Building Multilateral Military Coalitions: A Study of Bribery and Coercion in Controversial Military Interventions

Student: Marina Rae Roski
Major: Political Science with an International Relations Focus
Minor: Economics
Advisors: Jeff Lantis, Sid Simpson
This study focuses on the interactions and exchanges between countries which allow multilateral military coalitions to form. Especially in coalitions that are not condoned by the majority of the international community, coalition leaders must employ certain strategies in order to obtain coalition members. The driving question in this study is “what strategies utilized by the United States government are most often used to obtain certain types of support for multilateral military coalition efforts?” The role of the United Nations in coalition building is also in question. To address these questions, a comparative case study examining the coalition of the First Persian Gulf War and the ‘Coalition of the Willing’ of the Iraq War is employed. The cases highlight the highest level of contribution from each member state and the most threatening strategy used by the lead country to obtain each member state. Ultimately, the data from both case studies is combined to draw conclusions on all aspects of the research question.

Marina will be online to field comments on May 8:
2-4pm EDT (PST 11am-1pm, Africa/Europe: evening)

Posted in I.S. Symposium, Independent Study on May 1, 2020.