a contest of beneficence 91
participating in humanitarian interventions, offering emergency relief, pro-
viding mediation services, or donating foreign aid, is somewhat perplexing,
especially when analyzed within a rationalist framework.
Consequently, the literature offers little in the way of rationalist analy-
sis of prosociality. Instead, the discussion of prosocial behavior is often
marginalized, and when it does occur it is analyzed as a pronorm behavior
and an indication of socialization and norm internalization (Ikenberry and
Kupchan 1990 ; Johnston 2001 ). Analyzing prosociality within the frame-
work of conspicuous consumption does not necessarily contradict the
socialization literature. Prestige, after all, is a thoroughly social concept.
Yet the conspicuous consumption approach still rests on a rationalist
foundation. Accordingly, the analysis in this chapter focuses, at least ini-
tially, on the identification of the possible payoffs of prosocial behavior.
If prosociality can generate prestige, the tension between self- help and
other- help is resolved. Thus, in this chapter I highlight those aspects of
prosociality that demonstrate the hallmarks of prestige- seeking behavior.
Empirically, prosocial policies are rarely analyzed together under one
theoretical framework. Instead there are separate bodies of work on issues
like aid or mediation but little overarching discussion treating such poli-
cies as related examples of a broader phenomenon. Moreover, while one
can easily find substantial literature regarding the efficacy of UN peace-
keeping operations, relatively little has been written about the motiva-
tions of contributing members. The literature regarding the determinants
of foreign aid is more developed but is still lagging behind the literature
analyzing the effectiveness of foreign aid, both in quantity and in theo-
retical sophistication. The same is true of the mediation literature.^2 The
growing literature on humanitarianism, on the other hand, mainly focuses
on the motivations and practices of nonstate actors but generally ignores
prosocial actions by states (Barnett 2005 , 2009 ; Stein 2001 ). The puzzle of
international prosociality is further compounded by the following obser-
vation: at times, international prosocial efforts do little to improve the
welfare of the recipients. Decades of foreign aid have so far culminated
in a relatively dismal record of success. Some critics go as far as arguing
that foreign aid and even humanitarian assistance have had a net negative
effect on developing countries.^3 The record of UN peacekeeping has been
similarly questioned and is most often found to have no discernable influ-
ence on conflict outcome, duration, or recurrence (Diehl, Reischneider,
and Hensel 1996 ; Lipson 2007 ).^4 Similarly, the number of failed mediation
efforts outweighs any anecdotal evidence of success. Bercovitch and Diehl
