Non-aggression pacts

Context and Explanation

Datos Bibliográficos

ID6431085
AutoresAlexander Lanoszka (0000-0001-6812-3873, autor de correspondencia)
Año2025
Volumen17
Número3
Páginas371-394
Fecha de publicación2025-04-22
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaInternational Theory (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1752-9719 • E-ISSN: 1752-9727
EditorialCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s1752971925000065
OpenAlexW4409687179
IdiomaEN
Referencias citadas51

The existing literature offers contrasting views on the causes and effects of non-aggression pacts. Some scholars contend that these agreements impose audience costs that prevent an ongoing rivalry from escalating to war. Others claim that states use non-aggression pacts to signal to others that their rivalry is over and that their future relations will be peaceful. Scholars disagree as to the impact non-aggression pacts have on violent conflict. I demonstrate that various definitional and coding issues beset the literature, resulting in the incorporation of many agreements that should not be considered as non-aggression pacts. I then make a threefold argument about non-aggression pacts. First, non-aggression pacts came into being in the 1920s amid emerging norms proscribing interstate warfare. Second, they saw frequent use in interstate Europe. Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union used them to manipulate those norms so as to make themselves appear more acceptable despite their revisionism. Finally, many friendship treaties, which have been miscast as non-aggression pacts, are a separate type of agreement that became common among those post-colonial states that acquired independence during and immediately after the Cold War. Timeless arguments regarding non-aggression pacts thus reify these agreements and overlook key motives behind their use

Aggression · Context (archaeology · Geography · Political science · Global Peace and Security Dynamics · International Law and Human Rights · Political Conflict and Governance · Psychology · Social Psychology