...Democratic peace theory, in its wider interpretation, is the empirical observation that democracies rarely, if ever, fight one another and it is this empirical dyadic observation that that has been described as the “closest thing we have to empirical law” in international relations. [1] Although what is meant by democratic peace is contested, and indeed as its validity as this essay will explore, the theory has been previously under Woodrow Wilson and more currently the Presidencies of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, a significant conceptual factor in the formation of American foreign policy.[2] Our aim is a democratic peace, a peace founded upon the dignity and rights of every man and woman. America acts in this course with friends and allies at our sides, yet we understand our special calling: this great republic will lead the cause of freedom. In light of this statement, ongoing U.S. policy and its likely persistence an examination and understanding of the democracy peace proposition is clearly with merit. This essay will look at the democratic peace proposition at a several levels of analysis: at the monadic level of interstate war on whether democracies generally are more peaceful and whether transitional democracies are more inclined to war; and at the intrastate level as to whether democracies experience more or less civil war. It will examine the validity of the proposition(s), reasons for is occurrence and postulate on what implication there may be for...
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...Democratic Peace Theory Democratic Peace Theory, which is firstly originated by Immanuel Kant back in 18th century, is a theory in political science that prevents armed conflict among democracies. The Democratic Peace indicates that democratic states will not get into war with each other; they have a separate peace On the other hand, it is possible for these democratic states to go to war with authoritarian regimes or stateless people. Scholars and academicians believe that democracies find an alternative way to get into a war such as compromises and arbitrations. It has been examined that democratic states have not engaged in a war with one another. Inherently, the number of democratic states expected to rise in the upcoming years of 18th century. As there are more democratic states, as there will be less armed conflicts among each other, which is going to lead the world to a better international system. It has been observed that democracies do get into armed conflict however not with one another; they usually get into war with non-democratic states. It is a significant observation. Democratic Peace Theory is consisted from Immanuel Kant’s “Perpetual Peace”. Immanuel Kant claims that peace is a reasonable outcome of the interaction of states with a republican form of government. The main idea behind Immanuel Kant’s “Perpetual Peace” is that ‘Democracy’ must be spread and made a universal system, in order to create peace amongst the states. This idea of Democratic Peace...
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...Jestin Thompson Political Science 23 April 2013 Final Paper Theory of Democratic Peace The idea of democratic peace was brought up in the enlightened era. The theory of democratic peace was based off of Immanuel Kant’s “Perpetual Peace.” The theory of democratic peace argues that nation-states governed by democratic regimes do not tend to have conflicts with other countries that would lead to wars. With this theory, it shows that nation-states with a democratic rule are more likely to not go to war with other countries. In some cases, this theory has been proven to be true, but in other cases it has not, especially with the United States. There are many proponents and opponents for this theory. Through this essay, the theory is to see if democratic, authoritarian, and totalitarian rule can coexist peacefully together, which will be proven either to be true or untrue. In 1795, Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher, wrote the basis for the theory of democratic peace, which is called “Perpetual Peace.” Through his writings, it explains how countries can reach a perpetual peace and fit the democratic peace theory. In this writing, contains the preliminary articles for perpetual peace among states. This section includes six main topics to help achieve a perpetual peace. First, he explains that after a war there should not be a treaty with provisions for the future wars between the two nation states. Secondly, no state, whether large or small, should be controlled...
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... Lecture: Josè Alarcòn EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Conscious Capitalism: A more complex form of Capitalism that hold within itself the possibility to enhancing corporate performance while contributing to advance billion peoples’ quality of life...or...just good business. When approaching to this “new” horizon we have to know that is not new...capitalism doesn’t involve avidity and disrespect, it just has been corrupted. When Kant and Montesquieu were talking about the reducing of conflict through commerce, they were talking about just good business. This is a really important thing that has to enlighten everyone while approaching to capitalism in general and, obviously, to Conscious Capitalism. This philosophical and economical theory has to be understood in all its details because it seems there are no trap this time, we have eroded our world till today but maybe tomorrow we can began to “reconstruct” it. In fact, now, we can see our reality and our future “on the shoulder of the giants” (passage from Bernard de Chartres) and of the other tall men that have kept thinking about what the giants saw and sad. We need a “new” focus, we need a wider one, a multiple stakeholder one...without forgetting we need more, wise stakeholder and wise stockholders. TABLES OF CONTENTS: * Executive summary…………………………………………………………………..2 * Table of contents……………………………………………………………………..3...
