Cooper
1


Safe From Democracy:

Rethinking the Connection Between Democracy and War

Joshua B. Cooper

GVPT 200
Virginia Haufler
May 7, 2010

 Cooper
2


It has become fashionable to hold the opinion that countries that adopt a

democratic form of government are the most peaceful. Almost every day, one can read in

popular opinion articles, the cry that the U.S. is failing at its supposed duty to

democratize the world for the cause of spreading peace. Nearly constantly, from one side

of the political spectrum to the other, commentators, educators and authors alike accept

and promulgate the idea that the U.S. must pursue a vigorous interventionist foreign

policy, in order to spread democracy, and therefore peace.

Self-described democracies do their best to claim that their intentions are

peaceful, and insist that any action they take is either peaceful or intended to produce

peace. This theory has found a home in the places of high power in this country. In a

speech before the British parliament in June of 1982, President Ronald Reagan

proclaimed that governments founded on a respect for individual liberty exercise

"restraint" and "peaceful intentions" in their foreign policy. 1

However, if history is carefully examined, the claim of the overall peacefulness of

democracies does not hold up under scrutiny. This is the case for several reasons. First,

public ownership of government, as is the case with democracy, allows rulers to be much

less careful with the territory and resources at their command. Second, the advent of

global democratization changed the nature of warfare, creating major ideological

conflicts where mere territorial disputes existed previously. Third, democratic states feel

a need to export or promote democracy to foreign nations, leading to what some would


























































1
Doyle,
Michael
.
"Liberal
Internatinalism:
Peace,
War
and
Democracy."
Nobelprize.org.

http://130.242.18.21/nobel_prizes/peace/articles/doyle/index.html
(accessed
May
7,
2010).



2
Kinsella,
Stephan
N.
Against
Intellectual
Property.
Auburn,
Alabama:
Ludwig
Von
Mises
Institute,


2008,
22.


 Cooper
3


call increased imperialism. In short, democracy changes the players, scope, and

imperatives of warfare.

The Changing Players of War

All goods have ownership of some sort. This is because there is a scarcity of

goods in the universe. Without any scarcity, the concept of ownership would not exist. As

author Stephan Kinsella writes, “Were we in a Garden of Eden where land and other

goods were infinitely abundant, there would be no scarcity and, therefore, no need for

property rules… For example, your taking my lawnmower would not really deprive me

of it if I could conjure up another in the blink of an eye.”1 However, we live in a world

where goods are in fact scarce, and hence, the concept of property arises.

The two basic forms of ownership of resources are public ownership and private

ownership. Publicly owned resources are such that there is no exclusion to their use.

Privately owned resources exist where there is a defined person or group of persons who

can exclude others from the use of the resources.

The same distinction may be applied to government. Governments can be

privately owned, where there would exist a ruler who owns the government as if it were

his private property. Such is the case with a monarchical government. In particular, he

would have the right to pass the property, in this case the government, on to future

generations. Also, governments can be owned publicly, when temporary caretakers are in

charge of the government who do not own it. Such is the case with a democratic

government. This kind of government is such that the caretakers cannot pass the


























































1
Kinsella,
Stephan
N.
Against
Intellectual
Property.
Auburn,
Alabama:
Ludwig
Von
Mises
Institute,

2008.




 Cooper
4


government directly to future generations. In privately owned government, the ruler alone

has the use of his property, while in publicly owned government, there exist no barriers to

entry into the caretakership of the government.1

From this distinction, a number of deductions can be made. First, as is the case

with all property, those who own private property, in this case, the government, have an

incentive to maximize total wealth. They will be interested in preserving the capital value

of the government under their ownership. On the other hand, if the government is

publicly owned, the caretakers do not have an incentive to maximize the wealth of their

domain. Quite the opposite. In a publicly owned government, the caretakers have an

incentive to use the resources for their own personal gain as quickly as they can, knowing

that their caretakership is limited by time constraints. Such exploitation can be

undertaken by the caretakers for personal material gain, for the advancement of a

particular ideology, or for the sake of advancing their own reputation or legacy. Thus,

public owners of government, such as monarchs, have an incentive to use the resources of

their realm in a prudent and future-oriented way, while caretakers of public governments,

such as presidents and legislators, have an incentive to loot the resources of their realm as

quickly as possible, never giving thought to the long term consequences of their actions.

In addition, public caretakers of government have a much greater tendency, even

an incentive, to incur public debts than do private owners. This should be self-

explanatory, as the public caretaker is not liable personally for the repayment of the debt.

