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This dissertation examines the Ottoman grand strategy during the turbulent years of war and reform between 1826 and 1841.The concept of grand strategy utilized in my thesis does hereby not refer to purely military matters. It is rather a notion that explains how a political authority strives to realize its long-term aims through mobilization of its available instruments and resources. During 1820s-1840s, facing grave internal and external threats, the Ottoman grand strategy was directed at defending its existing possessions and re-establishing the center’s authority throughout the empire. To ensure their aims, Ottoman decision-makers initiated a radical bureaucratic-military reform agenda and mobilized available fiscal, military and ideological resources at their disposal. The majority of the existing scholarship tend to interpret the Ottoman reforms in an overly descriptive or superficial manner, therefore neglecting the Ottoman decision-makers’ perceptions, plans, and broader goals as well as the subsequent effects (and repercussions) of those policies within the empire. The “Eastern Question” literature, which is mainly based on European sources, often ignores the Ottoman agency and obscures the rather complex nature of Ottoman policy-making by assessing it within a facile “modernist-reactionary” bipolarity for the period in question. With my holistic approach and utilization of unused archival material, I will contribute to the existing knowledge about Ottoman policy-making and political-military transformation during the era in question. I argue in my thesis that the imperial center consciously, if frantically, responded to the internal and external challenges by tightening its grip around its subjects and making far-reaching changes in its governmentality. Aided by an expanding and diversifying military-administrative bureaucracy, Ottoman rulers managed to collect more taxes, create and expand a disciplined army, limit the power of provincial notables, standardize governing practices and pragmatically used their newly established European embassies to achieve their foreign goals. The social and economic costs of these policies were also immense, as I clearly underline in my study. Many common subjects and members of the higher classes expressed neither optimism nor pleasure about the top-down reforms and state policies. They were heavily taxed, suffered from rampant inflation, while tens of thousands of men were pressed into the new military formations to serve until they became disabled, deserted or died. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / Grounded in archival research in Turkish historical repositories, this thesis examines the Ottoman ruling elite’s efforts to ensure the empire’s integrity and re-establish central authority by military-bureaucratic reform and internal negotiation in the second quarter of the 19th century. Going beyond the standard institutional histories and Eurocentric narratives of the Eastern Question, it explores how the Ottoman sultans and bureaucrats mobilized the empire’s political, military, and ideological resources to achieve their broader goals of reversing collapse and resisting European political-military challenge.

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How do states win wars against other states? We have three explanations. By selection, states enter more winnable wars. By warfighting, states use negative inducements so enemies fear fighting. By peacemaking, states use positive inducements so enemies hope for settling. This dissertation investigates peacemaking. It theorizes that states optimally produce influence only if they efficiently combine warfighting negative and peacemaking positive inducements. It hypothesizes that using some peacemaking on average improves outcomes verses using none. The dissertation tests this with a statistical analysis that measures peacemaking as law of war compliance and estimates effects on all inter-state outcomes from 1899 to 1991. It finds that compliance likely on average improves immediate military and final political relative outcomes. This dissertation also tests peacemaking in four case studies from the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871 and World War II. These case studies find that state peacemaking to enemy states, allies, leaders, troops, and civilians probably on average improves absolute war outcomes. These complementary and independent empirical results provide unprecedented support for the peacemaking explanation of how states improve inter-state war outcomes. To succeed, states should be prudent by selection, fierce in warfighting, and principled for peacemaking. / Government

Canada consistently balances competing inclinations for proximity and distance with the United States. Yet the extant literature on Canadian foreign policy has rarely focused on this particular behaviour trait or readily accepted that such an ambiguous stance is actually underpinned by a strategic logic, let alone the crux of a purported grand strategy. And the few that that are open to the notion of a Canadian grand strategy often overlook the domestic decision-making determinants of behaviour, are largely empirical-descriptive in content, or are chronologically limited to either the early Cold War or a few key foreign policy episodes. This dissertation rectifies these shortcomings by providing a theoretical-explanatory and empirically-informed account of Canada’s post-war grand strategy, in which its domestic origins, strategic policies, and cultural predispositions are all carefully explored. It does so by applying the cultural-cybernetic model of behaviour, which combines strategic cultural factors that guide policy-makers on security matters with cybernetic policy processes, through which beliefs, inclinations, and policy choices are standardized and regularized as distinct doctrines across a range of foreign, defence, and security policies. It tests this model on two key cases of Canadian grand strategy in the post-war period: (1) Canada’s policy responses to American preferences on strategic (air and missile) defence over some six decades, and (2) its policy responses to US – and to a lesser extent British – strategic preferences on NATO defence strategy during the Cold War. The findings reveal that Canada’s strategic policies fluctuated between the two Standing Operational Doctrines in its policy repertoire: continental soft-bandwagoning and defensive weak-multilateralism. These two doctrines span the range of feasible policy options – the “goldilocks zone” – required to ensure that any trade-offs between security and sovereignty, as the central values being pursued in the cybernetic process, are minimized. It is for this reason that Canada’s strategic behaviour has a high degree of policy continuity, patterned consistency, and is best described as the goldilocks grand strategy.

