Definition and management of International crises

DEFINITION AND MANAGEMENT OF
INTERNATIONAL CRISES
Ömer Göksel 􀃸􀃹YAR*
Abstract
This paper will mainly focus on the conduct of international crises
with a particular emphasis on developing strategies for resolving conflicts
peacefully. Our study reviewed a number of the prominent theories and
hypotheses about how crises can be resolved short of war. In addition, we
examined and compared several prominent 20th century international crisis
waves in historical context. The basic aims of this study are to present
different views on international crises, to gain an understanding of the
strengths and weaknesses of the literature on crisis definitions, and to
develop an agenda for future research on international crisis management.
This article also investigated the hypotheses that leadership qualities during
crises are associated with the outcomes of the crises.
Key Words
International crisis, foreign policy crisis, crisis management, conflict
management, decision making, leadership.
Introduction
The concept of crisis is a wide variety of meanings. Indeed, it is used
in various fields, such as medicine, economics, management, public
administration, communications, history, psychology, political science, and
international relations. Originally coming from medicine, crisis is defined by
Georges Canguilhem as “change heralded by some symptoms, occurring
during an illness, through which the patient’s life will be saved or not.”1 Such
a story of the concept of crisis is not surprising, given the fact that, as would
say Bryan Turner, “the body is the most potent metaphor of society.”2
According to Mary Douglas, the formal structure of a set of social relations
* Associate Professor, International Relations Department, Uludag University.
1 Georges Canguilhem, “Le Probléme des Régulations dans l’organisme et dans la
Sociéte”, Ecrits sur la Médecine, Sevil, Champ Freudien, 2002, p. 104.
2 Bryan S. Turner, The Body and Society: Explorations in Social Theory, Oxford, Oxford
University Press, 1984, p. 114.
2 PERCEPTIONS • Winter 2008
Definition and Management of International Crises must be based on an analogy referring to the natural world. Thus, institutions
are legitimized by structural analogies with the body.3
In social relations, crises are chaotic situations that might be
experienced by people, states, governments, organizations, etc. The word
‘crisis’ means disorder; in other words we can explain that crisis is a situation
which is not normal or stable. This term means an urgent situation that
suddenly happens and breaks the routine processes of any system.
In terminology, another word, ‘chaos’ is one of the closest terms in
meaning to the word, ‘crises. In reality, pre-crisis, crisis, and post-crisis
periods are called generally chaotic processes. Chaos might cause disorder
for a temporary time period. Chaos is a Greek word meaning ‘something
causing blanks’. According to Thomas Schelling, chaos is the ‘metaphysical
unity of potential forces’.4 This situation is able to be seen in active systems,
and it reveals that the system is not being developed linear. It expresses a
non-linear developing process. Therefore, we say that the systems, whether
they are chaotic or not, can meet the expectations of one three conditions: (1)
stable case,5 (2) start of bifurcation near stability, and (3) increasing
bifurcation, which is also called chaos.
It might be possible to say that there is gradual scheme of relationship
among those three situations of any system. The beginning level input
becomes very important in the case of a chaotic system. It is not possible for
this kind of system to meet the function of input forming by itself; on the
contrary, the quality or the quantity of the beginning level input is important.
Because of that, the structure is affected by even small-scale changes in the
input values of the process. As well, it is difficult to predict the future of
these systems. The most commonly revealed chaos type for the current
international system is the destruction or separation of actors. For instance,
the break-up of the Eastern Block in 1989, the collapse of the Soviet Union at
the end of 1991, and the break-up of Yugoslavia beginning in 1992 are all
examples. However, the currency of chaos could be a moderator in many
3 Mary Douglas, Comment Pensent les Institutions, Paris, La Découverte, 2004, pp. 83-84.
4 As cited by Michael Welker, “Alfred North Whitehead’s Basic Philosophical Problem:
The Development of Relativistic Cosmology”, at
http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=2589
5 Balance within the system intends the case of repetition in certain patterns of interaction
between system actors.
