Misaligned interests and the credibility of alleged support

When can a third party manipulate the bargaining dynamics between its protégé and its adversary through diplomacy? I develop a formal model in which (1) the third party and its protégé have misaligned interests, and (2) the disputants bargain simultaneously over two issue dimensions—one capturing common interests, the other capturing misaligned interests between the allies. The results show that when the protégé and its patron have heterogeneous preferences for the disputed issues, the protégé will not necessarily use the patron’s support in the way the patron wants. Foreign support increases the protégé’s bargaining leverage, and how the protégé will use this increased leverage at the negotiating table directly affects the way the patron communicates. The existence of misaligned interests increases the credibility of the patron’s alleged support if the signal can potentially improve the protégé’s gains over both shared and misaligned interests with its patron.