The Strategy Project

Abstract

Strategy is central to political science. Wars, elections, treaties, and bargains – the outcomes we care most about turn on the strategies actors adopt to pursue their desired ends. Strategy is also one of the few political science concepts with widespread utility outside the classroom and the study of politics. Students who grasp what it means to act, compete, and cooperate strategically will have a decisive edge in the war room, boardroom, or courtroom.

Unfortunately, teachers who want to expose students to this critical way of thinking quickly find that there are few effective tools for doing so. This is especially true at the undergraduate level. From Clausewitz to Schelling, the canonical literature on strategy makes for dry reading. Game theory is similarly inaccessible to most college students (at least those without an abiding passion for math or deer hunting with Rousseau). Even contemporary national security strategy documents are a poor model for how to think strategically. They tend to read like a laundry list of goals and objectives. This overlooks the most important aspect of any strategic interaction: the other side has a say in the outcome too.

Two years ago a group of Princeton students began searching for a way to fill this gap. Working under the auspices of the University’s Center for International Security Studies (CISS), this team developed a simulation-based approach to strategic education. Since then their efforts have evolved into a coherent series of simulation exercises. One set of simulations teaches students about the bureaucratic obstacles to strategic action in a crisis. Another set focuses on grand strategy, helping students understand the challenges of investing today in the tools you need tomorrow. Both types are designed to be realistic yet accessible to the average undergraduate. To date over 225 undergraduate, masters, and doctoral students have participated in one of these simulations.

This paper recounts the origins of this initiative. It then describes the structure and results of the crisis simulation (as grand strategy simulation is still being refined). The goal is to share ideas with departments and research centers that are also interested in finding new ways to teach security studies and strategy. The key takeaway is that simulations are a low-cost, high yield way to fill an important gap while increasing student interest in the subject. In our experience they convey lessons of both theoretical and substantive value, doing so in a way that student-participants find more interesting and easier to remember than traditional lectures, readings, and discussions. They also attract students from a wide variety of disciplines and majors, including many with no prior exposure to the field.

Keywords: strategy, simulation, security studies