y = -26.2 + 23.2 nx 1 R 2 = .87 p -11 , one-tailed y = -26.7 + 24.1 nx 2 R 2 = .83 p -9 , one-tailed where y = score on the Conflict Scale of Figure 1 x 1 =joint dyadic political freedom score x 2 = joint dyadic freedom score n = natural logarithm N = 25

As should be expected, the maximum conflict behavior per political freedom or freedom score is well represented by continually rising curves, logarithmic in each case. This is shown by the coefficients of determination R 2 , both of which are highly significant. Freedom, however, is not a significantly better fit than political freedom. But when the results get this good (accounting for at least 83% of the variance), even greater significant improvement becomes very difficult.

Nonetheless, as theory predicts, when the curves of Figure 6 and Figure 7 are overlayed, as shown in Figure 5 the freedom curve is higher. That is, for the same political freedom and (transformed) freedom score, freedom predicts to a higher level of violence.

All this aside, the plots and shape of the curves in Figure 6 and Figure 7 in the region of those dyads involving libertarian states sum up the theory underlying Hypothesis 1 and Hypothesis 3. Clearly, freedom makes a critical difference in conflict behavior and marks a fundamental threshold between violence and nonviolence. Note especially that the greatest increase in the maximum conflict behavior along the curves happens when freedom is beginning to be lost, and the maximum violence occurs when both members of a dyad are no longer free at all. 19

CONCLUSION

Contiguity is not an intervening variable: Contiguous or not, libertarian states do not exert violence on each other; and whether having common borders or not, the less freedom in states, the more violence between them.

Whether libertarian is defined by political freedom or freedom, the data are highly supportive of the propositions. However, while economic freedom does not significantly detract from the Joint Freedom Proposition, it is clearly important for the Freedom one. To add economic freedom to civil liberties and political rights is to reduce significantly the level of violence for a state overall, or between particular states. For the Freedom Proposition, the libertarian's (or classical liberal's) faith in the peaceful effects of economic freedom appears" according to these data, well justified.

POSSIBLE CRITICISMS

20

The best check against normative bias involves two stages. One is presenting clear and precise data and methods, using systematic and objective techniques, and making tests and conclusions intersubjectively verifiable. The second is even more important. It is the actual attempt to refute through reanalysis or new data what one believes to be biased or wrong. It is, in short, through the dialectical process of presenting controversial results and the attempts at their public refutation that we check bias.

(2) The sample is too limited, and does not include the period when democracies were heavily involved in war, such as the Suez or Vietnam War periods. First, in including all violence for five years, the sample is hardly limited. Second, other samples were drawn on, such as of all wars between 1816 and 1974, and all threats or actual use of force between 1945 and 1965, which all show the same lack of violence or wars between democracies. Third, such wars as Vietnam are irrelevant to the Joint Freedom Proposition, for that is a case of a libertarian state versus a nonlibertarian one. In any case, one must make one's tests with one sample at a time. The real question is whether this sample is important and these tests well done.

(3) Violence is misconstrued. This study severely neglects the violence of the rich or imperialist nations against the poor, or what is called "structural violence." "Violence" as physically attacking the life, limb, and property of others is the consensual meaning in both field and libertarian theory. This criticism would really want to use another theory and meaning, one based on a socialist and equalitarian perspective. Fine. But then the onus is the critic's to show that the concept of "structural violence" will yield better results, in some sense, than the one given here. 21

(4) The theory is too sketchy--its logic and properties need detailing, especially regarding economic freedom. I agree, but the purpose here is to test the two propositions and not to present the theory that I have elaborated elsewhere in greater detail (e.g., Vol. 4: War, Power, Peace).

With regard to economic freedom, the basic idea is that intervention of centralized, coercive power--government--into a social field has certain social effects, among which is an increase in the polarization of interests (forces) and a reduction of cross-pressures. By theory and holding other things constant, this should increase the level of violence in the social field (Vol. 2: The Conflict Helix: Part VIII) and decrease inhibitions in the foreign policy behavior of the elite. That mixed capitalist-socialist democratic systems like Sweden or Denmark, therefore, should be more violent than the United States or West Germany may strike some as silly. But then among the mixed democracies are also Israel, the United Kingdom, and Portugal; and also among the capitalist are Iceland, Switzerland, and New Zealand. For these two groups the claim that the former should and does have more violence is not at all strange. All this says, of course, is that the theory should not be left to socialist or liberal predispositions, but must be tested systematically. And this I have tried to do here.