PERCEPTIONS • Winter 2008 3
Ömer Göksel İşyar
cases to move to stability from a higher level of chaos. At this point, it might
be appropriate to consider the relationship between the chaos and crisis. As
follows, crises can sometimes allow us to normalize the current or the
potential chaotic situations. If the sudden collapse of the Soviet Union is
considered to be a chaotic situation because of its destructive results for the
balance and/or the order of the former system, it must also be correct that the
asymmetrically-structured Iraq Crisis in 1991 formed a convenient
environment for new ideas on the way towards building the New World
Order. However, this idea has not been exactly firmly established in the
world. Because of that, the common system in the world has not been exactly
saved from being chaotic. In this respect, it must be wondered if another
crisis would be able to solve that problem. As the matter of that fact, the 11
September 2001 crisis of the USA, which was caused by the terrorist attacks
against the USA that day, allowed the White House administration to
reconsider the World Order, which had not been considered to a great extent
prior to that time. So, as that example shows us briefly, a situation of crisis
can be considered to be a chaotic situation. Because of that, there are close
relationships between those two concepts and reality.
In international relations, each crisis can make the state a winner or a
loser. But naturally, each state wants to be on the side of winners. In this
case, it is possible to consider a crisis situation as an opportunity to gain
something. First of all, a well-organized crisis management program is
required to be able to take advantage of such a crisis although some
conditions are needed for appropriate crisis management. Crisis forecasting is
one of the basic steps of successful management. In addition, an international
actor should prepare itself for coming crisis conditions; it has to be searching
for likely opportunities and also has to be prepared for crisis management.
The actor has to be able to deal with the conditions of the crisis and even it
has to try to eliminate it. But it must be always remembered that there is no
method that has been developed to eradicate the formation process of a crisis6
and the element of uncertainty in crisis requires decision making on the basis
of an unclear picture of the crisis at hand.7
6 Arjen Boin and Patrick Lagadec, “Preparing for the Future: Critical Challenges in Crisis
Management”, Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management, Vol. 8, Issue 4,
(December 2000), pp. 185-191.
7 Arjen Boin, et.al., “Book Review: The Politics of Crisis Management: Public Leadership
Under Pressure”, Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management, Vol. 15, Issue 3,
(September 2007), p. 168.
4 PERCEPTIONS • Winter 2008
Definition and Management of International Crises The main aim of this paper is to look at the different definitions and
dimensions of international crises and analyze the various crisis management
methods in international politics.
I. Crises in International Politics
The concept of ‘crisis’ has entered international politics as a situation
“Jenseits von Krieg und Frieden” in German literature – where there is a
crisis, there is no war but there is no peace (‘no war no peace’).8 The
literature in international relations has two general approaches to crises in
international politics: the substantive and procedural approaches. The
substantive approach is concerned with the contents of each crisis, problem
and/or situation. Therefore, supporters of this approach consider above all the
definitions and the effects of a specific instance of crisis. On the other hand,
the purpose of the procedural approach is concerned with forming general
theories about the crises to find out the procedural definition of general crises
and focus on the shared characteristics of all kinds of crises without
examining their specific subjects or contents.9
Followers of the procedural approach have primarily developed two
main theoretical perspectives when defining crises in international politics.
First, the users of the decision-making approach, who take the government as
the level of primary analysis, are interested in the conditions and the
procedures within the actor. Second, the users of the international systems
approach are interested in reciprocal changes among the actors.10
The adherents of the decision-making approach11 tend to be interested
in the subjects within the framework of political processes that governments
may have perceptions of intentions, acquired information about reciprocal
8 Marc Houben, International Crisis Management: The Approach of European States,
London and New York, Routledge, 2005, p. 12.
9 Warren Phillips and Richard Rimkunas, “The Concept of Crisis in International Politics”,
Journal of Peace Research, Vol. 15, No. 3, (1978), p. 259.
10 James M. McCormick, “International Crises: A Note on Definition”, The Western
Political Quarterly, Vol. 31, No. 3, (September 1978), p. 352.; Zeev Maoz, “Crisis
Behavior: Theory and Evidence”, Mershon International Studies Review, Vol. 38, No. 2,
(October 1994), p. 333.
