By Araya Kebede Araya*
How far does DPT travel in explaining IRs: why democracies do not go to war against each other?
Essay Argument: No International Relations (IR) theory has so far been able to provide sufficient causal mechanism to buttress Democratic Peace Theory’s (DPT) proposition: no two democracies go to war against each other.
Basic assertion
There is wide-spread talk of “democratic peace.” Presidents mention it all the time. For example, Bill Clinton, former President to the USA declared in 1994 that democracies do not attack each other. He meant that ultimately the best strategy to insure security and to build a durable peace is to support the advance of democracy elsewhere. (Owen, p.1) The data from Russett‘s book (p. 21), shows that over the 40 year period (and indeed in the years since 1986), there have been exactly ZERO wars between democracies! (Emphasis supplied) When democracies come into conflict with one another, they only rarely threaten to use force, because it is ‘illegitimate’ to do so. (Doyle, p.213, Russett, p.33)
By extension, it means democracy is viewed as an antidote that will prevent future wars or that if all countries are democratic, arguably, we can say war will cease to exist on the earth. Is it practical? Why is it really that democracies do not go to war? We need to think carefully and critically about WHY democracies do not fight each other. What are the competing theories? What is this thing democracy? What do we mean by war?
There are two general strands to the DPT’s logic: one, norms and culture; two, institutional constraint. The justification provided from liberal/constructivist, normative theories, side relies on democratic ideas, norms and culture. Russett (p.31) explains that culture, perceptions, and practices that permit compromise and the peaceful resolution of conflicts without the threat of violence within countries come to apply across national boundaries toward other democratic countries. Similarly, Owen (p.3) argues that liberal ideas cause liberal democracies to tend away from war with one another, and that the same ideas prod these states into war with illiberal states. Furthermore, he lists many theorists that wrote on this side on whom he relies for his many cases and propositions.
The above explanations go back to Immanuel Kant in the late 19th Century and Woodrow Wilson at the start of the 20th. It was part of the “liberal” and “idealist” optimism about possibilities for avoiding war. It is also part of the modern constructivist view of the world, because it emphasizes the influence of socially-constructed norms like peaceful resolution of conflict. Owen (p.5) taking Kant’s, Doyle’s, and Rummel’s idea explains this point that democracies believe it would be unjust or imprudent to fight one another. They practice the norm of compromise with each other that works so well within their own borders. Those in democracies come to feel that others in similar systems of government are constrained by the same norms. We do not seek to dominate democracies by force because we assume those in other democracies are similarly constrained and will not try to dominate us by force.
The problem is that this normative condition applies only between democracies. It does not apply between fellow communist regimes or between fellow authoritarian regimes. It’s not a similar matter of “sharing a common identity” because we see fellow communists and fellow authoritarian regimes and fellow monarchies do fight each other.
Owen (pp.5-6) criticizes the normative theories group for not taking perceptions into account. Often states which today's researchers consider democratic did not consider each other democratic. Thus the anticipated normative check on war was frequently absent. Therefore, it is necessary for two democracies to be perceived each other as democracies.
The second strand attributes the absence of war between democracies to, structural theories or institutional constraint i.e., the restraining effects of public opinion or of the checks and balances embedded in a democratic state’s domestic political structure. Michael Doyle (pp.8-9), building on Immanuel Kant, explains that democratic governments are reluctant to go to war because they must answer to their citizens. The second point: states with executives, answerable to a selection (elected) body, with institutionalized political competition, and with decision making responsibility spread among multiple institutions, or individuals, should be more highly constrained and hence less likely to go to war.
The Realist explanation, on this score, rests on the role of information. Some Realists have come up with an explanation that fits with their assumptions about unitary actors, anarchy, and rationality. Two democratic states, each with perfect information about the other’s constraints, will always settle their conflicts short of war. (Bueno de Mesqita and Lalman, in Russett) What they emphasize is the role of democratic institutions in providing information about what states want and the risks they are willing to bear. It is because relations between democracies are so open, which debate on whether to go to war handled out in public that allows democracies to settle their conflicts short of war, through negotiations. In the words of Owen (p.5), chief executives in democracies must gain approval for war from cabinet members or legislatures, and ultimately from the electorate.
There are several IR scholars that have forwarded their views against part or all of the above DPT explanations.
