The democratic peace proposition: An agenda for critical analysis

Abstract

The proposition that democracies are more peaceful than autocracies has spawned a huge literature. Much of the relevant quantitative research has shown that democracies indeed rarely, if ever, fight each other, although they are not necessarily less bellicose than autocracies in general. This essay seeks to identify several areas of concern that offer fruitful directions for further research to extend and clarify this proposition. These concerns relate to (1) conceptual clarification, (2) methodological assumptions, (3) causal interpretations, and (4) policy relevance.