to meet their objective and win.

Ultimately, this simulation more closely resembled the collective action problem, which is when disincentives discourage joint action by individuals in the pursuit of a common goal. I found that in the absence of a common good, there is utter selfishness and I believe that if we continued the simulation, there would have been eventual anarchy. Cooperation and coordination are tenets necessary to effect change and properly facilitate peace-keeping efforts. In reality, collective action occurs when states work to achieve some common objective. In our case, the game was not an accurate depiction of collective action because alliances had no discernable effect and diplomacy was mostly for the purpose of one team meeting their objective. To bolster the simulation’s effectiveness and real-life capability, the presence of NGOs should be included in some capacity.

Comments

  1. Jack CahalaneMay 6, 2022 at 6:11 PM

    I think your discussion of how our simulation of Diplomatic Risk related to the idea of collective action problems was a very adept analysis which I alluded to in my work on an international stage. Furthermore, I think the pursuit of common good is a collective action problem in its own right. I think the reading of Garrett Hardin's work, The Tragedy of the Commons, highlights some of the potential misreadings and mistakes which can be made in providing solutions to work towards the common good.

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