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In recent times, 'just war' discourse has become unfortunately associated, in the minds of some, with the idea of the forcible promotion or imposition of democracy as a legitimate just cause. It would thus be understandable if supporters of just war theory were to disavow any particular linkage of its tenets with the democratic ideal. However, while certainly not endorsing the stated cause, this article contends that the theory in its most plausible and attractive form does exhibit certain biases towards the ideal, in both jus ad bellum and jus post bellum. If these biases fall short of shackling the theory to claims such as 'only democracies can fight just wars', they may nevertheless place taxing justificatory burdens on a non-democracy's claim to have a war-waging right and on non-democratic conceptions of the just peace that should ideally follow a just war.

If contractualism causes both democracy and peace, the correlation between democracy and peace is spurious. But the definition of contractualism is sufficiently unclear as to create doubts that it has such an impact. In addition, if democracy has an impact on contractualism, then, even with an otherwise perfectly specified model, controlling for contractualism will bias estimates of the effect of democracy on peace. International trade involves contracting behavior between strangers in different states. In addition, unlike contracting behavior within states, trade involves interactions in the same arena where interstate conflict needs to be deterred. Contractualist states have existed in significant numbers only recently. This limits contractualism's ability to compete with democracy as a predictor of peace. Mousseau's previous findings have been extraordinarily fragile. Finally, observational data should be complemented by multiple streams of evidence. Some experimental data support democratic peace theory; analogous experiments would almost certainly not provide evidence to support contractualism.

The problems and prospects of democratic peace have attracted both scholars of international relations and policy makers in recent years. The main argument is that the promotion of democracy will lower the probability of war because democracies have not yet gone to war against each other. The promotion of democratic governance therefore became one of the cornerstones of the foreign policies in both the U.S. and the member countries of the European Union (EU) in the 1990s. South Asia can surely be regarded as a region where the benefits of democratic peace would be more than desirable. South Asia's image as a region of chronic instability was only to be seconded by U.S. President Clinton's remarks in March 2000 that the Line of Control (LoC) in Kashmir is the 'most dangerous place in the world'. The events following September 11 and the growing tensions between India and Pakistan after the attacks of Islamic militants on the Indian parliament in December 2001 have again increased the probability of a nuclear war in this part of the world. But the overall picture of the region is more complex. Besides the well-known conventional and nuclear security risks, South Asia is also among the poorest and least developed regions in the world according to international social and economic indicators. Despite these developments there are remarkable traditions of democratic rule at the same time. During most of the 1990s, South Asia was the biggest democratic region after the transition from authoritarian rule in Pakistan (1988), Nepal (1990) and Bangladesh (1990). Moreover, South Asia is the only region where western political institutions go hand in hand with a variety of non-western civilisations and where religion plays an active role in current politics. The only forms of Hindu and Islamic democracies are to be found in Nepal and Bangladesh, and Buddhism received a foremost place in the Sri Lanka constitution. In contrast to other Asian regions there is a strong commitment by South Asian countries to follow the ...

The problems and prospects of democratic peace have attracted both scholars of international relations and policy makers in recent years. The main argument is that the promotion of democracy will lower the probability of war because democracies have not yet gone to war against each other. The promotion of democratic governance therefore became one of the cornerstones of the foreign policies in both the U.S. and the member countries of the European Union (EU) in the 1990s. South Asia can surely be regarded as a region where the benefits of democratic peace would be more than desirable. South Asia's image as a region of chronic instability was only to be seconded by U.S. President Clinton's remarks in March 2000 that the Line of Control (LoC) in Kashmir is the 'most dangerous place in the world'. The events following September 11 and the growing tensions between India and Pakistan after the attacks of Islamic militants on the Indian parliament in December 2001 have again increased the probability of a nuclear war in this part of the world. But the overall picture of the region is more complex. Besides the well-known conventional and nuclear security risks, South Asia is also among the poorest and least developed regions in the world according to international social and economic indicators. Despite these developments there are remarkable traditions of democratic rule at the same time. During most of the 1990s, South Asia was the biggest democratic region after the transition from authoritarian rule in Pakistan (1988), Nepal (1990) and Bangladesh (1990). Moreover, South Asia is the only region where western political institutions go hand in hand with a variety of non-western civilisations and where religion plays an active role in current politics. The only forms of Hindu and Islamic democracies are to be found in Nepal and Bangladesh, and Buddhism received a foremost place in the Sri Lanka constitution. In contrast to other Asian regions there is a strong commitment by South Asian countries to follow the development model that is included in the democratic peace debate. There is a great consensus for democracy and economic liberalisation. The constitutions of South Asian countries promote individual rights in contrast to community rights that created the debate on "Asian values" in parts of East and Southeast Asia some years ago. The ambivalent picture of conflict, poverty, and democracy offers an interesting test case for the theoretical assumptions of the democratic peace debate. In how far have periods of democratic governance on the domestic level as well as on the bilateral level brought about greater periods of peace as suggested by the theoretical debate? Will widespread democratisation and economic interdependence improve the prospects for peace and stability in the region? In order to address the problems and prospects of the democratic peace argument in South Asia, I will first give a short overview about the theoretical argument. In the second part, I will look at the domestic situation, the bilateral relations at the regional level and the role of economic interdependence and international institutions. Finally, I will draw conclusions about the applicability of the democratic peace argument for South Asia.

If contractualism causes both democracy and peace, the correlation between democracy and peace is spurious. But the definition of contractualism is sufficiently unclear as to create doubts that it has such an impact. In addition, if democracy has an impact on contractualism, then, even with an otherwise perfectly specified model, controlling for contractualism will bias estimates of the effect of democracy on peace. International trade involves contracting behavior between strangers in different states. In addition, unlike contracting behavior within states, trade involves interactions in the same arena where interstate conflict needs to be deterred. Contractualist states have existed in significant numbers only recently. This limits contractualism's ability to compete with democracy as a predictor of peace. Mousseau's previous findings have been extraordinarily fragile. Finally, observational data should be complemented by multiple streams of evidence. Some experimental data support democratic peace theory; analogous experiments would almost certainly not provide evidence to support contractualism.

I am grateful for the opportunity to respond to the rejoinders to my article, "The Flawed Logic of Democratic Peace Theory" (Rosato 2003). In each case, I summarize the core issues at stake and explain why I do not believe that my critics have succeeded in casting serious doubt on my original argument.