Book Reviews

Abstract

In Elections and War, Kurt Taylor Gaubatz asks how the electoral process affects a democratic state's decision to go to war. The question is an interesting one, as it brings the fundamental trait of democracy-elections-squarely into the debate about the democratic peace. Moreover, to his credit, Gaubatz uses a combination of case study and statistical analysis to support his arguments. That the book raises more questions than it answers indicates the complex nature of the question at hand and illuminates a rich field for future research.As this is a study of the interaction of domestic and international politics, Gaubatz employs a two-level model. For each level, he specifies the important actors, the structure, and the outcomes. Although the model includes arrows linking these six components and two levels, several of the proposed relationships get lost as the argument advances. This gives the book a bit of a choppy feel that detracts from the overall effectiveness of the work.The main argument is that electoral politics tend to reduce incentives for state leaders to enter wars in the period just before an election. This is not because voters avoid imposing the costs of war on themselves. Indeed, democratic societies may become virulently war prone. Using case studies, Gaubatz shows that public mood in fact shifts between belligerence (the United States prior to the Spanish-American War) and isolationism (the United States between the two world wars). During an election period, government leaders become increasingly influenced by public mood. If conflict looms on the horizon, additional pressure emerges from "legitimate" antiwar elites, who use the political space opened by elections to air their views. Antiwar elites thus raise the costs to government leaders contemplating war entry by disrupting the social unity necessary for such an undertaking. The preelectoral period becomes a risky time for leaders to enter a war.Gaubatz presents three cases to show that elite-level opposition emerges even when the public's mood is belligerent. He examines British attitudes leading up to the Crimean and Boer Wars and U.S. attitudes leading up to the Spanish-American War. The cases provide strong evidence about the aggressive tendencies of democratic citizens. As presented, however, they do a less effective job at illuminating the interaction between mass and elite views. For example, the antiwar opponents always lose-the war is entered, in line with public demands. Indeed, Gaubatz notes, "politicians who attempted to resist the tides of public passion did so at considerable risk to their politi-216