1 What Are FD Interventions?
Forced Democracy (FD) interventions reflect a desire on the part of powerful Western liberal democracies to create governments in their own political images. One potentially powerful reason that the FD strategy may be so appealing is that it appeared to be extremely successful in the World War II experiences of Germany, Japan, and Italy, three highly illiberal regimes that were transformed into liberal democracies after military defeat by the Allied powers. Because each of these three âsuccessfulâ cases constitutes a rather dramatic example of a successful democratic transformation, American leaders have often been tempted to recreate these Axis transformations in âhard to crackâ cases of autocracy.
While what constitutes an FD attempt appears to be rather straightforward, this foreign policy strategy is not always clearly distinguishable from othersâboth in terms of intent and in the actions a state might take in order to carry out the policy. For instance, the implementation of sanctions may appear to follow roughly the same rationale as that of the FD strategy: to enhance the likelihood of democratization in a target country through coercive means. However, the method for achieving the objective is different. While sanctions are designed to push a regime toward democracy using economic or diplomatic means, FD interventions attempt to deliver democracy by removing the illiberal regime and installing a democratic system in its place.
Similarly, external interventions intended to restore pre-existing democratic governments (as was the case with the regime of President Jean Bertrand Aristide in Haiti), or to replace one autocrat with another (such as when the USA supported the coup that led to the replacement of President Ngo Dinh Diem in Vietnam in 1963) may appear to be a very similar types of actions since they involve the hostile overthrow of a regime. However, while FD interventions are intended to replace âundesirableâ (and usually hostile) regimes with friendly ones, their purpose also includes bringing about a regime that is more democratic than the existing one.
Keeping these considerations in mind, I define a FD attempt as:
An attempt by a liberal government or governments to bring about democracy in an illiberal target state through military force.
I emphasize the word âattemptâ here, as the FD strategy ultimately includes cases of intervention and forced regime change that are unsuccessful as well as those that succeed. In fact, irrespective of precisely how one defines them, a rather high percentage of FD attempts do not prove successful in the long run; most FD attempts do not result in democratic change in the target country, even in the short term (see, e.g., Bueno de Mesquita and Downs 2006; Gleditsch et al. 2007).
The definition above is consistent with how many of the principal studies on FD have treated this concept (see Meernik 1996; Peceny 1999; Bueno de Mesquita and Downs 2006; Walker and Pearson 2007). However, a potential weakness of this definition is that it does not account for the degree to which the desire for democratization played in either the decision to intervene or any post-intervention pro-democracy measures. It is probably impossible to convince die-hard skeptics that countries intervene for any other reason than narrow self-interest; thus, it would be foolish to argue that any intervention has ever occurred as a purely altruistic attempt to establish democracy.
Thus, given the dominant motive of self-interest that political scientists almost universally attach to explanations of state behavior, how do we try to identify the motives behind FD interventions? While disagreements exist over the degree to which the desire for democracy is actually at the heart of decisions to attempt to change an autocratic regime by force, I argue that we cannot discount the role of the desire for democracy on the part of American policymakers in the post-World War II era. Therefore, it is not necessary that we assume democracy is the only, or even the primary, goal of intervention. Instead, we need to accept that an intrinsic desire to promote democracy may play a role in the decision to intervene in some cases.
But how are we to place the centrality of democracy promotion in American foreign policy? Wolff and Wurm (2011, 87) create a useful typology of ways in which countries may view the idea of democracy promotion. At the minimalistic end of the spectrum is what the authors term the rhetorical view, in which policymakers view democracy promotion as a mere tool that can be applied to support a purely âmaterialistâ (costâbenefit) endeavor. Political actors pursuing the rhetorical strategy would use the concept of democracy promotion solely as a tool to justify their pursuit of ânarrow, security-oriented national interests (ibid., 83).â The authors argue that if we accept that powerful liberal states only use democracy promotion in a rhetorical sense, then the whole exercise is entirely futile. Therefore, it follows, the study of FD strategies is only worthwhile if we believe that states can potentially attach some actual importance to the value of democracy. If an intervention is merely a rhetorical device, then any attempt to distinguish FD attempts from other forms of military intervention would be pointless.
