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Introduction
- Johns Hopkins University Press
- Chapter
- Additional Information
One of the most significant developments in world politics in the later half of the twentieth century has been the spread of democracy around the globe. In 1942 fewer than 20 percent of the states of the world were democratic; by 1990 almost half were, according to data assembled by political scientist Samuel Huntington .1 Indeed, the march of democracy seemed so inexorable that former State Department official Francis Fukuyama famously declared that we had reached “the End of History.” By that he meant simply that while democracy may not have been the only form of political order left in the world, it had become the only legitimate one.2 Fukuyama’s thesis generated much controversy and debate,3 but his larger point that democracy was increasingly coming to dominate world politics—and would fundamentally change it—was widely accepted by both scholars and policymakers. Scholarly and policy attention moved away from a focus on the spread of democracy to the consequences of these developments. The first manifestation of this shift was the debate over what has become known as the “democratic peace.” The notion that democracies are less likely to go to war with each other derives from classical liberal arguments such as that proposed in Immanuel Kant’s system for “Perpetual Peace,” which guarantees global amity once “the civil constitution of every nation [is] republican.”4 In a series of influential articles, political scientist Michael Doyle adopted Kant’s argument but focused on liberalism and democracy rather than republicanism, and based on a survey of the wars of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, he concluded that liberal and democratic regimes were very unlikely to go to war with each other.5 Introduction Since that seminal piece, much research has attempted to clarify the mechanisms explaining this “democratic peace”—specifically, is it due to the structure of democratic governments or the externalization of democratic norms among states?—but many scholars agree with international relations scholar Jack Levy’s claim that it is “the closest thing we have to a law in international politics.”6 This theory of the democratic peace not only has been influential in the academy but has also come to undergird America foreign policy in recent years.7 Both the Clinton and Bush administrations embraced it as their rationale for believing that the spread of democracy will bolster U.S. security. Clinton’s 1996 “National Security Strategy” stated explicitly that “the more that democracy and political and economic liberalization take hold in the world . . . the safer our nation is likely to be and the more our people are likely to prosper.”8 In his 2004 State of the Union address, President George W. Bush confirmed that “our aim is a democratic peace.”9 His national security advisor, Condoleezza Rice, subsequently explained that “President Bush’s foreign policy is a bold new vision that draws inspiration from the ideas that have guided American foreign policy at its best: That democracies must never lack the will or the means to meet and defeat freedom’s enemies, that America’s power and purpose must be used to defend freedom, and that the spread of democracy leads to lasting peace.”10 The logic of the democratic peace is widely embraced by political leaders from both parties and will no doubt continue to influence American foreign policy for years to come. Like previous American presidents, Bush not only thought that the spread of democracy would be good for America, but he was optimistic that it could take root nearly anywhere. “Do not bet against freedom,” he advised us.11 And he backed up his claims against long odds. On Iraq, the president argued, “There was a time when many said that the cultures of Japan and Germany were incapable of sustaining democratic values. Well, they were wrong. Some say the same of Iraq today. They were mistaken. The nation of Iraq—with its proud heritage, abundant resources and skilled and educated people—is fully capable of moving toward democracy and living in freedom.”12 In a discussion of Afghanistan in 2003, Vice President Dick Cheney boasted that the nation’s capital has “a lot of people in it who are armchair quarterbacks, or who like to comment on the passing scene. But those who have predicted the demise of our efforts since 9/11, as we fought the war on terror, as we’ve liberated 50 million people in Iraq and Afghanistan, did...