Globalization And Kant's "democratic Peace"

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Do you think globalization has furthered the neo-Kantian idea of “democratic peace”? Kant and the liberal-Internationalists[i] described an IR system where states that became liberal democracies would not attack each other due to their shared ideals and the interdependence of their economies through international trade and investment. This theory appears to have been largely confirmed when we evaluate the peace that has prevailed between liberal democracies (not necessarily all democracies) since there emergence over the last 200 years. The other side of Kant’s thesis, that the peace only holds between liberals and not between liberal and non-liberal states is also borne out by recent history. In fact, we will see, globalization may actually be increasing the potential for conflict between liberal and non-liberal states by increasing the root causes of conflict namely inequality, poverty and injustice[ii]. Globalization and its key forces are cast in favour of the liberal North and are increasing the interdependence and integration of the states of the developed world. In this sense, globalization is making the liberal peace stronger and broader as more countries join the “club” of the liberal-democratic. Given the World Wars of last century were fought primarily amongst the Great Powers of the `North’, the fact they have been peaceful since all embraced the liberal-democratic model, suggests that integration has furthered a neo-Kantian “democratic peace”. The only WWII winner that has remained non-liberal is Russia and they have had an uneasy relationship with the West including “cold” warfare (further strengthening Kant’s claim). This, however, is not the whole story as globalization appears to be increasing the potential for conflict outside the liberal-democratic Global North. Globalization is more than just a geographic term describing the
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