11 For example; Margaret and Charles Hermann, Bruce Paige, Piers Robinson, Richard C.
Snyder, H.W. Bruck and Burton Sapin, Ole Holsti, Zeev Maoz, Mark Granovetter, Gary
Goertz, Paul’t Hart, Eric Stern, Bengt Sundelius, Joe Hagan, etc.
PERCEPTIONS • Winter 2008 5
Ömer Göksel İşyar
motives, effects of public opinion to the international politics, the
psychological management of crises, etc. On the other hand, the adherents of
the international systems approach12 have dealt with subjects such as
unexpected changes in a crisis; force, intensity, and importance of periodic
activities as outputs of the foreign policies, and the dispersion of these
actions.
At this point, it will be necessary to consider those two crisis
definitions related to the procedural approach. The main theme of crisis
analysis based on the (bottom-up) decision-making approach (subjective
approach) is how to define a situation as a crisis. Decision makers do that,
and accordingly, the outer environment of the state has been completely
changed by the actions of other states.13 Decision makers would consider
such a situation to be a crisis situation and these conditions force them to take
extraordinary actions in response. In other words, the conditions of the
situation require the decision-makers to apply crisis management. According
to the supporters of this approach,14 e.g., Charles Hermann, a foreign policy
crisis is a situation which threatens the most important and the primary aims
of the political unit, and limits the time for thinking, planning, and
responding in order to change the probable outcome. In Hermann’s analysis,
this is also a kind of situation which is perceived by the units of a
government to be a surprise while erupting.15 As we can see, it is really
important how a situation in the context of the foreign policy must be
perceived to be as real as possible by the political units. Certainly, the
important indicators of foreign policy crises are the extraordinary changes
12 For example; Charles McClelland, Graham Allison, Andrew Sullivan, Ned Lebow,
Michael Brecher, James L. Richardson, Barbara Farnham, Patrick J. Haney, Thomas
Preston, Edward Hallett Carr, and so on.
13 Also, Wallace and Suedfeld (1988) have recognized that the threat to important values
which often defines a serious crisis, affects changes in the decision making process.
Michael D. Wallace and Peter Suedfeld, “Leadership Performance in Crisis: The
Longevity-Complexity Link”, International Studies Quarterly, Vol. 32, 1988, pp. 439-
451.
14 Methodologically, many of the studies (e.g., Ole Holsti, Robert C. North, and Richard
Brady, 1968; Graham Allison, 1971; Michael Brecher, 1980; Zeev Maoz, 1981; Steve
Smith, 1984; Patrick J. Haney, 1994) have tended to focus on the output of a decision
process, rather than the processing strategies used in making the choice. See Allison
Astorino-Courtois, “The Effects of Stakes and Threat on Foreign Policy Decision-
Making”, Political Psychology, Vol. 21, Issue 3, (2000), p. 490.
15 Charles F. Hermann, “Some Consequences of Crisis Which Limit the Viability of
Organizations”, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 8, No. 1, (June 1963), p. 64.
6 PERCEPTIONS • Winter 2008
Definition and Management of International Crises occurring in the decision-making structure, the sudden changes from the
routine, and the method of entering the crisis management process but
leaving the great extent of responsibility to the centralized ad hoc political
groups.16
Based on the decision-making perspective, there are two types of
crises to talk about based on the number of people involved: one-sided crises
and two-sided crises.17 As a difference between the two types of crises, an
actor amidst a crisis situation may perceive himself surrounded by crisis and
threat, while the opponent may not perceive a crises. For instance, in 1936,
Germany with its leader, Hitler, did not perceive itself to be in a crisis
situation when the Rhine area had been re-militarized, while Belgium,
Czechoslovakia, Poland, Romania, Yugoslavia, France, and England
perceived crises. Other examples could be given for one-sided crises. For
instance, similarly, Israel also had a crisis in 1976 because of the swift
mobilization of the Syrian army. In this framework, the announcement of a
no-fly zone in the north of Iraq in 1992 was also perceived by the Baghdad
administration as a crisis. Nevertheless, there can also be a crisis situation
that is perceived by each actor, which would then be a two-sided crisis (i.e., a
‘normal’ crisis).
