Replication Data for: Making Trains from Boxcars: Studying Conflict and Conflict Management Interdependencies

Research on international conflict management remains largely siloed, with studies omitting conflict events and focusing on disparate conflict management strategies (e.g., mediation, or peacekeeping); yet we know that strategies regularly interact with conflict events and one another (e.g., within the same conflict). If one imagines conflict events and conflict management strategies as train boxcars, and begins from the observation that boxcars travel in trains (i.e., collections of boxcars linked together in a purposefully constructed, meaningful way), a key question emerges: how do we build trains from conflict management strategy boxcars? How do we move from the impulse to isolate these strategies artificially and study them discretely, to theorizing about and examining the interdependence between them directly. The contributors to this special issue address that broad question. In this introductory article, we first explain the challenge at hand, outline the forms conflict management interdependence can theoretically take, and define the conflict management strategies that feature throughout the issue. We then conduct a multidimensional scaling exercise to ascertain the most promising dimensions along which to theorize conflict management interdependence. This analysis shows that the myriad conflict management strategies organize along two prominent dimensions: whether the strategy pursues a more integrative or distributive outcome, and how costly the strategy is for its user to employ. The analysis, far from being the last word, serves as an opening salvo for further research on conflict management interdependence. Finally, we discuss the various articles in this special issue, highlighting their contributions and tying them together into a few main themes.国际冲突管理研究长期以来呈现出显著的学科割裂状态，现有研究往往忽略冲突事件本身，仅聚焦于各类不同的冲突管理策略（如调解、维和行动）；然而学界业已证实，各类策略往往会与冲突事件及其他策略产生互动（例如在同一冲突场景中）。若将冲突事件与冲突管理策略类比为火车车厢，并基于“车厢需编组为列车——即经刻意联结、形成有机整体的车厢集合”这一观察，核心问题便应运而生：我们该如何以冲突管理策略的车厢组构为列车？又该如何摒弃人为割裂策略、孤立开展研究的惯性思维，转而直接构建理论并探究策略间的相互依存关系。本特刊的各位作者便围绕这一核心议题展开了探索。在本导论性文章中，我们首先阐释当前面临的研究挑战，梳理冲突管理策略间相互依存关系的理论形态，并界定本特刊各篇文章所涉及的冲突管理策略。随后我们开展多维尺度分析（multidimensional scaling），以明确用于构建冲突管理相互依存理论的最具潜力的维度。本次分析显示，纷繁多样的冲突管理策略可归纳至两大核心维度：一是该策略旨在实现整合式还是分配式结果，二是策略实施者执行该策略所需付出的成本高低。本次分析绝非定论，而是为冲突管理相互依存关系的后续研究拉开了序幕。最后，我们对本特刊收录的各篇文章进行评述，梳理其各自的研究贡献，并将其归纳为若干核心主题。