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1 Owen,
However,
as
Kenneth
Waltz
ironically
specifies,
only
democracies of the right kind (i. e., liberal ones) are peaceful in
relation to one another3. As it will be put forward afterwards, it is
precisely that assumption that there is only one universally accepted
concept of democracy that denies the whole liberal theory due to the
lack of agreement on its basic concepts.
republican political systems (i. e. democratic) are less likely to wage war against each
other. For this reason, the more democratic states, the more the probabilities of
achieving perpetual peace5. Furthermore, liberals often turn to the Correlates of War
project of the University of Michigan, which affirms that, since 1815, no major conflict
has taken place between liberal democracies6. However, both Kant and the University of
Michigan scholars take for granted that there is only one universal and objective
definition of democracy and war that has remained unaltered throughout history.
Nevertheless, by carrying out a closer analysis, we realise that the 19 th centurys idea of
democracy has nothing to do with the current one. For instance, universal suffrage,
gender and race equality, freedom of speech, etc., are some of the basic rights that today
we inherently associate with democracy; nonetheless, these were completely
unconceivable for a democrat of the United Kingdom or France in the early 19 th
century. Furthermore, nowadays, a country which does not recognize womens right to
vote (for instance Bahrain, where women were denied the right to vote until 2002 7)
would never be recognised by the international community as a democracy. However,
liberalism does consider the British regime in 1850 a democracy, even though the
womens situation was the same as in the above-mentioned example of Bahrain8.
This instance leads to rethink the concept of democracy throughout history and analyse
how the definition of this system of government has acquired different perceptions
5 Kant, Immanuel. 2006. Toward perpetual peace and other writings on politics, peace
and history. Yale University Press.
6 Hegre, Hvard. 2001. Toward a Democratic Civil Peace? Democracy, Political
Change, and Civil War, 18161992. American Political Science Association, pp 33-48.
7 Darwish, Adel. 2002. Bahrains women vote for first time. The Telegraph.
8 Mehta, Uday Sigh. 1999. Liberalism and Empire: A Study in Nineteenth-Century
Brotish Liberal Thought. Chicago, University of Chicago Press. Chapter 4, Liberalism,
Empire and Territory.
depending on the historic stage. Furthermore, even today, there are still numerous
contradictory explanations on how democracy should work. In lieu of providing an
exhaustive account of different self-denominated democratic regimes, which is not
the goal of this essay, just some explanatory examples will be offered: probably,
liberalism would never consider countries like North Korea or the former East Germany
as democracies given their obvious lack of freedom and rights. Nevertheless, we
ought to bear in mind that these countries official names are, to the surprise of liberal
scholars, Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea9 and German Democratic Republic10
respectively. As a result, we face a dilemma: are these states democracies or not? Which
concept of democracy, ours or theirs, is the right one? If we were to accept these
countries as democracies, then the Democratic Peace Theory would fail, since North
Korea, for instance, can be described as a belligerent state with aggressive policies
towards South Korea, which is considered a democracy by liberalism. However, if we
do not recognise the DPRK as democracy, then we are assuming that there are more
definitions of democracy apart from ours and that we are selecting the examples that are
convenient for us in order to prove the equation democracy=peace.
In the Middle East, in Africa and the Balkans, the exercise of international
justice signifies a return to the Westphalian system of open great-power
domination over states which are too weak to prevent external claims
against them.14
to
achieve
Kants
perpetual
peace.
Until
now,
liberal
Bibliography
Darwish, Adel. 2002. Bahrains women vote for first time. The Telegraph.
North
Korea.
2014.
In
Encyclopaedia
Britannica
Online.
Retrieved
from
http//.britannica.com (24/11/15).
Hegre, Hvard. 2001. Toward a Democratic Civil Peace? Democracy, Political Change,
and Civil War, 18161992. American Political Science Association, pp 33-48.
Kant, Immanuel. 2006. Toward perpetual peace and other writings on politics, peace
and history. Yale University Press.
MacMillan, John. 1996. Democracies Dont Fight: A Case of the Wrong Research
Agenda? Review of International Studies 22(3), pp. 275-299.
Pugh, Jeff. 2005. Democratic Peace Theory: a review and evaluation. CEMPROC: 2.
Waltz, Kenneth. 2000. Structural Realism after the Cold War. International Security
25(1): 7.