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	Deterrence Modeling	Crisis Bargaining Game
Field	International Relations	International Relations
Family	MCDM	MCDM
Year of origin	2000	1994
Originator	Classical deterrence theorists (Schelling); formal perfect deterrence by Frank Zagare & D. Marc Kilgour	Formalized by James Fearon and others (building on Schelling)
Type	Game-theoretic model of threat-based conflict prevention	Extensive-form game of sequential crisis escalation
Seminal source	Zagare, F. C., & Kilgour, D. M. (2000). Perfect Deterrence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.	Fearon, J. D. (1994). Domestic political audiences and the escalation of international disputes. American Political Science Review, 88(3), 577–592.
Aliases	Deterrence Theory Modeling, Rational Deterrence Models, Perfect Deterrence Game, Extended Deterrence Analysis	International Crisis Game, Escalation Game, Signaling Game of Crisis Bargaining, Deterrence Crisis Game
Related	3	3
Summary	Deterrence modeling uses game theory to analyze when a defender can dissuade a challenger from aggression by threatening unacceptable costs. Classical deterrence theory, rooted in Schelling's work and Cold War nuclear strategy, was reformulated by Frank Zagare and D. Marc Kilgour in Perfect Deterrence (2000) into a family of incomplete-information games. These models make precise the two requirements a deterrent threat must meet — capability (the means to inflict the cost) and credibility (a genuine willingness to carry it out) — and identify the equilibrium conditions under which deterrence succeeds, fails, or collapses into conflict.	A crisis bargaining game is a formal, usually extensive-form model in which two states sequentially choose to challenge, escalate, stand firm, or back down during an international dispute, and the analyst solves for the equilibrium pattern of escalation and concession. Building on Schelling's strategy of conflict and given an influential treatment in Fearon's (1994) model of escalation as a war of attrition, these games make explicit how incomplete information about each side's resolve, and the costs each pays for backing down, shape whether a crisis ends in mutual accommodation, capitulation, or war.