The next category in Wolff and Wurmâs typology classifies external democracy promotion as an instrumental aim of foreign policy: âdemocracy promotion is just one instrument among others (such as commercial liberalism or utilitarian concerns) that is applied to the extent that it contributes to the ârealâ aimsâŠthat guide foreign policyâ (ibid., 87). According to this classification, the desire to bring about democracy in a target state is a contributing factor, but not a central one, to a materialist (costâbenefit) view of foreign policy. If leaders value democracy through an instrumental lens, democracy promotion would at best have an identifiable but not a particularly central role in the decision to intervene in an autocratic state. At this level, FD attempts might be distinguishable from those in which democracy was not a consideration. However, such a distinction would be of dubious utility because of the minor role that the desire to establish democracy plays in the overall decision-making calculus.
A third, somewhat more central, role that Wolff and Wurm suggest external democracy promotion may play in American foreign policy is that of a secondary aim, which they equate to what Carothers calls a âsemi-realistâ approach to democracy promotion (1999, 16; in Wolff and Wurm 2011, 87). As a secondary aim of policymakers, democracy promotion is understood to be an important concern, but one that may lose significance when it comes into conflict with more central policy interests. One could argue, given the centrality of the importance of democracy in American political culture, that a democratic outcome may be in some instances be at least a secondary consideration in the decision to intervene.
Finally, at the other end of Wolff and Wurmâs typology is a classification that places democracy promotion as the primary goal of American leaders. At this location on the spectrum, advancing democracy is an aim that takes a significant role in guiding foreign policy actions, and it exists on an equal plane with other concerns. 1 Clearly, if democracy promotion is a primary goal of American foreign policy, then interventions are said to be initiated out of a concern for democracy can be uncritically accepted as genuine .
Where on this scale does the centrality of external democracy promotion to American foreign policy actually fit? One might make a strong case that, on balance, American democracy promotion falls somewhere in between the two extremes of being purely rhetorical and being the principal raison dâetre of interventions. It might not be difficult for many to accept the proposition that, at a minimum, the desire to spread democracy has a degree of instrumental value in helping to determine American foreign policy. The political culture of the USA fully embraces democratic values, both in written and spoken discourse. There are no major societal groups or movements in the American political landscape that stand in opposition to these values. However, the question remains to what degree democracy is a central goal of modern American foreign policy. I argue that, given the centrality of democracy to the American political identity and the fact that there are political advantages to pursuing democratic objectives, a desire to intervene for democratic purpose can be at least a secondary concern in policymakersâ minds in some foreign policy decisions (I refer to these advantages at length in Chapter 7).
It is almost certainly a bridge too far to argue that democracy is a primary motive for American foreign policy behavior that is equal to or even more central to American foreign policy strategy than security concerns. Clearly, if other, more critical national security aims cannot be achieved through a push for democracy in a target state, we would not expect an FD intervention to occur. However, if a desire for democratic change is a secondary concern, it may help to tip the balance in the direction of an intervention that attempts to establish democracy .
I concede that we will probably never be able to make the case that democratizing a target state is the sole purpose of any military intervention. However, to say that democracy is in all instances merely a rhetorical device or an inconsequential factor that can never play a significant role in foreign policy decision making is also too sweeping an assumption. The truth seems to be somewhere in the middle .
My positionâthat we should entertain the possibility of an intermediate positionâis based on the premise that it is rather implausible to argue that strategic concerns are the sole objective of American foreign policy. Elshtain (in Carothers 2007, 18) argues that an essential element of the American identity is a sense of a burden, or âmoral imperative ,â to spread democracy. At the same time, ideological principles almost never operate in a vacuum; they are invariably tempered with self-interest.
Among available policy tools aimed at liberalization, direct military intervention is almost never the first option considered. Instead, it often becomes more attractive to policymakers if and when other liberalization strategies do not produce the desired result. Liberalization strategies can be conceptualized using a spectrum of policy choices varying from least intrusive to most intrusive. At the least extreme end of such policy choices are democracy assistance and diplomatic pressure. Somewhere in the middle are political and economic sanctions, as well as boycotts...