Beliefs play a central role in IR theory, from diverse approaches such as realism to constructivism and the recent practice turn. Yet, the sources of beliefs continue to be poorly understood. Recent work in psychology has attempted to better understand where beliefs come from, how they are generated, and how they change over time. Mercer (2010) and McDermott (2004) have brought these debates into IR by examining the role of emotions in forming and changing beliefs. Mercer has illustrated the importance of “emotional beliefs” while McDermott has uncovered the emotional components of rational beliefs in decision-making. In this paper I engage this debate by introducing a new role of emotion in belief formation: aliefs. Tamar Gendler coined the term “alief” to describe the automatic belief-like intuition that often contradicts other explicit beliefs. For example, a person standing on a transparent bridge across a raging river may rationally believe that they are completely safe, but alieve that they are in danger. Aliefs thus are the emotional beliefs that provide us with intuitions about a given situation and, importantly, may contradict other beliefs that we possess. In this paper I develop this idea and create a framework for understanding the intersection of emotions and beliefs/aliefs in international politics. I apply the framework to current debates regarding Iran’s status claims and nuclear intentions and suggest that while policymakers may believe one thing, namely Iran’s rationality, they may very well alieve something completely different which may explain the relative paralysis in strategy.
