ELECTIVE GOVERNMENTS - A FORCE FOR PEACE 民选政府—和平的力量 (1964年 迪恩·巴斯特 Dean Babst)

ELECTIVE GOVERNMENTS - A FORCE FOR PEACE

Dean V. Babst

Wisconsin State Department of Public Welfare

In 1961 Congress created the United States Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. One of the goals assigned to it was to carry out research toward achieving a ‘‘better understanding of how the basic structure of a lasting peace may be established (1)_". One ap­proach to this problem is to inquire whether there are certain types of governments which do not make war against each other.

PureJy impressionistically the hypothesis was formulated that these would be freely elected governments of independent countries, the borders of which are firmly established. This is based on the as­sumption that the general public does not want war, if it can choose. However, the possibility of choice requires independence and the existence of an elective government. The tendencies of such govern­ments to work out international differences by means other than war would be most obvious in their dealings with other such governments.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a preliminary test of this hypothsis. This test was made by asking the question. “Have there been any wars fought between independent freely elected govern­ments?" In order to make a systematic test’ a search was made for a list of wars and the countries participating in them. One of the best enumerations was found in Quincy Wright’s book A Study of War (2).

Wright and his associates listed all major wars fought since 1500. They define a major war as one important enough to involve over 50,000 troops or to cause the creation or extinction of states, territorial transfers, or changes in governments.

Using this list, each war was evaluated to determine if any free­ly elected independent government fought each other. In order to objectively compare governments of various areas for different per­iods, it was necessary to deve]op an operational definition of the type of government in which we are interested. The definition used is that a country's government will be considered as freely elected, for the year under consideration, when it has the following four character­istics:

1.      Legislation and national finances are controlled by a leg­islature or parliament whose members are chosen by majority vote from at least two opposing choices, at reg­ular intervals, by the electorate.

2,      The administrative control of the government is by an executive chosen by majority vote by a parliament se­cured in the above manner, or by direct vote of the elec­torate, from two or more opposing candidates, at reg­ular intervals. If an hereditary ruler, such as a king, can chose the prime minister or president, then the country is not considered to have an elective government unless the monarch’s function is primarily ceremonial.

The author wishes to express his gratitude to Hugo 〇.Engelman. John W. Mannering and Paul H. Kusuda for their critical review of an earlier version of the paper.

3. There is a secret ballot and some freedom of speech and press; otherwise the opposing choices are not legitimate.

4. Since in a country that is not independent the population cannot exercise a relevant choice the country must be independent at the start of the war.

The question here is whether any wars occurred between gov­ernments meeting the preceding specifications. Quincy Wright's list of wars extends from 1480 to 1941, when his book was published. However, only the wars from 1789 to 1941 were analyzed. 1789 was selected as a starting point for this study, because it was this year the first elective government in our sense, that of the United State, began operating.

James Bryce, shows the recency of popular elective governments in. human history (3),

“A century ago there was in the Old World only one tiny spot in which the working of democracy could be studied. A few of the ancient rural cantons of Switzerland had recovered their freedom after the fall of Napoleon, and were governing themselves as they had done from the earlier Middle Ages, but they were too small and their conditions too peculiar to furnish instruction to larger communities or throw much light on popular governments in general. Nowhere else in Europe did the people rule. Britain enjoyed far wider freedom than any part of the European Continent, but her local as well as central government was still oligarchic. When the American Republic began its national life with the framing and adop­tion of the Federal Constitution in 1787-89, the only materials which history furnished to its founders were those which the republics of antiquity had provided, so it was to these ma­terials that both those founders and the men of the first French Revolution constantly recurred for examples to be fol­lowed or avoided.”

From this shaky beginning, popular elected governments have grown greatly in number and size to become a world force. Despite two world wars and many lesser ones there has been a large growth in the number of elective governments, e. g. United States, Great Britain, Norway, West Germany, Finland, India, Canada, Ireland, Netherlands, Israel, Australia, Switzerland.