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...International Security Lecture 1 March 30th, 2015 The politics of security knowledge What is international security? We could start thinking about the security council of the UN But also about the invasion of Afghanistan (chapter 7 UN in order to secure the international security) We can also think about security in terms of the invasion of Iraq in 2003. This was a unilateral act of war, but sure it can also mean other things We can think of the national security agency, the agency in charge of spying all the signals and communications to a certain extent. What’s interesting about the NSA, it is seen as a threat to the security of the privacy. Lately, with the reports of the UN development programme, we start talking about HUMAN security (not military security, but rather the security of individuals, having a livelihood that’s acceptable). Whether security is international or not, it can be a rather confusing word The protection of values we hold dear. We search for it, we pursue it, we achieve it, we deny it to others. * what is to be secured? Is it the security of states? Or individuals? * What is the actual threat that we’re facing? Primarily to be dealing with military threats, or are there other types of threats we are facing. Essentially contested concept A concept that ‘inevitably’ involves endless disputes about their proper uses on the part of their users – Walter Gallie There can be ambiguity (one persons freedom-fighter is the other’s...
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...Minorities” Matthew Reed Political Science 10 Professor Benjamin Bishin Discussion Section #27 There has always been a fight between what is considered fair for the rich and the poor. Under certain leadership, there can be favoritism towards one these groups of people. The Democratic Party tends to have more of an influence on the minorities and the poor class while the Republican Party is supported mainly by the white working class. Based on evidence provided by Bartels, the poor class does better under democratic rule. A strong correlation between the theory of Frymer and the evidence of Bartels can be seen. There is a strong racial issue that can be seen during elections for these political parties but it is not in certain political Parties interest to find support from certain groups due to electoral capture. The minorities and lower classes have a lower representation by the Political Parties during elections and need to have more benefits instead of it being focused mainly on the white working class. Though the lower class seems to do better under the Democratic Party, neither of the main Parties seems to represent them well. Voting behavior seems to be in favor of the Democratic Party, but the Republican Party still has a good chance at winning even though most of electorate has been worse under Republican leadership. Bartels suggests that this is due towards the American voters are myopic and are convinced that economically they will be better off. The voters...
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...Katrin Voltmer The past two decades or so have seen an unprecedented spread of democracy around the globe. With the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989 and the end of the Cold War, the ‘third wave’ of democratization, which started in the early seventies, now encompasses countries in Asia and Africa.1 And even in states whose governments continue to resist a more open and participatory form of governance, such as North Korea, Burma or Zimbabwe, the idea of democracy is a powerful force that inspires people to take on a more active role in public life. However, many of the newly emerging democracies seem to fall short of some, often many, of the basic standards that define democratic rule, with irregular voting procedures, corruption, inefficiency and autocratic styles of government being but a few of the maladies. In addition, as many of the newly emerging democracies belong to the developing world, inequality and poverty remain severe obstacles to full self‐determination of the people. The experiences of the past decades have shown that democracy is not a one‐way road and that a viable democracy requires more than the implementation of the key institutions of government. Rather, an accountable and efficient government is embedded in a complex web of interdependent conditions that require considerable time and effort to develop. In the context ...
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...Many people believe the Andrew Jackson was the most democratic president ever, but how democratic was he? Being a democrat means a person who believes in the political or social equality of a all people. Most people believe that he was the most democratic president ever because he represented the common man. According to document 1, “Methods of Electing Presidential Electors” by the time 1828 when Jackson was first elected most states, presidential electors were chosen by the people and not the legislative. The 1828 election resulted in a landslide victory of Andrew Jackson because more people got to vote in the new election. But truly Andrew Jackson was not a democrat. His biggest flaw on calling himself a “democrat” was that he thought...
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...There are many different philosophies that have impacted my life and the reason I am who I am today. Through relativism, I have seen both sides of the election, the democratic side vs. the republican side. Growing up, I have learned that I support the idea of laissez-faire because less government control is better for the country. I am very democratic because I grew up in a very liberal community where people could do whatever they wanted and it wasn't considered wrong. The location I was living in and the rules and regulations at school, taught me to be myself and respect other people’s styles. There was no right or wrong way of how to look or act. Overall, I believe that my family and the media has influenced me the most for being democratic because ever since I was young, I usually watched CNN, which taught me to think more liberally. A couple years ago, “Keeping up with The Kardashians” was a very popular show that struck the media. There are two different perspectives that can be considered morally “right” or molly “wrong” depending on how people look at the family. For example, some people believe they are a successful family and are rich because they...
