The dissertation covers 1689-1712 in English political history. It deals with the debate between the Whig and Tory parties, and their internal conflicts, over the strategy necessary to defeat France in the two wars of this period: the Nine Years' and Spanish Succession Wars. It describes the widespread hopes for a quick victory, centred on the 'descent', in the early years of William's reign; and how this optimism was exploited to secure support for the Continental .war. It traces the development of an alternative 'Country' strategy in response to the failures to mount an invasion of France and the build up of English forces in Flanders. The consolidation of Whig support behind the Contin~ntal war in 1693-95; and the failure of the Country attempt to draw away mercantile support from the European war by exploiting the anger over privateering losses are analysed. The explosion of Country/Tory bitterness in 1697-98 which ied to the precipitate disbanding of the army is discussed with reference to the strategic hopes and dis- , appointments of :the previous war. The approach of the Spanish Succession War in 1698-1702 is analysed against the background of the expectations of both Whigs and Tories that England would now fight as naval auxiliaries; and attenti-on is drawn to the wide-spread interest in Caribbean warfare. The internal disputes within the Tory ministry in 1702-04 over war strategy are analysed, and the strategic ideas of the main political figures - Nottingham, Godolphin, Marlborough and Harley - are examined. The importance of the Spanish theatre to public and political opinion and the revival of interest in Caribbean warfare from 1706 on are both documented. Harley's changing attitude to the war in the years 1704-08 is discussed. The rise to dominance , of the Junto war strategy 1708-10 is cpnsidered, and the Tory response. The war strategy of the Tory ministry of 1710 is examined, with particular reference to the hold of the Spanish war on Tory loyalties, and Harley's West Indian and St John's Canadian schemes. The fierce pamphlet debate between Whig and Tory in 1710-12 over the conduct of the Succession War is analysed.

This dissertation explores how experience and environment impact behavior. In the first chapter, I provide behavioral foundations for a model of taste uncertainty with endogenous learning through consumption. In this setting, uncertainty is over an unobservable, subjective state space. Preference over lottery-menu pairs is sufficient to identify the state space and the learning process. In this model, the agent is viewed as if he learns the utility of an object upon its consumption. This information is used to improve choice from the follow-on menu. This implies a trade-off between consumption value and information leading to experimentation. I provide a behavioral definition of experimentation. While the literature focuses on identifying subjective states through a demand for flexibility, I show that experimentation also (partially) identifies taste uncertainty. The second chapter explores the potential for social networks to affect decisions of political leaders. To this end we construct a database linking European royal kinship networks, monarchies, and wars to study the effect of family ties on conflict. To establish causality, we exploit decreases in connection caused by apolitical deaths of network important individuals. These deaths are associated with substantial increases in the frequency and duration of war. We provide evidence that these deaths affect conflict only through changing the kinship network. Over our period of interest, the percentage of European monarchs with kinship ties increased threefold. Together, these findings help explain the well-documented decrease in European war frequency. The final chapter builds on the robust finding from the psychology literature that the co-presentation of products causes consumers to associate them. Associated products are evaluated more similarly. Supposing that agents behave according to this evidence, I axiomatically derive a tractable utility model of this association effect. In an application, I study a two-product monopolist that can strategically choose whether or not to offer his products under the same brand. I demonstrate that psychological association can provide strict incentives for either brand extension or brand differentiation depending on the distribution of product valuations in the market. Appropriate branding strategies allow firms to extract more surplus from consumers when psychological association is present.