Democracies Do Not Fight Each Other : Dean Babst’s Hypothesis Revisited

Abstract: The democratic peace theory assert that democracies never or rarely fight each other in war. It is the closest we have to an empirical law in political science and peace and conflict studies as it contains the intellectual justification that by spreading democracy abroad, we can promote world peace. The aim of this research is to broaden our knowledge on how lasting peace may be established by confirming or rejecting hypothesis ‘democracies do not fight each other’. Essentially, this research is a continuation of Dean Babst statistical testing from 1964, who analysed all major wars fought 1789-1941 and determined whether any were fought between freely elected governments (democracies). This research inherits the same working format, however testing the hypothesis to 21st century wars (2000-2020) and with different operationalization of war and democracy – Based on the Uppsala Conflict Data programme (UCDP) and Regimes of the World (RoW). The adopted research design is quantitative statistical and collects both quantitative and qualitative data to provide context to every state- based war fought and actors involved. In this research, 38 wars are identified to be fought in the 21st century but only 5 are fought between two governments (primary and secondary). 10 governmental oppositions are counted to exist within these 5 wars. 5 of them are fought between democracies and autocracies, while 5 other oppositions are between purely autocracies. The results are that 0 out of 38 wars in 2000-2020 are fought between democracies, and this research can thereby confirm hypothesis to the period and the operationalisation of war and democracy studied.