{
  "handle": "SecurityDilemma",
  "gloss": "Each side's defensive build-up reads as a threat to the other, so both arm and both end less secure",
  "extends": "sema:Recifluence#mh:SHA-256:4fba0e2a7234f81a910b220abaedd7890ba08700646aeaa090a11f0c313dcf11",
  "mechanism": "Two or more parties with no common authority above them each raise their capacity to defend themselves. Much of that capacity could also attack, so each reads the others' increases as possible threats and raises its own in reply; the reply in turn raises the first party's next increase, and each round lowers the security of all though none intends aggression. The spiral eases when the parties can tell defensive from offensive capacity, credibly limit or verify each other's capacity, or accept a common authority, and it can end in a war that each side expected the other to start. One party pursuing aggression while the other only defends, and build-ups that cannot threaten the other side, are not instances.",
  "invariants": [
    "The parties have no common authority able to guarantee their security.",
    "Each party raises its capacity to secure itself, not to attack the others.",
    "Each party's increase in defensive capacity can also threaten the others.",
    "Each party answers the others' increases by raising its own, and that answer raises the others' next increases."
  ],
  "failure_modes": [
    "Intent read from capacity: the other side's build-up is taken as proof of aggressive intent.",
    "Every war a spiral: wars that one side sought on purpose are explained as spirals no one wanted.",
    "Restraint read as weakness: one side's attempt to limit or signal its capacity is dismissed as a trick or exploited."
  ],
  "sema_id": "sema:SecurityDilemma#mh:SHA-256:a61b1b133e69e9ccd9ce5ccecfc552ceea464e553d2eece3060ec2a02544e93d",
  "sema_ref": "SecurityDilemma#a61b",
  "sema_stub": "a61b",
  "sema_layer": "Society",
  "sema_category": "Dynamics",
  "_meta": {
    "path": [
      "Society",
      "Dynamics"
    ],
    "ring": 2,
    "tier": 2,
    "related": [
      "Warsift",
      "FreeRiderProblem"
    ]
  },
  "used_by": {}
}