The Illusion of Safety: Lawfare and the Democratic Security

Abstract

The Democratic Peace Theory notes the reduced incidence of war between democracies. The emerging field of Democratic Security Studies is motivated by this finding, yet the field's future growth is contingent on a further finding that democracy reduces the incidence of war between democracies and non-democracies. If mechanisms within democracy cause democracies to war less often with each other, do these same mechanisms cause democracies to war less often with non-democracies? If so, the reduced incidence is likely caused by a mechanism internal to democracy. This paper hypothesizes that the causal mechanism internal to democracy resulting in fewer wars between democracies and non-democracies is the requirement that the executive adhere to the dictates of democratic governance and rule of law. To test this hypothesis, this paper employs the method of difference, comparing Spain (negative case) to the United States of America (positive case). The initial finding is that democratic governance and the rule of law so constrain the American executive that he refrains from waging aggressive war. The paper then introduces the concept of "Lawfare" and concludes that, by looking at the conduct of the American executive through the lens of "Lawfare," the author is unable to confirm the hypothesis that adherence to democratic governance and rule of law so constrain the American executive that he refrains from waging aggressive war.