The debts will be paid by future caretakers, not himself.


























































1
Hoppe,
Hans‐Hermann
.
"Reflections
on
State
and
War
by
Hans‐Hermann
Hoppe."

LewRockwell.com.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/hoppe/hoppe17.html
(accessed
May
7,
2010).


 Cooper
5


Thirdly, because of the fact that there is free entry into a publicly owned

government, and completely restricted entry into the ownership of privately owned

government, there exists in privately owned governments a clear-cut distinction between

the rulers and those being ruled. On the other hand, in a publicly owned government, a

person might be in the ruled class one day, and in the ruling class the next. Everyone has

a chance to become the President, while not everyone has the chance to become the king.

All of these tendencies show that greater incentive exists for rulers of publicly

owned government to wage war than for rulers of privately owned government. First, the

ruler of a privately owned government will have an incentive not to squander the lives or

fortunes of his subjects or the natural resources present in his territory on unnecessary

war making. As these subjects and natural resources are the source of wealth in his

country, he has an incentive not to endanger them frivolously. He must steward them for

long-term use. On the other hand, the rulers, or caretakers, of publicly owned

governments are motivated by no such incentive, as the human and natural resources of

their domain are not theirs to steward for long-term use. Thus, if it is politically or

financially expedient for a caretaker to engage in a war without a just cause, he will not

hesitate in doing so, as the resources needed to fight the war are not available for his

long-term use.

Second, if a public caretaker decides it would somehow benefit him to engage in

unjust war, he will not be concerned with the debt he will occur in so doing, as he will

not have to repay it personally. Reversely, the private owner of a government is

personally liable for the war debts, thus he will employ all means possible to avoid

 Cooper
6


incurring the debts in the first place. As wars generally create massive debt, the reason

for this should be clear.

Third, with a clear distinction between rulers and ruled, there will be on the part

of the public, more resistance to rule by a private person than to rule by a replaceable

caretaker. As such, if a private owner of government decides to engage in unjust war, he

is deterred from doing so because he knows that there likely will be a public outcry or

revolt against him. Public caretakers of government, on the other hand, will likely not be

the recipients of such a pronounced hatred. Furthermore, because of the blurred

distinction between ruling and ruled classes, the populace of the publicly owned

government has a greater identification with their particular state. When war is waged

under these circumstances, the public is more willing to go to war “for their country.”

Thus, we can see that whether or not a ruler owns the territory he rules influences

the actions of that ruler. Modern democracy meets all the criteria for a publicly owned

government. There are no barriers to entry, the term of rule is short, and the rule cannot

be passed on directly. As such, the temptations faced by the ruler of a publicly owned

government like a democracy make war theoretically much more enticing and possible.

These theories can be proven by historical study.

The Changing Scope of War

It is safe to say that most governments throughout history have been privately

owned monarchies. Notable exceptions include Athens in classical Greece, the Roman

republic, Venice and Florence during the Renaissance period, and what would later be

known as the Netherlands from 1648 to 1673, among others. These exceptions were

generally short-lived.

 Cooper
7


World War I marked one of the most influential and significant changes in global

politics in all of human history. This war was the event that prompted the end of the

monarchical age and the advent of the democratic republican age, so to speak.

At the time of the onset of the war, only three democratic republics existed in

Europe – France, Switzerland, and Portugal.1 A mere four years later, all the major

European monarchies effectively disappeared. The Romanovs in Russia, the

Hohenzollerns in Prussia and the Habsburgs in Austria were all forced to resign, thus

creating democratic republics, with universal suffrage, in those nations. In addition, with

the exception of Yugoslavia, all the new successor states adopted a democratic form of

government.2

The cause of this dramatic shift was primarily the entrance of the US into the war.

As philosopher Hans-Hermann Hoppe stated in his book Democracy, The God That

Failed, “World War I began as an old-fashioned territorial dispute. However, with the

early involvement and ultimate official entry into the war by the United States in April

1917, the war took on a new ideological dimension.”3 President Woodrow Wilson

declared that the U.S. must throw itself into the war effort to make the world “safe” for

democracy. In no uncertain terms, in a speech before Congress in 1917, Wilson called the

European monarchies untrustworthy, saying, “A steadfast concert for peace can never be

maintained except by a partnership of democratic nations. No autocratic government


























































1
Hoppe,
Hans‐Hermann.
Democracy:
The
God
that
Failed:
The
Economics
and
Politics
of
Monarchy,


Democracy,
and
Natural
Order.
New
Brunswick:
Transaction
Publishers,
2001,
ix.