According to the definitions of crises in the light of the (top-down)
systems perspective18 (the objective approach), an international crisis is a
situation in which normal/ordinary patterns of interaction between nations
change significantly. For example, it could be possible to talk about a crisis
situation that erupted in the international system (at the global, dominant or
sub-systems level) related to the cases which may cause highly conflicted
interactions, or challenges against domination of one actor in international
system. There would be some sudden and extraordinary changes observed in
the intensity and/or the capacity (volume) of the interactions that actors have
with one another. Then, it would be possible to see a return to the normal
16 Shun’ichi Furukawa, “An Institutional Framework for Japanese Crisis Management”,
Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management, Vol. 8, Nr. 1, (March 2000), p. 12.
17 For detailed information, see J. Joseph Hewitt and Jonathan Wilkenfeld, “One-Sided
Crises in the International System”, Journal of Peace Research, Vol. 36, No. 3, (May
1999), pp. 309-323.
18 On this subject, see Ole R. Holsti, “International Systems, System Change and Foreign
Policy: Commentary on “Changing International Systems””, Diplomatic History, Vol. 15,
Issue 1, (January 1991), pp. 83-89.
PERCEPTIONS • Winter 2008 7
Ömer Göksel İşyar
levels in the intensity and/or the capacity of the interactions after crises. In
this respect, Ikenberry has argued that hegemonic wars ratify shifts in the
balance of power and spur the emergence of new systematic arrangements, as
“historical junctures . . . [that] come at dramatic moments of upheaval . . .
when the old order has been destroyed by war and newly powerful states try
to re-establish basic organizing principles.”19
Especially interactions among the major powers, which exist in the
international system, could be considered in the same way, and it is possible
to reach some conclusions about the subject. Major international crises are
described as powerful changes which form some rigid orientations for parts
of the global system. Some analysts such as Charles McClelland and Oran
Young have made descriptions of crises from the perspective of the
international system. According to McClelland, an international crisis is a
‘change of situation’ that takes place in the actions between the rivals and
affects the entire international political system.20 Likewise, extraordinary
amounts of system inputs are converted into new outputs to escalate interstate
relationships, and those become other inputs again to continue the process in
the same way. Thus, it passes beyond a normal point/level in the course of
reciprocal actions in international system regarding the intensity and the
volume of the relationship. For instance, the significant changes in the
international system beginning from the 1990s could be easily thought of in
this manner as a period of crisis period. As a matter of that fact, the trembling
and the breaking down process on the European side of the Eastern Block in
1989 caused the fall of the Soviet Union in late 1991, and this occurrence, as
a continuous process, indirectly triggered more local crises such as the 1991
crisis in Iraq and also the 1992 crisis in Yugoslavia. Afterwards, the
characteristics of those crises became the reasons for ‘the storm of change’
that could be considered as a cornerstone for the causes of the 11 September
2001 crisis. As we can see, the reasons for crises are related to each other, as
in a chain reaction. The whole structure of a particular chain of events could
be described as an ‘international crisis’.
19 G. John Ikenberry, After Victory: Institutions, Strategic Restraint, and the Rebuilding of
Order After Major Wars, Princeton, NJ, Princeton University Press, 2001, p. 3.
20 Charles A. McClelland, “The Anticipation of International Crises: Prospects for Theory
and Research”, International Studies Quarterly, Vol. 21, No. 1, (March 1977), pp. 15-
16.; See also Raymond Tanter, “International System and Foreign Policy Approaches:
Implications for Conflict Modelling and Management”, World Politics, Vol. 24,
Supplement: Theory and Policy in International Relations, (Spring 1972), pp. 7-39.
8 PERCEPTIONS • Winter 2008
Definition and Management of International Crises After the Cold War, two crisis-related trends appeared. The first one
is the changing tendency to observe that most international crises are related
to the perception of the ‘so-called’ global power, the USA; therefore, almost
all large scale crises had previously been considered to be foreign policy
crises for the Washington administration. Now, crises tend to be considered
international crises by the rest of the world as well. The second one, related
to the first, is that the crises of the Cold War years were generally
symmetrical ones, which erupted between the two equal sides and/or blocks,
while recently occurred crises are perceived as asymmetrical ones,21 meaning
that they appear between states which do not have a equal power.