Under det senaste decenniet har Ryssland nyttjat det militära maktmedlet mot forna sovjetstater i syfte att uppnå politiska målsättningar. Skälen till detta är troligtvis flera, där Natos och EUs expandering till Rysslands närmaste intressesfär antas utgöra en väsentlig drivkraft. Den ryska interveneringen i Georgien år 2008 och annekteringen av Krim i Ukraina år 2014, var ur ett svenskt strategiperspektiv oväntade samt överraskande händelser som bidrog till djupgående förändringar av den svenska säkerhetsstrategin. Denna undersökning syftar till att analysera om och i så fall hur, dessa två ryska strategiska chocker har påverkat svensk säkerhetsstrategi under de senaste tio åren. Undersökningen ämnar även ge en ökad förståelse för utformningen av svenska säkerhetsstrategier, dess bakgrund, påverkansfaktorer och förhållande till ryskt geopolitiskt agerande. Denna kunskap skapar även förutsättningar att bättre förstå den aktuella strategin, generella säkerhetspolitiska ageranden likväl som den utgör ett bidrag till analys av framtida strategier. Denna fallstudie nyttjar en referensram som utgår ifrån Jacob Westbergs modell av strategins komponenter, miljö, mål, medel och metod. Genom textanalys studeras fyra analysenheter bestående av officiella säkerhetsstrategier och försvarspropositioner. Undersökningens första analysenhet utgörs av En strategi för Sveriges säkerhet från år 2006 och den sista analysenheten är Nationell säkerhetsstrategi från år 2017 med dess delrapport från år 2018. För att ytterligare berika empirin har även tidigare forskning inom ämnesområdet använts, likväl som rapporter från Försvarsberedningen och Försvarsmakten. Undersökningens slutsatser visar att de två strategiska chockerna har haft en betydande påverkan på svensk säkerhetsstrategi under det senaste decenniet. Chockerna har bidragit till ett skifte från internationella operationer, en solidaritetsdoktrin och ett frivilligt anställt försvar, till ett ökat fokus på närområdet, en form av Östersjöallians samt upprättandet av ett totalförsvar med värnplikt. Rysslands intervenering i Georgien hade dock inledningsvis en blygsam påverkan i jämförelse med annekteringen av Krim, som orsakade ett paradigmskifte inom svensk säkerhetsstrategi. Det framstår som att den första chocken delvis absorberades av en övertro till europeisk säkerhet i kombination med Sveriges 200-åriga tradition av fred samt den rotade synen på neutralitet och alliansfrihet. Den initialt absorberade chocken visar sig dock senare utgöra en förstärkare till den andra chocken, vilket leder till en helomvändning i säkerhetsstrategin. Följderna kan ses i återupprättandet av totalförsvaret, nya militära förmågor, ökad nationell försvarsförmåga och etableringen av en ökad permanent militär närvaro på Gotland. Det innebär även fördjupade bilaterala samarbeten med Finland, USA, NATO samt de nordiska och baltiska länderna. Svenskt fokus kanaliserades nu främst till två metoder, att kunna möta ett militärt väpnat angrepp mot Sverige, samt en form av alliansstrategi med främst Finland och USA i östersjöområdet. / Over the course of the past ten years, Russia has used its military means against former Soviet states in an effort to achieve its political objectives. The explanations behind this behavior are probably several, but NATO’s and EU’s expansion to Russia’s proximity and area of interest could very well have played a significant role. The Russian intervention in Georgia in 2008 and the annexation of Crimea in 2014 were from a Swedish strategy perspective, both unexpected, surprising and led to severe changes in Swedish security strategy, thus by definition being strategic shocks. This study aims to analyze if and, in that case how two Russian strategic shocks have affected Sweden’s national security strategy over the course of the past decade. Thus, in doing so it contributes to an increase in understanding the development of Swedish security strategy, its underlying causes, background and relation to Russian geopolitical behavior. This knowledge will also help to better understand the current strategy, political security actions in general as well as a contribution to future analysis of strategies. This case study utilizes a frame of reference based on Jacob Westberg’s model of a strategies components, environment, ends, means andways, to define, analyze and evaluate the security strategy in its right context. Through qualitative text analysis, this case study analyzes four analysis units consisting of official security strategy and Defense bills by the Swedish government. Spanning from 2006 to the last unit, the National security strategy from 2017. To enrich the empirical analysis, earlier research on the subject at hand, as well as, reports from the Swedish Defense Commission and the Swedish armed forces have been added to the study.   The study concludes that the two strategic shocks have in fact had a major impact on Swedish security strategies over the past decade. Causing a shift from focusing on international operations, a solidarity doctrine and a strictly professional armed force mainly used abroad, to focusing on Sweden’s immediate vicinity, with a Baltic Sea alliance and a re-establishment of a total defense concept. Russia’s intervention in Georgia had a modest impact compared to the annexation of Crimea which created a paradigm in Swedish security strategy. It seems like the first shock was partly absorbed due to a misbelief of European safety as well as Sweden’s two-hundred-year long history of peace, mainly due to a neutral- and alliance free policy. As a result, the first shock functioned as a catalyst, amplifying the impact of the second strategic shock, causing a total turnaround of the Swedish security strategy. Its effects initiated the re-establishment of a total defense concept, new military means, strengthening of the national defense and establishing an increased permanent military presence on Gotland. It also included deepening the bi-lateral co-operation with Finland, USA, the other Nordic-Baltic countries as well as with NATO. The Swedish security strategy is now being focused to two main courses of action. The first, being able to handle a military attack on Swedish soil, the other an alliance strategy with mainly Finland and the USA in the Baltic area.

