President Bush continues to bastardize our knowledge of history.

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
Since democracies have fought wars allied with each other it makes your contention unlikely.

How does that stand? DPTs don't argue that Democracies are more likely to ally together than to war, they argue that democracies never war against each other (and the corollary that Democracies won't war against each other in the future). Simply stating that democracies have allied together does nothing to support the contention that they don't war; democracies allied with each other often for geopolitical reasons that had nothing to do with their governance. Britain allied with France to oppose Germany in WWI to prevent Germany from becoming a regional hegemon, which Britain was highly concerned with; US allied with the Allies in WWII again to oppose Germany becoming a world hegemon, and because Japan attacked us (due to our perceived position protecting China). Post-1990, democracies allied to oppose Serbia (because it was in the major powers' interest to lessen the power of Serbia, who clearly was in position to become a regional hegemon if it stayed together) and Iraq, who has control over a vital resource (oil) and was attempting to become a regional hegemon in the middle east, further destabilizing a vital resource (oil).

Finally ... Mao, it doesn't irk me that I can't give you an example. Nor does it irk Mearsheimer, nor did it irk Ken Waltz, nor does it irk any self-confident Realist. I don't know any Realist who doesn't wish that DPT were true ... we don't believe it is, but I certainly wish it were. That would mean a solution to war. Anything that could bring about an eternal end to war, that wasn't more horrible than war, would be a good thing in my book (although I remain free to define "horrible" by my definitions). It's sad that DPT is not true ... but that doesn't make it true

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by snoopy369


How does that stand? DPTs don't argue that Democracies are more likely to ally together than to war, they argue that democracies never war against each other (and the corollary that Democracies won't war against each other in the future). Simply stating that democracies have allied together does nothing to support the contention that they don't war; democracies allied with each other often for geopolitical reasons that had nothing to do with their governance.

I suggest you reread. My post was not in any way intended as a proof of this so-called "DPT".

[snoopy369]

Well, I interpreted it as answering DinoDoc's explanation (that the rarity of dyads is the contention Realists use to counter Democratic Peace Theory) by objecting that Dyads are not so rare as implied.

[KrazyHorse]

My feeling is that liberal democracies are, indeed, significantly less likely to war against each other than are countries with other forms of government. I don't doubt that this general rule may be violated occasionally

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by snoopy369
Well, I interpreted it as answering DinoDoc's explanation (that the rarity of dyads is the contention Realists use to counter Democratic Peace Theory) by objecting that Dyads are not so rare as implied.

Then why didn't your post respond based on that interpretation?

[snoopy369]

I thought I did

[KrazyHorse]

Unfortunately, you didn't.

[KrazyHorse]

Listen, you're asking for a negative proof here. In the absence of evidence of violations, all you can do is put an upper bound on them. This upper bound certainly seems to be lower than the average amount of war-fighting between two randomly selected countries...

[KrazyHorse]

For your edification, snoopy, here is DD's original statement:

I'd wager that the main problem that they have with the theory is that war and democratic dyads are such a rare phenomena in the international system that it is an insufficent sample size to draw any meaningful conclusions from.

(bolding mine)

My only point is that the sample size is not so small as he claims here.

Or, more properly, since DD is a squirrelly little bastard who never states his own opinions without blaming them on someone else, what he claims that others might claim.

[snoopy369]

The problem is that DP theorists are trying to make a statement that can only be held by a negative proof - statistical, at least. They make unreasonably large claims from a dearth of evidence. The fact that a few democracies - carefully selected by DPT supporters - never warred is meaningless in the scheme of things, and certainly is not enough to support suggesting that Democracies are unlikely to war against each other in the future. Any claims of forecasting the probability of future events must be backed up by significant evidence, or the margin of error on those claims' forecasts will be so large as to render the claims meaningless.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by snoopy369
The problem is that DP theorists are trying to make a statement that can only be held by a negative proof - statistical, at least. They make unreasonably large claims from a dearth of evidence. The fact that a few democracies - carefully selected by DPT supporters - never warred is meaningless in the scheme of things, and certainly is not enough to support suggesting that Democracies are unlikely to war against each other in the future. Any claims of forecasting the probability of future events must be backed up by significant evidence, or the margin of error on those claims' forecasts will be so large as to render the claims meaningless.

Not meaningless. Just not certain. We have enough evidence, I think, to say that there is a significantly reduced likelihood of two democracies fighting each other.

It's like being told that the chance of precipitation is 10% instead of 50%

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
For your edification, snoopy, here is DD's original statement:

I'd wager that the main problem that they have with the theory is that war and democratic dyads are such a rare phenomena in the international system that it is an insufficent sample size to draw any meaningful conclusions from.

(bolding mine)

My only point is that the sample size is not so small as he claims here.

Or, more properly, since DD is a squirrelly little bastard who never states his own opinions without blaming them on someone else, what he claims that others might claim.

I'm suggesting that you are misinterpreting the sample. The correct sample is not "all democracies", but "all potential conflict situations between democracies". You can say that Nigeria and Australia have never fought, but I'd hardly say that supports any theory other than the Geographic Seperation theory. The sample size of nations that:
* Are democracies (according to a consistent definition thereof)
* Are geographically proximate
* Are of similar power levels [as the US and Canada not fighting post-1945 is sort of laughable]
and most importantly
* Have a reason to fight

is basically 0. The last qualifier there is significant, and generally ignored by DP theorists; but if the countries are predicted by Realists not to fight, then how does it support DPT that they didn't?

Give me a list of significant length of dyads who meet all of those qualifications, and we can talk again. (And I don't think you will be able to ... last time I looked at the list, it was about twenty dyads long, counting several pairs of countries multiple times...)

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse


Not meaningless. Just not certain. We have enough evidence, I think, to say that there is a significantly reduced likelihood of two democracies fighting each other.

It's like being told that the chance of precipitation is 10% instead of 50%

And I'd argue that you can't provide enough evidence to say that. Show me the evidence...

[KrazyHorse]

* Have a reason to fight

That's the whole point.

[Colonâ„¢]

Well, there is the case of the democratic Allied countries declaring war at Finland in the 2nd Winter War, when that country joined Germany in its attack on the USSR. But that's a highly specific case, since Finland was attempting regain the territories it had lost in the previous Winter War (when Russia attacked Finland), and since the alliance between the USSR and democratic western countries was ungodly on its own. There weren't any actual combats between 'democratic' forces either.