Symposium: Even Dictators have Friends: Autocratic Cooperation in the International System

[This is a post-publication review symposium.] In the 1990s and early 2000s, conflict scholars, especially those in the quantitative tradition, probed and prodded democratic peace theory and generally agreed that the phenomenon of peace (i.e., non-interstate war) to be an empirical reality for democratic pairs of states. [1] Understanding democratic state behavior is now a pillar of conflict research and includes examining crises behavior, war, foreign-imposed regime change, terrorism, intrastate war, and many other topics. Although scholars explained where and when democracies increase or reduce conflict behavior, they paid comparatively less attention to autocratic states. In addition, the cooperative behaviors of certain regime types in the international system have often been treated as simply the lack of conflict. With democracy stalling or rolling back in both Latin America and the Middle East, understanding the external behavior of autocratic states is increasing in importance. [...]【本文为出版后评议专题研讨会内容】20世纪90年代至21世纪初，冲突研究学者，尤其是秉持量化研究传统的学者，对民主和平论（Democratic Peace Theory）展开了深入探析与严谨检视，最终普遍认可：民主国家间的和平现象（即无国家间战争）是经实证验证的客观事实[1]。如今，民主国家行为研究已是冲突研究的核心支柱之一，研究范畴涵盖危机应对行为、战争、外部强加的政权更迭、恐怖主义、国内冲突（intrastate war）等诸多议题。尽管学者们已就民主国家何时、何地会增强或削弱冲突行为作出了解释，但相对而言，他们对专制国家的关注却较为不足。此外，国际体系中特定政权类型的合作行为，往往被简单等同于无冲突状态。当前拉美与中东地区的民主进程陷入停滞甚至出现倒退，因此探究专制国家的对外行为，其重要性正日益凸显。[……]