Democracy and Military Effectiveness

Biddle, Stephen; Long, Stephen B.

doi:10.1177/0022002704266118

Cited by 80 publications

(65 citation statements)

References 54 publications

(27 reference statements)

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“…To test this hypothesis, we created a dummy variable and assigned it a value of 1 if the combatant fought a victorious war in the past 25 years in which it relied predominantly on attrition and a 0 otherwise. Finally, since studies indicate that states with better educated populations may be able to field more capable military forces (Biddle and Long 2004), we also control for each state's average years of primary and secondary education.…”

Section: Military Strategymentioning

confidence: 99%

Bear Any Burden? How Democracies Minimize the Costs of War

Valentino¹,

Huth²,

Croco³

2010

The Journal of Politics

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In this paper, we argue that the greater accountability of democratic leaders to their citizens creates powerful pressures on leaders to reduce the human costs of war. In an analysis of a new dataset of fatalities in interstate wars (1900 to 2005) we find that highly democratic states suffer significantly fewer military and civilian fatalities. We argue that democracies limit their war losses primarily by adopting four specific foreign and military policies. First, democracies generate higher military capabilities than nondemocracies in times of war. Second, democracies are more likely to augment their national capabilities by joining more powerful coalitions of states during war. Third, democracies are more likely than other states to utilize battlefield military strategies that minimize their fatalities. Finally, democracies are more likely to fight wars on battlefields that are not contiguous to their home territories, thereby shielding their civilian populations from the fighting.A rough consensus has emerged in the literature on the ''democratic peace'' that, contrary to the expectations of early theorists like Immanuel Kant, democracies are not generally more pacific than nondemocracies. As modern scholars have recognized, the fact that elected leaders are more accountable to the citizens who must bear the costs of wars does not imply that these leaders will avoid wars in general-only that they will oppose highly unpopular wars that threaten their tenure in office.Recognizing this, recent studies of democratic war involvement have focused on war outcomes (defined in terms of victory and defeat) as a central concern of democratic leaders in times of war. We argue, however, that democracies should be highly attentive to the costs of war as well as its outcome; they do not seek victory at any price. Moreover, because victory is sometimes won only through a heavy price in blood and treasure, a war's outcome is not a reliable proxy for its costs. Thus, more than two centuries after it was articulated, one of the key implications of Kant's theory-that democracies should strive to minimize the costs borne by their citizens-has not been adequately tested.With this in mind, in this article we develop a refined theory of democratic war behavior and utilize a newly constructed dataset on war fatalities to conduct the most rigorous test of this theory to date. We find that highly democratic states suffer fewer military and civilian casualties in their wars than do other states. More importantly, however, we also shed new light on precisely how democracies reduce the costs of the wars they fight, a critical theoretical question largely ignored by the existing literature on the democratic peace. We argue that democracies limit their losses by adopting four key foreign and military policies that help them minimize both military and civilian fatalities-mobilizing superior military forces in times of war, utilizing casualty-reducing military strategies on the battlefield, fighting battles on distant territories and fightin...

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Section: Military Strategymentioning

confidence: 99%

Bear Any Burden? How Democracies Minimize the Costs of War

Valentino¹,

Huth²,

Croco³

2010

The Journal of Politics

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“…The role of the military in this global system has not been neglected. The military has been identified as an agent of socialization and change (Biddle and Long, 2004;Gheciu, 2005;Janowitz, 1964;Mann, 1986;McNeill, 1982;Tilly, 1992). Likewise, the political stand of the military has proved to be a crucial factor in civil-military relations (Huntington, 1957;Janowitz, 1964;Kamrava, 2000;Ritter, 2012).…”

Section: Arms Sales and Buyers' Dependencymentioning

confidence: 99%

Military westernization and state repression in the post-Cold War era

Swed

Weinreb

2015

Social Science Research

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“…This puzzle highlights a theoretical blind spot in existing civil-military relations research: while scholars have demonstrated that coup-proofing is an effective way to maintain military loyalty, they have said much less about how these strategies might actually make authoritarian regimes vulnerable when they face popular threats to their rule. The literature on this topic, moreover, has focused on how coup-proofing affects military effectiveness in interstate war, 20 giving little attention to how such strategies might impact a regime's ability to use its security apparatus to quell domestic challenges. The Arab Spring can help fill this gap by providing scholars with an opportunity to explore how different coup-proofing strategies affect military behavior when called upon to repress popular dissent.…”

Section: Coup-proofing and The Arab Spring Puzzlementioning

confidence: 99%

Coup-Proofing, Military Defection, and the Arab Spring

Makara

2013

Democracy and Security

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Democracy and Military Effectiveness

Cited by 80 publications

References 54 publications

Bear Any Burden? How Democracies Minimize the Costs of War

Bear Any Burden? How Democracies Minimize the Costs of War

Military westernization and state repression in the post-Cold War era

Coup-Proofing, Military Defection, and the Arab Spring

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