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...The True Science in Politics Benjamin Bishin's subconstituency theory of representation is supported with the empirical evidence that Larry Bartels provides from his book, of which Bartels evaluates social equality and its relationship with the American government, to Bishin's observations. Ideas, such as hidden minority rule, activism, visibility's true impact on the average voter, and ideological and social groups, that Bishin describes are supported by Bartels' findings; these findings being senators responsiveness to income groups, citizen's knowledge, and voting actions and more. Bishin's book, Tyranny of the Minority, develops the Subconstituency theory of representation that counteracts the leading theory of representation, the Demand Model. Bishin's synopsis of his theory is, “...subconstituency politics merely articulates a phenomenon long described by politicians and observed by journalists...,” (Bishin 13). The phenomenon being that minority held opinion can triumph over a majority held public opinion. However, Bishin shows this phenomenon to hold a deeper dogma in that constituents, for the purpose of reelection, appeal to groups. Bartels' book, Unequal Democracy, attempts to answer a question by Robert Dahl of, “...who actually governs?” (Bartels 1). Bartels' book argues, with a statistical emphasis, that our classed based society is becoming more polarized and unequal by politicians and cyclically exacerbated by voter apathy and actions. These examples...
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...Introduction Every four years, the United States presidential election becomes one of the country’s biggest news stories for a large chunk of that year. During this time there are a great many words both spoken and written about how people are going to vote and what factors supposedly lead them to vote a certain way. It seems that much of the time the analysis of these issues is of a qualitative nature, and with that in mind this paper will attempt to approach the problem from a statistical point of view. That is not to say there is a lack of quantitative research on how specific demographics tend to vote; indeed, some of the good data and information out there will be used to inform this paper’s hypotheses and econometric model. This study will focus on the 2012 U.S. presidential election Barack Obama and Mitt Romney (there were several other candidates on the ballot, but none received a significant portion of the votes). Pundits threw around seemingly countless factors in an attempt to analyze and predict how people would vote in this election; this paper will focus on a select group of those factors, in hopes of drawing some firm and well-grounded conclusions as to whether they actually played a statistically significant role. Countywide data will be utilized. The recent widespread availability of election results on a county-by-county level, combined with countywide information from the U.S. Census Bureau, allows for a very large number of observations (at least in...
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...presented himself as a representative of the 'common man' is the current president, Barack Obama. Like Andrew Jackson, Obama came from a humble background and identified as a self-made man; also like Jackson, he campaigned as a proponent of the common man and the middle class. As part of his election campaign in 2007, Obama opened up about his past, which he felt gave him a lot in common with the average American. He was raised by a single mother, with very little privilege or money. He put himself through law school and paid of his student debt using funds made from books he wrote. These factors all made him a valid representative of the 'common man', just as Andrew Jackson was. Also like Jackson, Obama would implement policies that would, in theory, aid the common man. These policies include Obamacare and tax plans. So both Obama and Jackson incorporated their lives as 'common men', and both attempted to help the 'common man' through the creation of policies that would benefit...
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...the House of Representatives as a Democratic-Republican. In the House, Calhoun was known as being a "War Hawk" because, he supported President James Madison's decision to declare war on Britain in 1812. Despite, his support...
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...Sade Tilghman Mrs. Coker RWS October 17, 2014 Democratic vs. Republican “Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the blame for the past. Let us accept our own responsibility for the future”. (J.F.K) Political parties have been around since the 1700’s, although they are not a part of our constitution they just sort of evolved. Democrat and Republican are both major political parties with a different set of beliefs and policies. Many political parties base their system on ideologies. An ideology is a system of ideas, especially one that forms political theories and policies. The main ideology for the Democratic party is liberalism and left-leaning. Liberalism is a political philosophy founded on ideas of liberty and equality. Left leaning ideologies are the rights of the individuals. Where as the Republican party tends to be right-leaning meaning power to the government. The Republican party's main ideology is conservatism which is a person who is opposed to change and holds to traditional values....
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...Conservative or Liberal: My Choice Angela J Flemister Liberty University Conservative or Liberal: My Choice A political ideology is a closely linked set of beliefs about politics. Political ideologies offer their adherents well organized theories that propose goals for the society and the means by which those goals can be achieved. (Americian Government pg.18) The two most common ideologies that come to my mind are the conservatism and liberalism, to in nonprofessional terms Republican and Democrat. The two parties differ in what they believe. The beliefs of one are totally opposite to the next. George Lakoff (Moral Politics) penned this book which simply asks “How Liberals and Conservatives think. In my reading of some of the book I was able to easily identify my personal political ideology immediately. Professor Whitham instructed class to research the elected officials in my district. Phil Gingrey and David Scott. The two could not be anymore different than they actually are as Congressman Gingrey is white and Congressman Scott is black. The color of the skin really should not matter but honestly we all know that at some point in time when an issue is presented and needs to be addressed by a vote there is some wrangling be it truth or not, race intervenes. The voting records of my elected officials provided an insight to their ideologies. By viewing the many interest groups it became evident that there is not a non-partisan accumulation of the facts. Many...
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