The Democratic Peace

1. The Democratic Peace INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS: THEORY AND PRACTICE(Course number MSFS 510-02) Russett and Oneal: Triangulating peace – From WikiSummary, the Free Social Science Summary Database. Schultz, Kenneth A. 1999. Do Democratic Institutions Constrain or Inform? Contrasting Two Institutional Perspectives on Democracy and War. International Organization 53 (2):233-266. Bueno de Mesquita, Bruce, James D. Morrow, Randolph M. Siverson, and Alastair Smith. 1999. An Institutional Explanation of the Democratic Peace. American Political Science Review 93(4):791-808. Instructor: James Raymond Vreeland

2. From last time, economic models of US elections do well…

3. Today's plan • Triangulating peace • The BDM2S2 story • Schultz and backwards induction • Selection problems • Quantitative analysis • WEEKS!

5. The Democratic Peace Democracy War Peace International Trade International Organizations

6. Vocab Question • What is the difference between “dyadic effects” & “systemic effects”? • Ask a randomly selected student time! • What would a “monadic” effect be? • Using technology • Google: monadic dyadic systemic • Google-scholar it?

7. BDM2S2 begin with 8 empirical regularities: • Democracies do not fight wars against each other (dyadic) • Democracies do fight wars with non-democracies (dyadic) • Democracies win a disproportionate share of the wars they fight (monadic) • When disputes do emerge, democratic dyads choose more peaceful processes of dispute settlement than do other pairings of states (dyadic) • Democracies are more likely to initiate wars against autocracies than are autocracies against democracies (dyadic) • In wars they initiate, democracies pay fewer costs in terms of human life and fight shorter wars than nondemocratic states (monadic) • Transitional democracies appear more likely to fight than stable regimes (monadic) • Larger democracies seem more constrained to avoid war than smaller democracies (monadic)

9. BDM2S2 conception of regime • Aristotelian • The key has to do with the number of rulers – or more specifically, the number of people who choose the rulers • S • “selectorate” • Enfranchised people who have a say in who rules • W • “winning coalition” • Those people whose support is requires to • keep the incumbent in office • Survival is the key • And institutions shape the effective strategies for survival

10. Hazard Rate over Time for Democracies (Solid Line) & Dictatorships (Dotted Line) – Time in years

11. Schultz The complete info game…

13. Working backwards… if –a<w1, game reduces to:

14. Working backwards… if –a<w1, game reduces to:

15. Working backwards… if –a>w1, game reduces to:

16. Working backwards… if –a>w1, game reduces to:

17. Summarizing • S1 plays [CH, SF] if –a<w1 • highly negative audience costs (democracies) successfully challenge • S1 plays [SQ, BD] if –a>w1 • weakly negative audience costs (autocracies) don’t challenge • S2 plays CD if –a<w1 • both democracies and autocracies concede to challengers with highly negative audience costs (democracies) • S2 plays RS if –a>w1 • both democracies and autocracies resist challengers with weakly negative audience costs (autocracies)

18. Complete info version • Complete: w1 & w2 are “common knowledge” • Explain • Solve the game through backwards induction • Last node (S1): If –a<wi, then “stand firm”, else “back down” • S2: • If –a<wi (threat), “concede” (because w2<0) • If –a>wi (bluff), “resist” (because 0<1) • 1st node (S1): • If –a<wi, then “challenge” (because 1>0) • If –a>wi, then “status quo” (because –a<0)

19. Incomplete info version • Bluffing occurs • S2 resists only if its expected value from war, w2, is is sufficiently high to make the gamble (that S1 is just bluffing) worthwhile • The probability that a challenge is “resisted” thus depends on the value of w2

20. Schultz Accountability/competition story Vs Informational/transparency story Explain each What is the prediction of each of how a democracy will react when challenged by another democracy?

21. Accountability/competition story • Costs of war are higher for democracies • In the model, draw w2 from a different distribution (increase d1)

23. Informational/transparency story • Audience costs are higher for democracies • In the model, assign different values of a according to regime

25. Hypotheses

26. Tests

28. Probability of reciprocating: Usually written: “Excel” command is just=NORMSDIST(“B’x”)

29. Selection problem? BDM2S2 p802:

30. Thank youWE ARE GLOBAL GEORGETOWN!