2012/07/01 by Alexander B. Downes, Todd S. Sechser · 144 citations
Social Sciences · #Computer science #Credibility #Democracy #Economics #Epistemology #International Relations and Foreign Policy #Law #Microeconomics #Outcome (game theory) #Political Conflict and Governance #Political economy #Political science #Politics #Positive economics #Proposition #Set (abstract data type) #Terrorism, Counterterrorism, and Political Violence #Test (biology)
paper · doi:10.1017/s0020818312000161
published in International Organization 66(3), 457-489 (University of Cambridge)
openalex publication_date 2012/07/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/04
Abstract Do democracies make more effective coercive threats? An influential literature in international relations argues that democratic institutions allow leaders to credibly signal their resolve in crises, thereby making their threats more likely to work than threats by nondemocracies. This article revisits the quantitative evidence for this proposition, which we call the “democratic credibility hypothesis,” and finds that it is surprisingly weak. Close examination of the data sets most commonly used to test this hypothesis reveals that they contain few successful democratic threats, or indeed threats of any kind. Moreover, these data sets' outcome variables do not properly measure the effectiveness of threats, and therefore yield misleading results. The article then reassesses the democratic credibility hypothesis using the Militarized Compellent Threats data set, a new data set designed specifically to test hypotheses about the effectiveness of coercive threats. The analysis indicates that threats from democracies are no more successful than threats from other states.