2
Ibid
x.


3
Ibid
x.



 Cooper
8


could be trusted to keep faith within it or observe its covenants.”1 He went on to say that

as long as monarchic governments existed, “there can be no assured security for the

democratic governments of the world.” Wilson,
throwing
subtlety
to
the
wind,
urged


Americans
 to
 see
 military
 might
 as
 the
 only
 way
 to
 see
 democracy
 spread
 abroad,


appealing
 in
 May
 1918
 for
 "force,
 force
 to
 the
 utmost,
 force
 without
 stint
 or
 limit,


the
righteous
and
triumphant
force
which
shall
make
Right
the
law
of
the
world."2

As Hoppe explains, “At the time of World War I, [the] ideology of an

expansionist democratic republicanism had found its very personification in then U.S.

President Wilson. Under Wilson’s administration, the European war became an

ideological mission – to make the world safe fore democracy and free of dynastic rulers.”

Thus began the trend of democracy creating major ideological conflicts out of

previously minor territory disputes. With this motivational shift came an increase in the

scope of war. Where before existed clear distinctions between combatants and non-

combatants, such distinctions were quickly erased. With the global rise of democracy, the

conceptual role of citizens changed. As historian and author Murray N. Rothbard wrote,

“In the premodern era there was no central nation-state that spoke inevitably in the name

of all inhabitants of a given land area. If one set of kings or barons fought another, it was

not felt that everyone in the area must be a dedicated partisan. Moreover, instead of mass

conscript armies enslaved to their respective rulers, armies were small bands of hired

mercenaries. Often, a favorite sport for the populace was to observe a battle from the


























































1
Wilson,
Woodrow.
"Wilson's
War
Message
to
Congress
‐
World
War
I
Document
Archive."
World


War
I
Document
Archive.
http://wwi.lib.byu.edu/index.php/Wilson%27s_War_Message_to_Congress

(accessed
May
7,
2010).

2
Beaumont,
Roger.
Right
Backed
by
Might:
The
International
Air
Force
Concept.
Connecticut:
Praeger,


2001,
11.


 Cooper
9


safety of the town ramparts, and war was regarded as something of a sporting match.”1

Thus, this new form of democracy-motivated war resulted in far more civilian casualties,

than of soldiers killed on the battlefields.2

The entrance of America into the war, and the consequential motivational shift

that made the war a clash of ideologies, led to a seismic increase in the scope of the war.

Not only were many more people involved in the war, as combatants and victims, but it

also prolonged and intensified the war. No longer were any peace terms an option.

Wilson would only be satisfied in the total surrender, humiliation, and punishment of

those states that were not democracies. On the other hand, had the U.S. not felt the need

to enforce democracy, and had remained uninvolved in the dispute, its likely that the

conflict would have ended relatively quickly and peacefully. By late 1916, widespread

popular support for the notion of ending the war was increasing. Without the U.S.

entrance into the conflict, one of several peace agreements, most notably that put forward

by Charles I of Austria in March of 1917, would likely have brought an end to the war.3

Instead,
 the
 U.S.,
 motivated
 by
 a
 supposed
 need
 to
 rid
 the
 world
 of
 monarchies
 in


favor
of
democracy,
caused
the
conflict
to
be
prolonged
and
intensified.
As
the
war


drew
to
a
close,
one
of
Wilson's
top
aides,
Henry
White,
later
said
of
the
1919
pairs


peace
talks,
"We
had
such
high
hopes
of
this
adventure;
we
believed
God
called
us


and
 now
 we
 are
 doing
 hell's
 dirtiest
 work."4
 The
 Wilson
 administration
 had
 high



























































1
Rothbard,
Murray
N..
For
a
New
Liberty:
The
Liberation
Manifesto.
Rev
Sub
ed.
New
York:
Univ
Pr
Of


Amer,
1986,
282

2
Hoppe,
Hans‐Hermann.
Democracy:
The
God
that
Failed:
The
Economics
and
Politics
of
Monarchy,


Democracy,
and
Natural
Order.
New
Brunswick:
Transaction
Publishers,
2001.

3
Shanafelt,
Gary
W..
The
Secret
Enemy.
0
ed.
Boulder:
East
European
Monographs,
1985,
125‐30.

4
Fleming,
Thomas.
Illusion
of
Victory,
The:
America
in
World
War
I.
Cambridge:
Perseus,
2003,
382. 


 Cooper
10


hopes
of
a
total
annihilation
of
all
non‐democratic
states,
and
while
this
is
in
a
sense


what
he
achieved,
any
talk
of
a
peaceful
resolution
left
him
unsatisfied.



