Soyoung Lee

@soyounglee.bsky.social

Assistant Professor @Yale || Studying International Relations with a focus on territorial conflicts, rivalries, and nationalism https://www.soyoungleeresearch.com

And this article by @soyounglee.bsky.social in @iojournal.bsky.social "The presence of capitalintensive resources-such as oil or minerals-raises concerns about how the benefits of acquiring the territory would be distributed within the nation." www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Resources and Territorial Claims: Domestic Opposition to Resource-Rich Territory | International Organization | Cambridge Core

Resources and Territorial Claims: Domestic Opposition to Resource-Rich Territory - Volume 78 Issue 3

cambridge.org

Ken Schultz@kschultz.bsky.social · 8mo ago

Apropos current events, I want to tout this paper by @soyounglee.bsky.social showing that discussion of economic benefits can reduce public support for military action. People are skeptical when they think specific groups (e.g., oil companies) will benefit. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Domestic Distributional Roots of National Interest
SOYOUNG LEE Yale University, United States, and Duke University, United States

What international issues become national interests worth fighting for, and why? Contrary to conventional wisdom, I argue that issues without clear economic value, such as barren lands, are more likely to be perceived as national interests because they do not benefit any single domestic group. Since who benefits is unclear, politicians have an easier time framing such issues as benefiting the whole nation. I test this argument using survey experiments on the American public. The results show that first, issues providing diffuse benefits to citizens are more likely to be considered national interests than issues providing concentrated benefits to certain domestic groups. Second, issues with clearer economic value are harder to frame as having diffuse benefits because they are more easily associated with specific beneficiaries. This study proposes a new theory of national interest and offers a potential explanation for why people frequently support conflict over issues without obvious benefits.

🥳 My paper is out @iojournal.bsky.social! Two main empirical takeaways: 1. States often don't fight over lands with resources, even when they can claim it for historical reasons. 2. Historical boundaries matter in how states shape their territorial claims. For more, abstract and paper below!

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International Organization@iojournal.bsky.social · 2y ago

New on #FirstView: are states more likely to claim territories with oil and minerals? Using 200 years of geocoded historical data, @soyounglee37 finds that states are *less* likely to claim such lands. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

🚨New paper alert🚨 #polisky #intsec My paper, "Domestic Distributional Roots of National Interest", has been cond. accepted at APSR! I ask: Why are some international issues perceived as national interests worth fighting for while others are not? While we may think the answer is obvious..1/4

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