Historien visar att en avsaknad av en ledande idé kan få förödande konsekvenser. Det är svårt att jämföra dagens Sverige med de krigförande nationerna under andra världskriget, samt de förödande effekterna som en avsaknad av en strategi medförde räknat i förstörelse, död och lidande. Detta väcker frågan om Sverige har en utvecklad strategi för sitt internationella engagemang i allmänhet, och vid internationella insatser där det militära maktmedlet används i synnerhet. För Försvarsmakten kan det finnas ett mervärde med en övergripande strategi, en så kallad fullständig strategi. Denna strategi skapas av regering och riksdag, och syftar till att koordinera statens resurser inom flera politikområden med målsättningen att nå ett bättre samordnat resultat. Syftet med uppsatsen är att ta fram ett analytiskt ramverk med indikatorer som kan nyttjas till att identifiera vad som bör vara utmärkande för en fullständig strategi i samband med Sveriges internationella insatser. Uppsatsens resultat visar att indikatorer för att kunna identifiera vad som är utmärkande för en fullständig strategi är samordning/samverkan, ledning/styrning, målformulering, resurs och synergi, givet uppsatsens avgränsningar till det så kallade övergripande strategiska sammanhanget. Resultatet visar även att Sverige har en fullständig strategi med insatsen i Afghanistan.

This dissertation analyzed the internal incoherence of China’s grand strategy. To do so, it used the cultural driver of honor to explain the contradictory behavior of China, which ranges from peaceful, responsible international actor to assertive, revisionist rising power with hegemonic ambitions. The central research question asked why China often diverges from Peaceful Development, thus leading to major contradictions as well as possible misperceptions on the part of other nations. Honor was the standard of reference that was utilized and examined in order to establish congruence and coherence between deed and praxis. Accordingly, the first hypothesis of this study posited that if policy diverges from or is incongruent with China’s standard of national honor, then the grand strategy is internally incoherent. Second, two further hypotheses posited that China will tend to use peaceful means if its goal is to enhance external legitimacy, whereas it will tend to use assertive means if its goal is to enhance internal legitimacy. This dissertation began by broadly tracing the cultural driver of honor and the link between honor and legitimacy in Chinese history. The second part of the dissertation looked at the six most salient events within a six-year timeframe (2009-2015) by way of the focused, comparative single-case-study method. For each grand strategy policy input (military strategy, economic policy, and diplomatic policy), the two most salient events were carefully chosen. A fourth grand strategy input, legitimacy (both internal and external), was evaluated for each of these events as well. Methodologically speaking, this study used process tracing in these within-case studies of the single case of China’s grand strategy. Results showed that China’s grand strategy manifestations are by and large legitimacy-driven and that, therefore, peaceful or assertive actions may be differentiated in terms of relation to external or internal legitimacy. In sum, this dissertation advanced an innovative means of inquiry into the grand strategy of a non-Western country, contributed valuable information for the policy community, and offered results that enable a re-evaluation of the debate on the peaceful or violent rise of China.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / The global climate is creating more ice-free waters in the Arctic. These new navigation possibilities around the Arctic lead to increased global trade, tourism, and oil and gas exploration. With the foreseeable increased nautical transportation through the Northwest Passage, the United States needs to revisit its security posture in and around the Bering Strait. At least five different grand strategies are potentially relevant in addressing this question. By comparing the suggestions of these leading grand strategy approaches to what has actually been implemented by the United States in the Strait of Hormuz, the Strait of Malacca, and the Panama Canal, similarities emerge that can help the United States shape their strategy for the defending of its national interests in the Bering Strait. By testing the different grand strategies against three reasonably similar cases, I find that a forward military presence and supporting a liberal institutionalist approach are the two key aspects that the United States should employ in the Bering Strait. Increasing and improving the military presence that the United States has in the region should be a top priority. In addition, supporting the Arctic Council would provide an increased level of security to the United States and other nations in the region. This strategy is not without its challenges and it will require artful statecraft in order to be successful.

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