Regime Type, Peace, and Reciprocal Effects

Abstract

This study explores potential reciprocity in the relationship of democracy with peace. In the decade since introduction of a potential causal role for conflict relative to regime type in the 1990s, a number of theoretical and empirical advances have been made. These steps forward include an innovative statistical technique for estimating multiple equations with categorical dependent variables. We use a system of equations to explore the reciprocal relationship. In our statistical model, we employ a variety of new independent variables and novel measurements of established independent variables that have emerged in the conflict processes literature. We find that the reciprocal relationship between conflict and regime type is sustained as a theoretically and empirically valid way to think about these two concepts. Our results support the idea that reciprocity should find a place within the continuing trajectory of the neo‐Kantian research program.

Publication
Social Science Quarterly 96(2): 523–539