(5) But you still should have carried out a sensitivity analysis. What would be the result if say, Sweden's freedom values were changed from partially free to free? Ordinarily, I think it methodologically unwise to change the values of a case alone in a sensitivity study, for then it is not clear what unique or common aspects of a case are causing the resulting effects. A better approach is to vary uniformly a variable or group of cases based on some theoretical or hypothetical principle. Here, I have in fact done this. For although mixed capitalist-socialist democracies like Sweden, Denmark, and Norway are coded partially libertarian on the freedom scale (and these are the cases that I believe will most bother some readers), their values are all changed to libertarian for the political freedom scale. That is, on the principle that political and civil rights completely dominate economic freedom, Sweden, Norway, and others are treated as free. Thus we have the two sets of results for political freedom and freedom, where those for political freedom in comparison to freedom can be considered methodologically a sensitivity analysis of the role of economic freedom.

(6) Contiguity should have been measured on a many-valued scale to take account of the impact of near contiguity. Perhaps, but I do not believe the scale will make much difference. Politically, the threshold condition is a common border; lack of such contiguity is, however scaled, of a different order. In other words, scaling contiguity should only marginally, if at all, alter the present results.

(7) Statistical tests were done without a well-defined sample, in a sample survey sense. The population is of interstate, dyadic violence, anywhere, anytime. The sample is of all such violence between 1976 and 1980 and was selected randomly with regard to the hypothesis. It is arguable whether this sample represents well the relevant characteristics of the historical population, but the working assumption is that it does.

Clearly, more samples must be taken and much more work be done before this question can be shelved; however, recall that other and larger samples of war and violence were used also.

But there is another answer. The statistical tests also assess whether for the given sample the particular combination of results (i.e., no violence falling among libertarian dyads) could occur by chance. And if the critic does not like my answer about sampling, he should nonetheless accept the statistical tests as valid on these second (not secondary) grounds.

(8) The variance in violence that libertarianism explains is low (see Figure 2 and Figure 3). Therefore, while the results are statistically significant, they are for practical purposes insignificant. True, the variance explained is low in some cases (but note also the high variance for the functions fitting the highest magnitudes of violence), but explaining variance is not the essence of this study. It is determining whether the prediction of no violence, or of decreasing violence with increasing libertarianism, holds true, and if so, whether this result could be due to chance. As to practical significance, the policy importance of establishing the credibility of these propositions should be obvious.

NOTES

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16. Since I am defining mathematical functions that may be useful in studies other than this one, rather than statistically testing contingencies I employed the full sample of dyadic violence used for testing Hypothesis 1.

17. The transformation was as follows. Freedom scores 6 and 7 were each given a new score of 4, 8 and 9, a new score of 5; 10 and 11, a new score of 6; ... ; 55 and 56, a new score of 28 (at the midpoint-to make up for an extra freedom score compared to political freedom-scores 30, 31, and 32 were each given a new score of 16). Then the highest violence score for 6 and 7 became that for the new score of 4; the highest for 8 and 9 became that for 5, and so on.

18. The reason for the difference in N is that no dyad having the political freedom scale value of 10 had violence (as can be seen from Figure 2).

19. I need to underline here that the classification of politically free or free states depends on Freedom House's criteria of "free," "partially free," and "nonfree" types, and therefore was established for this study prior and external to any data analysis.

20. 1 am well aware of the dichotomy between facts and values. However, values, often involve empirical assumptions that can be tested. On this dichotomy, see my Vol. 5: The Just Peace (Section 4.2.4E). See Part II of the book for my theory of social justice.

21. 1 have tried to deal normatively and systematically with the concept of structural violence elsewhere (Vol. 5: The Just Peace, Section 3.9.3).

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