When Is Domestic Political Unrest Related to International Conflict? Diversionary Theory and Japanese Foreign Policy, 1890–1941

In this article, we seek to advance the theoretic and empirical literature on the diversionary use of force. We argue that state leaders are more likely to engage in diversionary foreign policy behavior when opposition groups from within the winning coalition press for policy changes, but the government rejects those policy demands. Only when domestic unrest threatens a loss of political support from groups that are politically important to the leadership do we expect leaders to try and rally their support through heightened international conflict. We test this argument in an analysis of Japanese foreign policy behavior from 1890 to 1941 regarding (i) the initiation of military threats, (ii) concessions in negotiations, and (iii) the escalation of military confrontations. Drawing upon new data sets collected on Japanese domestic politics and foreign relations, we find strong support for our argument in a series of statistical tests.