Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Building on cognitive theory and relying on insights from prospect theory, this paper argues that the pace at which casualties occur during a foreign military intervention leads to differential risk assessment on the part of decision-makers. Looking at one particular type of loss—the loss of human lives for the country intervening—it attempts to deconstruct the different impacts of casualties occurring at different paces (incremental vs. sudden). Different strands of literature point to several elements that may explain why sudden casualties are particularly salient: they provoke surprise, and they inscribe the event into a larger timeline of events –including past traumatic events, in the form of analogies, and future marking events, in the form of ceremonies.