# We're Cooked! - Probing LLM Political Alignment Via Conflict-Framed Recipe Translation

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.07568 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.07568/

## Key facts

- No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 7 of its 14 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 7 Sep 2026.

## Builds on (most cited first, 7 of 7)

- [A Survey on LLM-as-a-Judge](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2411.15594/) (2024)
- [Towards Measuring the Representation of Subjective Global Opinions in Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.16388/) (2023)
- [Assessing Cross-Cultural Alignment between ChatGPT and Human Societies: An Empirical Study](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.17466/) (2023)
- [This Land is {Your, My} Land: Evaluating Geopolitical Biases in Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.14610/) (2023)
- [Only a Little to the Left: A Theory-grounded Measure of Political Bias in Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.16148/) (2025)
- [A Dual-Layered Evaluation of Geopolitical and Cultural Bias in LLMs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.21881/) (2025)
- [It's the humans, not the data: Geopolitical bias in LLMs originates in post-training, amplified by the language of the prompt](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.23825/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Large language models (LLMs) are increasingly deployed for translation tasks, yet their implicit political positioning in such contexts remains understudied. We ask whether a single politically charged framing term, such as aggressor, enemy, neighbour, or coloniser is sufficient to trigger implicit political alignment in an otherwise apolitical task. We present a fully crossed factorial study in which eight models spanning Western, Chinese, and European origins are prompted to translate culturally attributed recipes into a target language left deliberately unspecified. Across 17 languages, four framing conditions, eight models, and 15,680 responses, we find that models do not simply decline or ask for clarification but resolve the ambiguity. Language resolution and reasoning behavior cluster meaningfully along model families: Western models hedge and deflect with vague justifications, Chinese models resolve conflicts silently, and Mistral Large emerges as a distinct profile combining high compliance with conflict-grounded reasoning. Sensitivity to framing terms is consistent across models: even subtle framing variation is sufficient to modulate behavior. Our findings urge caution when deploying LLMs for translation in conflict-adjacent contexts, where implicit political judgments may be made without any signal to the user.