Democratic peace thesis
By Cornelia Navari Source: Williams, P. D. (Ed.). (2008). Security studies: an introduction . London: Routledge Taylor and Francis Group. “The ‘democratic peace’ thesis is the argument that liberal states do not fight wars against other liberal states. It was first enunciated in a keynote article by Michael Doyle in the journal Philosophy and Public Affairs (Doyle 1983). Doyle argued that there was difference in liberal practice towards other liberal societies and liberal practice towards non-liberal societies. Among liberal societies, liberalism had produced a cooperative foundation such that ‘constitutionally liberal states have yet to engage in war with one another’. Doyle based his findings on David Singer’s Correlates of War Project (COW) at Michigan University and the COW’s list of wars since 1816. Using the list, Doyle observed that almost no liberal states had fought wars against other liberal states, and that in the two instances in which it seemed that liberal states had