The international crisis description of Oran Young is very close to the
one of McClelland. According to McClelland, an international crisis is ‘a
range of events’ which consists of suddenly and rapidly changing
occurrences. According to Young’s thinking, the range of events causing
crises increases the effects of forces which make instabilities in the general

system structure. In addition, it activates the same type of factors in subsystems,

and empowers the probability of use of force and damage.22
Young has dwelt upon the importance of the direction of significant
changes in international system, especially regarding potential periods of
crisis. According to Young, it is possibly true that the relational forms of the
international system can totally break down in crisis situations.23 However, it
may bring us to incorrect results if we generalize that hypothesis. For an
opposite example, the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 was really perceived as a
watershed for the relationships between the USA and the Soviet Union but it
must be appreciated that this crisis also caused a period of moderation and
détente in the international system.
The general view of the procedural approach to the definition of crisis
in international relations can be summarized in a table as shown below:
21 See Eric Stern and Bengt Sundelius, “Managing Asymmetrical Crisis: Sweden, the
USSR, and U-137”, International Studies Quarterly, Vol. 36, No. 2, (June 1992), pp.
213-239.
22 Oran R. Young, The Intermediaries: Third Parties in International Crises, Princeton,
Princeton University Press, 1967, p. 10. For the article version of this book, see Oran R.
Young, “Intermediaries: Additional Thoughts on Third Parties”, The Journal of Conflict
Resolution, Vol. 16, No. 1, (March 1972), pp. 51-65.
23 O. Young, The Intermediaries: Third Parties in International Crises, p. 10.
PERCEPTIONS • Winter 2008 9
Ömer Göksel İşyar
Procedural Approach
Main purpose: General theories about the formation of crises
Sub-approaches:
Decision-making
approach (subjective

approach)

International systems

approach (objective

approach)
Analysis level:
Bottom-up analysis:
government,
leadership, etc.
Top-down analysis:
systemic level (global,
regional systems, etc.)
Quality of crisis: Foreign policy crisis International crisis
Crisis types:
One-sided, two-sided;
symmetric,
asymmetric crises
Global, regional, subsystem,
dominant
system crises, etc.
Definition of crisis: Perceived crisis
(Hermann)
Reciprocal change of
situation (McClelland);
range of abnormal
events (Young)
Besides, Charles Hermann (1972, 1989) defined another approach besides the
objective and subjective points of view: the actor confrontation approach.
Actor confrontation studies examine two or more actors as units engaged in
conflict communication and crisis bargaining.24
One of the serious problems of these approaches (especially the
international systems approach) regarding the definition of crisis is that those
approaches have not been adequately concerned with the phenomenon of
‘crisis management’. It has to be acknowledged that crisis management is
only partially referenced in the definitions of crises based on the ‘decisionmaking’
perspective.
If the definitions of crises are observed in international politics, five
basic shared-components of crises can be discerned:
24 For example, Phil Williams, 1976; Richard C. Snyder and Paul Diesing, 1977; Ned
Lebow, 1981; Alexander L. George, 1991; James L. Richardson, 1994.To this tripartite
division should be added an emerging fourth and to some extent cross-cutting tradition –
the political symbolic approach – which focuses attention on the manipulation of
symbols, rituals, and power in crisis communication (for example, Murray Edelman,
1988; Paul ’t Hart, 1993; Tom Bryder, 1998; Jutta Weldes, 1999). See Eric K. Stern,
“Crisis Studies and Foreign Policy Analysis: Insights, Synergies, and Challenges”,
International Studies Review, Vol. 5, Issue 2, (June 2003), p. 186.
10 PERCEPTIONS • Winter 2008
Definition and Management of International Crises 1) Significant increases in national military activities are observed in
critical periods when there are crisis situations in international politics,
especially when certain ‘crisis management operations’ are maintained.
