Evaluating Arguments Around Liberal Peace Theory
Democracy is the form of government most prevalent in the world today, and has been mostly unchallenged since the end of the Cold War, when Communism collapsed as an opponent. It is built upon certain shared ideals and cultural norms which, when looked at as a whole, mean that democracy is a more peaceable system of governance than any others, less likely to declare war upon other democracies. So says Liberal Peace Theory, but how accurate is that? This short paper will evaluate various arguments surrounding Liberal Peace Theory and critique them.
Liberal or Democratic Peace Theory argues that it is the shared cultural norms that exist across democracies – the peaceful transition of power from one government to another, free and fair elections, and certain means by which political competition may be resolved, among others – that make democracies less likely to engage in bellicose action against one another. After all, we do not exist in a world where
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Rosato argues that this may be true, and indeed it is, but it is not necessarily because of them being democracies that this is such. He examines the causal chain between democracy on one end and peace on the other, and posits that there exist intermediaries along this chain, causal mechanisms, that lead to the peace. Externalisation under normative logic produces trust and respect within the democracies, which leads to peace. Accountability under institutional logic leads to information, constraint both public and group, and countless other things, all of which lead to peace. As such, under Rosato’s argument, the logic that connects democracy and peace is inherently flawed, that democracies do not necessarily treat one another with trust and respect, or that democratic leaders are not always held