Dean's World

On the Israel-Hez War and the Democratic Peace

Rudy Rummel

Angie just posted this question:

Hi Professor Rummel. I've read your stuff in the past and was just wondering if you had thought about posting something that counters the recent media criticism that I've seen where someone mentioned that Israel and Lebanon are both democratic. I forgot the reporter, but it seems like someone was questioning the validity of the proposition by yourself and President Bush (I have read that he has read Natan Sharansky's book on democracy) that greater democracy is a solution to global violence.

Will you counter that question at all?

I have. My post on this is here. As to both Israel and Lebanon being democratic, see this post also.

Related Posts (on one page):

On the Israel-Hez War and the Democratic Peace
Israel Is Already At War With Iran

Posted by Rudy Rummel | Permalink | Technorati Trackbacks

(link)

Mike "Veeshir" Fisher (mail):

As you have used Greek city-states as examples of democracies, what about the Dutch Republic and Great Britain in the 1600s? They were as close as any country at the time to democracies and at least as democratic as any B.C Greek city-state, and yet they fought at least two wars. Doesn't that add a blemish to the theory? And if not, why would Greek city-states count but GB and the Dutch Republic not?

8.8.2006 2:06pm

(link)

TallDave (mail) (www):

I think the mistake a lot of people make is viewing the theory as an absolute rule, disproved by any single counter-example, rather than what it is: an enormous statistical discrepancy.

We would certainly not consider the Greeks free democrats; they were more of a tyranny-by-majority (for instance, they voted to have Socrates put to death). Their mob rule gave democracy a bad name for millenia.

Also, England at the time (and well after) was still essentially a constitutional monarchy. Paine actually cites Holland of the late 1700s as an example of a peaceful republic as opposed to the warlike Britain.

The Framers understood that free republican democracies tended to avoid war. It was one of their motivations for creating the government that they did.

8.8.2006 3:15pm

(link)

Mike "Veeshir" Fisher (mail):

Yes.
But Holland wasn't all that peaceful, as their colonies could attest.

8.8.2006 3:49pm

(link)

Dean Esmay:

Democracies are often rather cruel to colonial holdings. That can be seen in the worst excesses of the British after they became a functional democracy (some time in the late 19th or early 20th century), in French behavior, in American behavior in the Phillipines in the early 20th century, and so on.

People without democratic representation are sometimes oppressed by people with it. The solution is, generally speaking, to expand the franchise.

8.9.2006 9:28am