 In
 this
 example
 we
 see
 the
 way
 in
 which
 the
 nature
 and
 scale
 of
 conflict


changed
 from
 the
 territorial
 disputes
 of
 the
 monarchic
 age
 to
 the
 ideologically‐

based
 total
 war
 of
 the
 democratic
 age.
 The
 concept
 of
 total
 war,
 where
 all
 the


resources
of
a
nation,
human
and
material,
are
used
for
the
war
effort
is
intimately


connected
 to
 the
 rise
 of
 the
 democratic
 republican
 form
 of
 government.
 As
 noted


above,
countries
run
by
temporary
caretakers,
who
are
not
responsible
for
the
long‐

term
 effects
 of
 their
 decisions
 have
 the
 ability,
 and
 even
 the
 incentive,
 to
 use
 the


resources
 of
 the
 country
 in
 their
 dominion
 in
 imprudent
 ways.
 The
 creation
 of


unnecessary
total
wars
is
an
example
of
such
imprudence.



The
Changing
Imperative
of
War



 Woodrow
 Wilson
 was
 not
 the
 only
 President
 to
 urge
 sweeping
 military


interventionism
 for
 the
 cause
 of
 democracy.
 President
 Bush,
 in
 his
 first
 inaugural


address stated that “it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of

democratic movements and institutions in every nation.”1 Quoting Lembke, one of the

main characters from Fyodor Dostoevsky’s novel The Possessed, a character based on the

infamous nihilist Sergei Nechaev,2 President Bush said it was his goal to light a “fire in

the minds of men,” by exporting democracy to untamed lands abroad. Just as the

character Lembke saw himself as a someone anointed by history to put the world right by


























































1
"George
W.
Bush:
Second
Inaugural
Address:
U.S.
Inaugural
Addresses.
2005."
Bartleby.com:
Great


Books
Online
‐‐
Quotes,
Poems,
Novels,
Classics
and
hundreds
more.

http://www.bartleby.com/124/pres67.html
(accessed
May
7,
2010).

2
Chisholm,
F.
Derek.
"Dostoevsky
Essays."
Fyodor
Dostoevsky
(Dostoyevsky)
|
Crime
and


Punishment
|
The
Brothers
Karamazov.
http://www.fyodordostoevsky.com/essays/d‐chisholm.html

(accessed
May
7,
2010).


 Cooper
11


means of war making, so President Bush fancied himself the leader of a new campaign to

put the world right, by means of the democratizing the world at gunpoint.1

However fervent President Bush was, his use of the ideology of democracy as a

tool to wage war is far from new. In fact, the rise of global imperialism and the rise of

democracy have occurred side by side. The first instance of sustained global imperialism

in the Western world was the democratic city-state of Athens. Victor Davis Hanson has

emphasized this in his work on the Peloponnesian War. Hanson writes, “‘Athenianism’

was the Western world's first example of globalization. There was a special word of sorts

for Athenian expansionism in the Greek language, attikizô, ‘to Atticize,’ to become like

or join the Athenians.”2 Hanson goes on to explain that by the outbreak of the

Peloponnesian War, the Athenian empire had grown to "nearly two hundred states run by

seven hundred imperial overseers.”3 According to Hanson, "To maintain such an empire,

in the fifth century [B.C.] Athens had fought three out of every four years, a remarkable

record of constant mobilization, unrivaled even in modern times."4

Not only do democracies abroad have a long-standing tradition of imperialism,

but our own democracy exhibits the same tendencies as well. The first instance of

America forcefully spreading democracy came after the Spanish-American War. When

the U.S. declared war, it promised not to annex any foreign territory. But after an easy

victory, it immediately took the Philippines as its own. As
Tony
Smith,
author
of


America's
Mission,
noted,
"Ultimately,
the
democratization
of
the
Philippines
came
to


be
the
principle
reason
the
Americans
were
there;
now
the
United
States
had
a


























































1
Dostoyevsky,
Fyodor.
The
Possessed
(The
Devils).
Boston:
Public
Domain
Books,
2005. 

2
Hanson,
Victor.
A
War
Like
No
Other:
How
the
Athenians
and
Spartans
Fought
the
Peloponnesian


War.
2005.
Reprint,
New
York:
Random
House
Trade
Paperbacks,
2006,
14.

