To do this you must go to the expense of building up your power base, even if you do not plan to use it. If you do not have it, not only will your current threat be ineffective, your future threats are unlikely to work as well. Even if the threat is not carried out, people do not likely to be threatened and are likely to try to subvert or challenge any changes that are made as a result of threats or the use of force. This problem can be minimized if the use of threat and force is based on commonly held moral values or principles, and is therefore more likely to be considered legitimate, even by the target. This is a summary of one of the books in which Boulding sets out his theory of threats and compares them to other forms of persuasion and power.
Coercive diplomacy is diplomacy by threat.
This article discusses the theory behind this approach, while the following articles give some examples of its implementation. This is a summary of George's book on Forceful Persuasion. U.S. Foreign Policy Some of the dilemmas presented here result from the misunderstanding of the relationship between threat and force. This is an example where threats did not work. They led to a serious escalation of the conflict, not a resolution, as was intended.