This study applies the ICB model of state behavior in international crisis to one actor, Italy, in the 1953 Trieste crisis. At the historical level it reconstructs in detail, through recently declassified American and Italian documents, the flow of events from mid-1951 until October 5, 1954 when the signing of the so-called Memorandum of Understanding solved the Trieste question. At the theoretical level, it seeks to determine the impact of crisis-induced stress on the coping processes and choice patterns of Italian decision-makers. The findings confirm the major hypothesis (advanced by Holsti and George) about the stress-performance nexus, namely that "moderate" levels of stress improve decision-making performance while "high" stress might impair it. A modification of the definition of foreign policy crisis adopted by the ICB model is also suggested.

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