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English Abstracts 161 Is the Decision to Initiate an International Conflict a Rational Choice? : The Effect of Information on the Decision-making in an International Conflict Kim, Kwang-Jin Key Words International conflict, Information, Uncertainty, Decision-making This paper explores how expected outcomes and uncertainty affect the decisions to initiate a militarized dispute. Consistent with the arguments of rational choice perspective, certain components of pre-dispute information, i.e. the expected probability of victory and uncertainty, determine the decision-makers’ incentives to initiate a militarized dispute. Herein, the probability of victory representatives public information, whereas uncertainty reflects private information. In militarized disputes, the pattern of change in the net balance of costs and benefits induces the systemic change of combinations of three dispute outcome probabilities, so that those probabilities can covary. Accordingly, decision-makers can predict expected outcomes and future costs given expected probability of victory, so three dispute outcome probabilities can guide the decision-making process prior to militarized disputes. In this sense, because probabilities of draw and defeat decrease after the chance of victory increases up to some limit, the relationship between the expected probability of victory and the likelihood of dispute initiation is curvilinear. Likewise, uncertainty allows potential disputants to have incentives to initiate a militarized dispute because incomplete information leads disputants to exploit opportunity and to predict a failed negotiation. The initiation model reveals that estimated probability of dispute initiation is the function of both uncertainty level and the probability of victory. Thus, the chance of victory derived from combinations of three outcome probabilities is linked to the decision-making process prior to disputes. This means that a decision to initiate disputes is a rational choice.