DEMOCRACY AND PEACE - PUTTING THE CART BEFORE THE HORSE

To explain the strong finding that democracies rarely fight other demo cracies, analysts typically focus on some attribute of regime type. Th is linkage may be spurious, at least in part. The emergence and persis tence of the first wave of liberal republics and democracies were grea tly facilitated by the prior resolution of regional primacy questions. Because early democracies did not engage fully in competitions for re gional primacy and territorial expansion, they were less likely to att ack other states, democracies or otherwise, in their home regions. Non expansionist foreign policies also discouraged the domestic concentrat ion of economic and political power, which in turn facilitated democra tization processes. Four historical cases illustrate how regional prim acy issues preceded the development of democracy and either undermined or facilitated democratization processes in major powers that have be en especially important to the annals of war participation. Further re search on whether peace antecedes democracy or the other way around ap pears warranted.