Mearsheimer (pp.3-), Melvin and Singer (pp.50-69), Rummel (pp.27-71), maintain that democracies are generally less prone to war. But, the reality that we do not really know the causal mechanism behind the democratic peace means we cannot be certain the peace is genuine. It may be an epiphenomenon, a by-product of other causal variables such as those suggested by Realist theories of international politics.
Another challenge comes from David Spiro (pp.50-86). Lack of wars among democracies, even if true, is not surprising. Wars are so rare that random chance could account for the democratic peace, much as it could account for an absence of war among, say, states whose names begin with the letter K.
Scholars like Christopher Layne, make some outright objection to the statement that democracies do not go to war against each other: democracies have been at war with each other several times. More notable authors supporting this side mentioned by Owen (p.5) are Kenneth N. Waltz, Jack Vincent, Henry and Gowa. However, Christopher Layne (pp.12, 14) seems to argue harshly against the DPT. He along with others thinks institutional constraints do not explain the democratic peace. He challenges that if democratic public opinion really had the effect ascribed to it, democracies would be peaceful in their relations with all states, whether democratic or not. If citizens and policymakers of a democracy were especially sensitive to the human and material costs of war, that sensitivity should be evident whenever their state is on the verge of war, regardless of whether the adversary is democratic: the lives lost and the money spent will be the same. Nor is democratic public opinion, per se, an inhibitor of war. He continues his critique to the extent that even the check and balance mechanism, which is not necessarily exclusively owned by democracies, cannot explain democratic peace.
Moreover, he criticizes the norm and culture aspect of the theory. First, in a crisis, the more important the interests a democracy perceives to be at stake, the more likely that its policy will be shaped by realist imperatives rather than by democratic norms and culture. When vital interests are on the line, democracies should not be inhibited from using threats, ultimate, and big-stick diplomacy against, another democracy. Second, even in a crisis involving democracies states should be very attentive to strategic concerns, and the relative distribution of military capabilities, between them should crucially – perhaps decisively – affect their diplomacy. Third, broader geographical considerations pertaining to a state’s position in international politics should, if implicated, account significantly for the crisis’ outcome.
Therefore, not only that the DPT lacks causal link but also the seemingly impressive but in fact, inconclusive, statistical evidence of the universal cases providing empirical support for the theory is small, and several cases of wars between democratic states are not counted for unpersuasive reasons.
Some have tried to balance the unbalanced attacks on the DPT. For example, Owen attempts to defend that the inadequacy of either democratic structures or norms alone to explain democratic peace does not prove that the democratic peace is spurious. It shows how illiberal leaders of democracies can make threats against one another and yet still be domestically constrained from attacking one another. It explains several supposed exceptions to the democratic peace by taking account of actors' perceptions; for example, the War of 1812 was fought at a time when almost no Americans considered England a democracy. (p.5)
Another problem arises from inside the theory itself. In that the controlling terms it employs – democracy and war - are inherently ambiguous. Although Owen has elaborated what liberal democracy means in his article, it still, is only one part of the story as long as all or many do not have a consensus on the practical definition of the term.
Conclusion
First, notwithstanding that numerous studies, mentioned above and many more, have identified democracy as a cause of democratic peace, none have yielded much meaningful, clear-cut, and nontrivial predictive power achievements that lie at the heart of scientifically identifying causality. (Michael Mousseau, p.1) Second, Russett’s statistics cannot provide justification but mere correlation. Third, the normative condition of norms and culture applies only between democracies but not developed to the extent of “sharing a common identity”. Fourth, Owen’s addition of perception has not filled the gap. Fifth, Christopher Layne’s crushing criticism against the two strands of the theory has not been tackled with. Therefore, we can conclude that despite its contribution in the effort of helping in explaining past, contemporary and possibly future international relations, DPT still suffers from providing, inter alia but most importantly, a strong and lasting causal mechanism that can successfully bridge its premises and conclusion, and clear cut definitions to terms that it heavily employs: democracy and war.
Araya Kebede Araya, LL B., MA, LL. M (PROLAW)
Lecturer in Law, Mekelle University, College of Law and Governance
Ethiopia, Mekelle - Adi Haqi Campus
Cell phone: +39 3896872473 (Rome, Italy), +251 923 771883 (Ethiopia)
E-mail: araya57k@gmail.com, aaraya@luc.edu
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