Diplomacy: An Attempt to Explain the Interaction of States Using the Three levels of Analysis. By: Collin M.

Briggs (turned it in on time with the wrong file format) October 20th 2011

Page 1 The System Level: The game Diplomacy (created by: ) gives an effective matrix to view the levels of analysis. The

system of the game forces players into opposition; by giving each team the goal of achieving 18 points for victory. The map of Diplomacy is very carefully organized to give each team the same opportunities for expansion, and for war with each other. Each player is forced to be concerned with at least two teams due to proximity, and by the end of the game, even opponents on the far side of the map may become major concerns by way of naval convoy's. Forcing teams to either form strong treaties or immediately go to war. The geographical location of the states in most cases forces states to attempt to establish themselves as either a land power or a naval power. This is one of the reasons that France for example is not a good ally for England. England and France both grow the fastest as naval powers, but England would rightfully be quite distressed if France started building fleets in Brest and moving to the English Channel. Likewise France would be distressed if England took over not only the English Channel but the Mid-Atlantic Ocean. The only place for England to realistically land; if they wanted to be a land power, would be France. Given such a predicament it is no small wonder that France and Germany teamed up. Likewise Russia, Austria, Turkey find themselves in a three way power struggle; necessitating two of them to create an alliance, or fight to a three way stalemate. Germany will most likely will want to establish its self as a land power, and that will put it in contention with Russia, Austria, and France. Over and Over this pattern is re-established forcing states to decide early whether they want to be a land or naval power, and make alliances accordingly. This arrangement puts strain on any diplomatic attempts, because of the ease with which countries may betray one another. Case and point would be Turkeys' betrayal of Russia during the invasion of Austria. This move cause Russia to lose several points, and established Turkey as the Page 2 dominant power on the map. As a stark contrast, these close borders may also forge very strong relationships between states, I.E; Germany and France. At the beginning of the game both teams realized that they could go to war, and waste all their resources fighting each other while Germany would be attacked and conquered by Russia and Austria; mean while France would be picked at and locked in; at the very least, by England. These teams instead decided to join forces, and remove England from the game. This friendship lasted the entire game; a liberal perspective would not that this peace was possible due to a set of agreements between the two states. The game was slightly modified to better represent these interactions by composing each state in a group of several students. As part of the rules for the system of the game, it changes the value's of

an individual or groups identity. Since teams are not made of only one person, and the system will limit the forms of government; more on that later, an individual is obligated to work with others to establish the direction the state will move. It also grants the boon of allowing an individual person to have his/her plans subject to a peer review before they are implemented, removing, to some degree, the amount of human error. One more facet of the system must be analyzed; each game session was done in one hour increments, with a 23 hour break period in between each session. This had two major effects on planning, the first being an increased amount of time to study the board and test possible moves, and compare these moves to established good moves on the internet. The second thing that happened during these breaks was that states who did not take advantage of the extra time to review their positions often times forgot their positions and as such were at a disadvantage due to the nature of the system. The State Level Page 3 Establishing each state as a group of individual players introduces the problem of which system of government each team would use. In practice some teams opted for a democracy, and others a Dictatorship. These are the only real two options for government in this setting, most others (like a theocracy) don't apply. Though in retrospect it would appear each team was just a different form of oligarchy. As expected democratic teams were often slow in establishing commands to their troops; in contrast Dictatorships were quicker to establish their orders. This is caused by the simplicity of decision making in a dictatorship where there is a single person making all the decisions; versus a democratic organization where no move can be made until the majority of the players have agreed on a course of action. These formats for government certainly changed the way they interacted with each other, not necessarily in a clearly visible way however. In many cases the dictatorships were an easier opponent than a democratic state. The reason was the same Through out the game all of the states; with the possible exception of Austria, made deals exchanging territory for assistance in obtaining more territory. These deal were tenuous at best, usually causing states to feel more vulnerable to other teams by increasing the amount of territory bordered by other states. These deals were also difficult to work out sometimes, because both sides of the arrangement want to receive the lion's share. The Individual Level

At the heart each of the states are a group of people, and in this particular example they are an especially small group of people. Each of these people have different backgrounds and ideals. These

personalities in this game of Diplomacy are worth special considerations. These people are not walking into an already established form of government, so they must come to an agreement on how to run their decisions. How difficult this is to establish has a lot to do with individual temperaments and personalities. For example if you have a team made up of more than one very dominant personality type who have different ideas on how to run the game, there will arise a state of contention between the two. This contention may even achieve such a level of animosity as to require outside interference. In other cases you may have no one in the team willing to take the responsibility for making decisions. This causes a different sort of tension, and may induce erratic behavior or no behavior on behalf of the state. Both of these situations are something each team will want to see in another team. A team whose individual members do not function together will not be a major competitor in the end game. In this particular game Austria was a good example of a non-committal group. The team spent so much time not deciding what to do that in the end they effectively accomplished nothing. In addition how aggressive the people in the state are will in large part determine how aggressive the state plays. Likewise for things like honorable, trustworthy, intelligent, and diplomatic. In effect it is the attributes of the group that will determine how the team will function. A prime example for this would be the France, Turkey, and Germany relations at the end of the game. Near the last two years of the game, it became apparent to members of the France team that they could either side with Turkey, and betray their long term allies in Germany and ensure and victory, or they could struggle to stop Turkey from winning with 18 points and retain their alliance and friendship with Germany. This decision was put to a vote within the team, unbeknownst to the other two teams, and was labeled Victory or Honor in the French discussion board. In the end, a unanimous vote came in to side with Germany. The members of the French team each identified with members of the German team, and thus sided with them in spite guarantee of defeat. As far as the game is concerned this decision made no difference in the victory of the Turkish Page 5 team. However there is still a sense of friendship amongst members of the French and Germany teams. No other level of analysis can explain this scenario. There is nothing inherent in the setting of the game that would force or lead the French to consign to defeat, there is nothing inherent with their team government that would suggest defeat was inevitable; there was a sense of friendship and camaraderie between the French and German teams to cause the members to see defeat as preferable to betrayal. The Conclusion:

Though the study was short, and the data pool likewise limited it is still a profound exercise in establishing the truthfulness and practicality of the levels of analysis in explaining the behavior of different actors on the international stage. The examples mentioned were only a small sample set of the the exchanges amongst the players in a very short period of time, and may prove as a powerful reminder of the complexity of the world of international relationships.