Producing Goods and Projecting Power: How What You Make Influences What You Take

40 Pages Posted: 2 Oct 2017

See all articles by Jonathan Markowitz

Jonathan Markowitz

University of Southern California

Christopher J. Fariss

University of Michigan at Ann Arbor - Department of Political Science

R. Blake McMahon

University of California, San Diego (UCSD)

Date Written: 2017

Abstract

How does a state’s source of wealth condition the domain in which it seeks to project influence? We argue that what a state makes conditions what they take. Specifically, the less states rely on land rents to acquire wealth, the less interested they will be in seeking control over territory and the more interested they will be in securing access to distant markets. We develop and test several observable implications that should follow if this proposition is true. First, as states become less economically dependent on territory, they should be less likely to fight over territory; second, those states should be more likely to both invest in power projection capabilities and subsequently project power at greater distances. Our findings support our theory. These results are robust across a variety of model specifications that take into account potential confounds, such as regime type, economic development, threat, and geography.

Keywords: power projection, territorial conflict, political economy of security, foreign policy

Suggested Citation

Markowitz, Jonathan and Fariss, Christopher J. and McMahon, R. Blake, Producing Goods and Projecting Power: How What You Make Influences What You Take (2017). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3045482 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3045482

Jonathan Markowitz (Contact Author)

University of Southern California ( email )

2250 Alcazar Street
Los Angeles, CA 90089
United States

Christopher J. Fariss

University of Michigan at Ann Arbor - Department of Political Science ( email )

Ann Arbor, MI 48109
United States

R. Blake McMahon

University of California, San Diego (UCSD) ( email )

9500 Gilman Drive #0521
La Jolla, CA 92093-0521
United States

HOME PAGE: http://polisci2.ucsd.edu/rmcmahon

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