Shocks, expectancy revision, and the de-escalation of protracted conflicts: The Israeli-Palestinian case

This article introduces an evolutionary framework for the de-escalation of protracted conflicts. Key variables are political shocks, expectancy revisi on, policy entrepreneurship, third-party pressure, and reciprocity. The mod el is tested in the concert of the Israeli-Palestinian case, 1979-98. A qua ntitative assessment is made with the use of Middle East KEDS data as well as a qualitative assessment of the intervening impact of shocks on the expe ctations and strategies of key decisionmakers. The results show that while shocks by themselves did not always change the expectations and strategies of the Palestinian and Israeli leaderships, their combined influence with e ntrepreneurship, third-party pressure, and reciprocity did indeed improve t he frequency of Israeli and Palestinian agreements in the long term. In fac t, the joint effect of shocks and entrepreneurship appears to play a crucia l first step in the overall de-escalation process. In addition, shocks had important intervening effects for both sides by reducing major institutiona l constraints that paved the way for an initial political settlement reache d in the 1993 Oslo Accords. Finally, the results suggest that without polit ical shocks, inertia overrides the inclination of decisionmakers to pursue new, risky policies that could undermine their political positions.