Quincy Wright and his associates list 116 major wars from 1789 to 1941 (date of publication), with 438 participating countries. An analysis of this list shows that no wars have been fought between in­dependent nations with elective governments. Such nations have fought many wars against autocratic governments, and even some against their own colonies who wanted to become independent, but these nations have not waged war against each other.

Only the major wars can be considered in this paper. It is hoped that the testing of the hypothesis can be extended to the future. We should also find answers to these further, unresolved questions. For example, why have some of these elective governments occasional­ly fought a colony or area under their control which also had a freely elected government and was trying to become independent? This appears to be a serious weakness with elective governments but cannot be considered here.

.Elective Governments — A Force for Peace

The first war that came close to being a war between inde­pendent nations with elective governments was the war of 1812. In this war the United States was independent and had an elective government. Great Britain had an elected parliament but the king still dictated the choice of the prime minister and had considerable power in the operation of the government. It was not until about 1832 that parliment choose the prime minister.

In the Civil War, starting in 1861，the Southern States had an elective government but were not independent. Rather they were fighting to become independent and establish their boundaries. The South African War starting in 1899, between Great Britain and South Africa was another war of this type.

In the nineteenth century the number of independent nations with freely elected governments was limited. Consequently, while there was the possibility of war between such governments the prob­ability of such occurring at any one time was small. However, the fact that during the entire century no major war occurred between such nations lend support to our hypothesis.

Could the fact that there were no major wars between independ­ent elective governments have occurred by chance? World Wars I and II provide an opportunity to make a more rigorous test of this pos­sibility. These wars had more participants than any of the other wars listed by Wright.

Irv World War I 38 countries participated (Wright, Table 41). Five of these were not independent at the start of the war; India, Hejaz, Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia. This leaves the 33 independent nations shown in Table 1. Of these ten had elective governments as defined earlier.

Table 1 Independent Naiions Which Participated in World War I Allies and Associated Powers___________________________ Central Powers Elective Non-Elective Non-Elective Governments Governments Governments Australia China Montenergro Austria-Hungary Belgium Costa Rica Nicaragua Bulgaria Canada Cuba Panama Germany Great Britain Greece Portugal Turkey France Guatemala Rumania Italy Haiti Russia Brazil Honduras San Marino New Zealand Japan Serbia Union of Liberia Siam South Africa Luxemburg United States ______

Could the fact, that all of the independent elective governments were on the same side have occurred by chance? One way of statis­tical testing this relationship is in the following manner. Between the 33 independent nations there were 33!       or 528 possible

(33-2)1!

ways they could have fought on another. There were 72 declarations of war between them. With this many war relationships the prob­ability of war between any two nations was p equals 72 equals .14.

Between the 10 elective governments there were10!/ (10-2)! 2!  or

45 different ways they could have fought one another. There were no wars declared between them. The proportion of wars fought to wars possible was p equals 0/45 equals 0,

Using the test for the significance of the difference between pro­portions it was found that the difference between these proportions was statistically significant on the 1 percent level.

Another intriguing thing about World War I is that before Italy entered the war she was allied with the Central Powers. This meant that Italy, with an elective government at that time, was allied, against many other elective governments. However, before she en­tered the war public sentiment turned so strongly against the alliance that it was broken and eventually Italy entered the war on the side of other elective governments.

Germany and Austria-Hungary prior to World War I had gov­ernments with some elective features, however they could not be considered elective governments as specified in this study. Germany had an elective Reichstag but the Emperor, an hereditary ruler, had much authority such as choosing the chancellor. In Austria-Hungary the Emperor had considerable power and used it. Prior to the war he had parliament adjourned, and it remained muzzled for several years thereafter.