2) Unexpected occurrences at the international or national level are
the cause of most crises.
3) The decision maker is supposed to act quickly, and she/he must be
able to make a decision urgently in such unexpected events/situations.
4) Crises may harm the real or perceived interests of governments.
5) Crises, as major threats to the interests of governments, are quite
difficult to estimate or predict since they are defined as unexpected
occurrences.
II. Crisis Waves in International Political System
There were four waves or series of important international crisis in the
last century of world political history (from the late 19th century through the
20th century) involving several significant military and diplomatic
confrontations between the world actors affected during these international
crisis periods.
In ‘the first one of those crises periods’, there were certain political
and military agreements established between the big powers of Europe; thus a
sort of period of relatively unbalanced stability started after 1904, which was
the last year of a period (1870-1904) of stability and diplomatic balance
based on the superiority of Germany in Europe. Because of that, the first
period of crisis was experienced in the years between 1904 and 1914. In this
phase, there was a system of contrasting alliances established between the
Teutonic (Germanic) and Slavo-Latino blocks. Those alliances tried to
intensify their shared interest structures by establishing several secret pacts
against each other. In addition to the armament competition between the
alliances, the colonial struggle intensified. For instance, Germany-France
disagreements in 1904, 1905, 1908 and 1911 because of the Morocco
problem, and Austria-Russia crises about the Balkans in 1908, 1912 and 1913
come to mind. During the first crisis, small-scale disagreements occurred
between the two opposite blocks as well. As a result of that progress, the
PERCEPTIONS • Winter 2008 11
Ömer Göksel İşyar
unsettled balance broke down suddenly in 1914. There has been a lot of
scientific research done relating to the crises period since the end of World
War I that found there were two significant conclusions about these crises.
Firstly, the pre-observed severe relations of the War, which also signifies
excessive alliances, between the Tripartite Alliance and the Tripartite Entente
had significant effects on the series of those crisis events, and that situation
kept the international system in a condition in the middle between war and
peace for a while. Secondly, important politicians of some governments made
serious technical mistakes while trying to solve the crisis that occurred in the
summer of 1914 and they could not present a good pattern of crisis
management.25
‘The second wave of international crises’ occurred between the years
of 1935 and 1939. The analytical interpretations of the first crisis period had
not yet been determined before the start of the events of the second crisis.
Even though there was an increase in the tendency to reach agreements
before World War II, the historical background was quite different at that
time. There was no crystal shaped-strict alliance structure seen in the 1930s,
contrary to the situation before World War I. Even though there was no
compromise reached among the alliances, the degree of flexibility in the
systems of alliance was clearly high. Excessive alliances (chain-ganging) had
not yet appeared. In accordance with the appeasement strategy, France and
Britain had been sensibly open to negotiations and agreements. Each
aggressive or wide-ranging action of The Third Reich had been perceived as
acceptable by the other side in order to keep the peace; in other words, they
were trying to resist the outbreak of war. As was seen, the appeasement
strategy had been considered at the time as the most appropriate crisis
management technique to be able to preserve the peace. But this strategy had
not been able to avoid war either. The Hitler experience has been considered
by those affected as a reason to learn much more about international crises
and their management. Maybe it was the most important ‘gained experience’
that there should not be any concession to the aggressive policies of powerful
states, and that kind of attitude must be immediately opposed. Although the
Allies had tried to put the new strategy into practice in 1938 just before
World War II, the result did not change, and as a matter of the fact, the war
25 Arthur N. Gilbert and Paul Gordon Lauren, “Crisis Management: An Assessment and
Critique”, The Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 24, No. 4, (1980), pp. 649-650.
12 PERCEPTIONS • Winter 2008
Definition and Management of International Crises started in 1939.26 Both of these series of two crises resulted in a war. The
study of international relations, which had become more intensive and
systematic after World War II, has made direct connections between major
international crises and the wars that follow them.27
‘The third crisis period’ in the international system, that has been
called the ‘Cold War’, occurred between the years of 1948 and 1964. During

that period, there was never any general war among the nations