3
Ibid,
27.

4
Ibid,
27


 Cooper
12


moral
purpose
to
its
imperialism
and
could
rest
more
easily."1
The
use
of
democracy


as
a
means
to
justify
imperialism
continued,
in
Mexico
in
1914,
in
the
Dominican


Republic
in
1916,
in
Europe
in
World
War
I,
in
many
Latin
American
countries
in
the


‘20s
and
‘30s,
again
in
Europe
in
World
War
II,
in
Iran
in
1953,
in
Guatemala
in


1954,
to
name
but
a
few
examples.2



Conclusion:
To
Be
Safe
From
Democracy



 A
historically
minded
observer
will
not
fall
prey
to
the
common
myth
that


democracies
are
inherently
peace‐loving.
And
yet,
day
after
day,
this
fallacy
is


preached,
in
the
newspapers,
in
the
halls
of
congress,
and
in
the
university
lecture


halls.
This
mindset
has
the
tragic
effect
of
rationalizing
an
irrational,
dangerous,


hubristic,
and
ultimately
deadly
form
of
foreign
interventionism
and
expansionism.


Democracy
gives
rulers
extra
incentive
and
opportunity
to
wage
broad
war,
has


transformative
effects
on
the
ideological
bases,
and
hence,
the
scope,
of
war,
and


allows
politicians
to
pursue
flagrant
imperialism.
Thus,
rather
than
making
the


world
safe
for
democracy,
as
Woodrow
Wilson
preached,
the
stability
of
the
entire


geo‐political
system
depends
on
making
the
world
safe
from
democracy.


































































1
Leone,
Richard
C.,
and
Tony
Smith.
America's
Mission.
Princeton:
Princeton
University
Press,
1995. 

2
Bovard,
James.
Attention
Deficit
Democracy.
New
York:
Palgrave
Macmillan,
2007.


 Cooper
13


References:


Beaumont,
Roger.
Right
Backed
by
Might:
The
International
Air
Force
Concept.
Connecticut:
Praeger,

aaaaaaa2001.



Bovard,
James.
Attention
Deficit
Democracy.
New
York:
Palgrave
Macmillan,
2007.

Chisholm,
F.
Derek.
"Dostoevsky
Essays."
Fyodor
Dostoevsky
(Dostoyevsky)
|
Crime
and
Punishment

aaaaaaa|
The
Brothers
Karamazov.
http://www.fyodordostoevsky.com/essays/d‐chisholm.html

aaaaaaa
(accessed
May
7,
2010).



Dostoyevsky,
Fyodor.
The
Possessed
(The
Devils).
Boston:
Public
Domain
Books,
2005.



Doyle,
Michael
.
"Liberal
Internatinalism:
Peace,
War
and
Democracy."
Nobelprize.org.

aaaaaaahttp://130.242.18.21/nobel_prizes/peace/articles/doyle/index.html
(accessed
May
7,

aaaaaaa2010).



Fleming,
Thomas.
Illusion
of
Victory,
The:
America
in
World
War
I.
Cambridge:
Perseus,
2003.



"George
W.
Bush:
Second
Inaugural
Address:
U.S.
Inaugural
Addresses.
2005."
Bartleby.com:
Great

aaaaaaaBooks
Online
‐‐
Quotes,
Poems,
Novels,
Classics
and
hundreds
more.

aaaaaaahttp://www.bartleby.com/124/pres67.html
(accessed
May
7,
2010).


Hanson,
Victor.
A
War
Like
No
Other:
How
the
Athenians
and
Spartans
Fought
the
Peloponnesian
War.

aaaaaaa2005.
Reprint,
New
York:
Random
House
Trade
Paperbacks,
2006.


Hoppe,
Hans‐Hermann.
Democracy:
The
God
that
Failed:
The
Economics
and
Politics
of
Monarchy,

aaaaaaaDemocracy,
and
Natural
Order.
New
Brunswick:
Transaction
Publishers,
2001.



Hoppe,
Hans‐Hermann
.
"Reflections
on
State
and
War
by
Hans‐Hermann
Hoppe."
LewRockwell.com.

aaaaaaahttp://www.lewrockwell.com/hoppe/hoppe17.html
(accessed
May
7,
2010).



Kinsella,
Stephan
N.
Against
Intellectual
Property.
Auburn,
Alabama:
Ludwig
Von
Mises
Institute,

aaaaaaa2008.



Leone,
Richard
C.,
and
Tony
Smith.
America's
Mission.
Princeton:
Princeton
University
Press,
1995.


Rothbard,
Murray
N..
For
a
New
Liberty:
The
Liberation
Manifesto.
Rev
Sub
ed.
New
York:
Univ
Pr
Of

aaaaaaaAmer,
1986.



Shanafelt,
Gary
W..
The
Secret
Enemy.
0
ed.
Boulder:
East
European
Monographs,
1985.