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Through the use of a theory of individual rational decision-making that is explicitly linked to the systemwide assumptions of Realpolitik theorists, I show that no particular distribution of power has exclusive claim as a predictor of peace or war either in theory or in the empirical record of the period 1816–1965. Assumptions related to variable attitudes toward risk-taking are used to build a simulation of decision-making under the constraint of expected utility maximization. Within the simulation I show that peace through power parity and peace through power preponderance can be supported in isolated instances, while no particular power distribution is linked to the expectation of peace in general. Similar results are reported in a replication by Singer et al. (1972) of the empirical analysis of the association between power distributions and major power war.
Bruce Bueno de Mesquita (1981) studied this question.