States' Pursuit of Military Technology
Since the war in Ukraine, military technology has been at the forefront on key policy discussions, whether in relation to the military aid provided to Ukraine by many of its allies and partners or the effectiveness of the Ukrainian and Russian military on the battlefield. For this part of my research agenda, I examine the choices that states make in the development of their military arsenals, the role of the tools and methods of warfare in the planning for and the actual conduct of military operations, and the reasons that some technologies and practices are abandoned while others gain prominence. My book manuscript, “Imagining the Unimaginable: War, Weapons, and Procurement Politics,” is at the center of these research efforts. Beyond the book project, I am working on a several articles, which are listed below.
Since the war in Ukraine, military technology has been at the forefront on key policy discussions, whether in relation to the military aid provided to Ukraine by many of its allies and partners or the effectiveness of the Ukrainian and Russian military on the battlefield. For this part of my research agenda, I examine the choices that states make in the development of their military arsenals, the role of the tools and methods of warfare in the planning for and the actual conduct of military operations, and the reasons that some technologies and practices are abandoned while others gain prominence. My book manuscript, “Imagining the Unimaginable: War, Weapons, and Procurement Politics,” is at the center of these research efforts. Beyond the book project, I am working on a several articles, which are listed below.
Book Project
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My book project, entitled "Imagining the Unimaginable: War, Weapons, and Procurement Politics," asks why and how do states decide to develop different weapon capabilities within a similar military domain. Contrary to the existing literature, I argue that ideas, particularly those about the future, play a critical role in shaping states’ decisions about military technology. Based on original archival evidence from fourteen archives and one hundred in-depth interviews with key defense stakeholders, I contend that domestic actors’ ideas about future warfare—what I call the “images of warfare,” consisting of actors’ perceptions of the future
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environment and their theory of victory—shape actors’ preferences for particular military capabilities. Not all of these ideas, however, are equally influential. I therefore trace how those within the military, the legislative and executive branches, the industry, and the community of defense analysts bargain over their technological preferences. In order to transform ideas into actual capabilities, I argue that actors need to build a cross-cutting coalition within the broader defense community around their “imagined security interests,” while exploiting the state's political opportunity structure. To test this theory, I use in-depth case studies, in which I compare and contrast the development and operationalization of missile defense (1980s-2010s) in the United States, France, and the United Kingdom. I also include evidence from two shadow cases on the pursuit of military aircraft (1920s-1930s) and aircraft carriers (1950s-1960s) in those same states.
Other Work in Progress
- Prevailing over the Future: The Role of Imagination and Ideational Contestation in the Construction of Military Technology. (working paper)
- The Eternal Promise of Missile Defense: Malleability and Ignorance in Unconstrained Technological Pursuits. (working paper)
- Up in Arms: The Influence of Political Parties on Compliance with the Responsible Arms Transfer Norm. (working paper)
- Why Interstate Arms Collaborations Fail: Examining the Triple Dilemmas in the Missile Defense Realm. (in preparation for special issue of Journal of Strategic Studies)
- The French Case: Planting the Seeds for Missile Defense. (in preparation for an edited book on the Strategic Defense Initiative for Cornell University Press)
- Missile Defense and the Future of Arms Control. (in preparation)