World War II provides another opportunity to test whether the lack of wars between independent nations with elective governments could have occurred by chance. The same procedure was followed as in the case of World War I. Fifty-two nations which participated in the war were independent on Sept 1, 1939, the date the. invasion of Poland began. See Table 2. Of the 52 nations, 14 had elective gov­ernments in our sense. Between the 52 nations there were 52!/(52-2)2!

or 1,326 possible ways they could have fought one another.

______ Alleis_______			Axis Powers
Nations With Elev- tive Governments	Nations Without Elective _____________ Governments
Australia	Argentina	Latvia	Bulgaria*
Belgium	Bolivia	Liberia	Finland*
Canada	Brazil	Lithuania	Germany Hungary*
Chile	China	Luxenburg
Costa Hica	Columbia	Mexico	Italy
Denmark	Cuba	Nicaragua	Japan
France	Dominican	Panama	Rumania
Great Britain	Republic	Paraguay	Siam*
Netherlands	Ecuador	Peru
New Zealand	El Salvador	Poland
Norway	Estonia	Hussia
Union of	Greece	Saudi Arabia
South Africa	Guatemala	Tukey
Uruguay	Haiti	Venezula
United States	Honduras Iran	Yugoslavia

Table 2 Nations Which Were Independent on September 1 ,1939 And Which Pariicipaled in World War II

Elective Governments — A Force for Peace

*These members of the Axis Powers were first occupied by Ger­many and Japan and then used against the Allies.

Wright's book was published before the end of the war, therefore the source for the data on World War II are his book and the States- men's Yearbooks (4).

During the second World War there were 103 war relationships between the independent nations. The only war relationships counted were those that occurred before the nations lost their independence. A declaration of war, or an invasion of a country without a declara­tion of war, were counted as war relationship.

With this many war relationships the probability of war between any two nations was p equals 103/1,326 equals .078.

Between the 14 elective nations involved there were 14!/(14-2)! 2!

or 91 different ways they could have fought one another. Since there were no wars declared between them，the proportion of wars fought to that possible was p equals 0/105 equals 0. Again testing the difference between these proportions, it was found to be statistically significant on the 1 percent level.

In World War II there was one nation with an elective govern­ment, Finland, which fought with the Axis Powers against the other elective governments. This situation provides a very interesting ex­ample of the desire for peace between nations with elective govern­ments. Finland frequently expressed a desire not to fight the other nations with elective governments but she had lost her independence prior to December, 1941, when she entered the war.

After Hitler took Norway he insisted on the right to transport troops across Finland to face Hussia. This was reluctantly granted. He then disregarded the terms of the transit agreement so that by June 1941 there were two German SS divisions with their entire military equipment moving about North Finland. During the war the Finns were left some independence of action since Hitler wanted their help in fighting Russia. However, an indication of how little this inde­pendence amounted to is given by the fact that the Germans were only removed after they had devasted much of Northern Finland in 1945.

No rigorous test of the wars from World War II to 1963 was made. This is another study in itself. However a general review of the main wars since 1941 appears to be consistent with the findings here reported.

This study suggests that the existence of independent nations with eJective governments greatly increases the chances for the main­tenance of peace. What is important is the form of government, not na- ional character. Many nations, such as England and France, fought wars against each other before they acquired freely elected governments, but have not done so since. The rapid increase in the nrnnber of elec­tive governments since World War II is an encouraging sign. Diplo­matic efforts at war prevention might well be directed toward fur­ther accelerating this growth.       •

Heferences

(1)     An Aci To Establish A Uniled States Arms Control and Disarm­ament Agency, Public Law 87-297, September 27, 1961.

(2)     Wright, Quincy; A Siudy of War, Volume 1, Chicago University of Chicago Press 1942.

(3)     Bryce, James; Modern Democracies, Volume 1, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1929 p. 3,

(4)      Steinberg, S. H, editor, Staleman's Year-book, New York, Saint Martin Press.

http://hawaii.edu/powerkills/BABST.ELECTIVE.GOVERNMENT.PDF