Ruler Autonomy and War in Early Modern Western Europe

In Search of Democratic Peace: Problems and Promise

“…Some of this research has explored the proposition's "cosilience" (Olson 1982) by extending its logic beyond the original concern with war to other phenomena such as foreign intervention, dispute mediation, trade practice, civil strife, covert subversion, alliance membership, and international treaties as well as the crisis-management and war-winning capabilities of democratic or democratizing states (see, for example, Bueno de Mesquita and Lalman 1986Gaubatz 1991Gaubatz , 1996Siverson and Emmons 1991;Burley 1992;Lake 1992;Dixon 1993Dixon , 1994Gowa and Mansfield 1993;Fearon 1994;Kozhemiakin 1994;Raymond , 1996Zerbinos 1994;Chan 1995;James and Mitchell 1995;Kegley and Hermann 1995a;Barbieri 1996a;Eyerman and Hart 1996;Hermann and Kegley 1996;Hewitt and Wilkenfeld 1996;Jacobsen 1996;Lemke and Reed 1996;Simon and Gartzke 1996). Other studies have offered collateral evidence for the democratic peace proposition using historical, anthropological, and experimental approaches (see, for example, Ember, Ember, and Russett 1992;Russett and Antholis 1992;Geva, DeRouen, and Mintz 1993;Mintz and Geva 1993;Crawford 1994;Weart 1994;Kiser, Drass, and Brustein 1995). Still others have presented various political, economic, psychological, and philosophical perspectives to illuminate why the democratic peace occurs (see, for example, Roy 1991;Lake 1992;Sørensen 1992;Russett 1993a<...>…”

Constraints, states, and wars

“…I do agree with Kiser's (1989: 74) first proposition, according to which ruler autonomy contributes to war initiation and involvement. But I disagree with his monadic research designs (Kiser, Drass & Brustein 1992) which neglect inter-nation relationships. Disinclination to wage war may have very different effects depending either on other states sharing this disinclination or on their readiness to exploit this disinclination.…”

Politically Motivated Opposition to War1

“…Many of these same themes appear in the more general literature on state‐building and nation‐building (Rasler and Thompson 1989), although there is considerable debate as to how closely the patterns identified in Europe are replicated in the Middle East (Barnett 1992; Heydemann 2000), Africa (Herbst 2003), Latin America (Centeno 2002), or elsewhere. The extent to which war leads to an increase in states' institutional strength and tax revenues and to a shift in the relative power of different actors in society—an important but neglected question (but see some interesting hints in Kiser, Drass, and Brustein 1995)—appears to revolve around whether there are groups that anticipate the negative implications of war for their interests and that attempt to block war where that is a realistic strategy.…”