The Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance 1880-1914: a Collective Goods Approach

The distribution of burdens in alliances may be explained in terms of public and private outputs. A joint product model is applied to the Triple Alliance and Triple Entente, using generalized least squares-auto regressive moving average (GLS-ARMA) techniques and time series data. Results indicate that countries regarded allies' military effort more as complements than as substitutes, though several examples of free-riding behavior are noted. The method used here may provide more accurate estimation of publicness problems than is found in the usual static tests.