Over the course of the past two centuries, the world has witnessed and fallen victim to an abundance of wars spread through the seven continents, ravaging and demolishing governments, cities, families, and lives. As we pass the midway mark of the year 2022, our world is still submerged in conflict and violence. We read updates of Russia and Ukraine, we speculate upon China and Taiwan, and we sigh at the political state of Afghanistan. Some wars are ongoing but simply forgotten, such as the Syrian Civil War. Some wars are not even military conflicts at all, such as the Saudi-Iranian Proxy War, or the Cold War. And some wars most of the population arguably doesn’t even know about at all, such as the Nagorno-Karabakh War. War infiltrates and controls so many aspects of life, whether one is caught in the crossfire or watching the evening news.
While war is varied and visible throughout the world, there are undeniably specific characteristics that shape one’s perception of a country poised and anticipated to demand war: the most common being the government under which the nation is ruled. While there is a variety of regimes under which a State is governed, the two most notable are authoritarian and democratic regimes. Generally, authoritarian regimes are recognized for their strong central government and leader/government that is not necessarily representative of the opinion of the people. In addition, the ruler of the State essentially has unlimited power, with little to no restrictions on the amount or reason of usage. Democracies are characterized by an elected representative as the leader of the country, oftentimes an opposition party, and are objectively known to grant more rights to the citizens. Governments represent, power, and dictate State’s decisions, including the declaration of war. It has been argued by many over the course of many years whether a democracy or authoritarian regime is more likely to initiate and take part in war. While democracies show a high rate of involvement in foreign war, it is essentially personalist regimes that are the most likely to initiate war against other nations and regimes due to the extent of power held by the dictator, the desire to prove a newly personalist regime as a legitimate government and a threat to democracy, and prevalent dispute over territory.
To fully understand the scope of the argument, it is crucial to comprehend the characteristics and complexities of different regimes to understand their motives behind partaking in war. The term ‘authoritarian regime’ is used to house a wide variety of distinct regimes that all fall under one broad definition, which was defined earlier. Personalist regimes are a sub-branch of authoritarianism that place the majority, if not all of the power of the government in the hands of a single dictator: hence the title. Some prime examples of personalist leaders include Saddam Hussein of Iraq, Mao Zedong of China, and Idi Amin in Uganda (Colgan and Weeks 164). According to ‘Revolution, Personalist Dictatorships, and International Conflict’ by Jeff D. Colgan and Jessica L.P. Weeks, revolution of a government or within a country is the root cause of international conflict, and almost half of all revolutions have ended in personalistic rule (164). Throughout the past centuries, democracy has evolved to become the status quo, and the whole main prospect of democracy is the ability to solve both international and internal conflict with peace and resolution, rather than resorting to military violence. Personalist and authoritarian regimes in general aim to abolish and reform the status quo, effectively making them more prone to violence and international conflict rather than peaceful negotiation (Colgan and Weeks 166). Indeed, this is proven by data. Personalist regimes take responsibility for 71% of international conflict initiated by nations with recent governmental revolutions (Colgan and Weeks 164). Dictators’ need to prove themselves and their nation as a legitimate state with a strong leader to other states fuels their desire to do so in a militaristic manner. Personalist regimes aim to reckon with the standards set by democracies, and doing so in a way that both opposes democratic ideals and morals as well as proves the power and validity of the nation is the most desirable for personalist dictators, therefore enabling them to ensue military conflict when disagreement spurs. Democracies do not share this desire to begin conflict, as they stand for the maintenance of peace and discussion regarding disagreement. Furthermore, democracies have no need to prove themselves to any larger or more powerful nation, because democracy itself is the newfound status quo. The institution of democracy is recognized as legitimate worldwide, whereas personalist regimes are not guaranteed the same validation. Therefore, the desire to prove themselves as a powerful nation as well as combat the basis of democracy are two reasons for which personalist regimes are more likely to engage in military conflict and make war.
A broad historical factor that has always seemed to elicit war is territory dispute. The main function of humans is that we, as a species, are constantly greedy. We are always wanting what we can’t have, more than we have, and more than others. This attribute can be extended to nations as a whole as well. The desire to garner more resources, more money, more power, and most of all, more land. The fights over territory have been long and fierce. A nation has many reasons to declare war in the name of land: They may believe land had been unjustly granted to another nation, land may be historically theirs, there is a large population and influence of their nation in another country’s territory, etc. But the most important reason for the sake of this argument is that a larger land mass is equivalent to more power. Now, power does not necessarily only entail military force, but also power over other nations. A country with a large land mass is more likely to be considered and regarded by other nations in comparison to a country with an extremely small land mass. A common similarity between the world’s superpowers is their vast amount of territory: The United States, Russia, China, and Germany all have a large amount of land under their name. Personalist regimes are likely to make war in the name of territory, and this has been proven historically. For example, the previous leader of Peru during its personalist era, Juan Velasco Alvarado, was planning on initiating war with Chile to regain lost territory from earlier conflicts (Colgan and Weeks 164). This shows a real historical example of how territory plays a role as a large interest for personalist regimes, for both gaining and proving power. Had Peru invaded Chile successfully under Alvarado’s rule, they would have not only increased Peru’s land mass, but also show a clear demonstration of Peru’s militaristic power and prove itself as a legitimate threat and nation to be considered to the rest of the world. Furthermore, democratic countries are more likely to have established lines of territory, and are more inclined to settle territorial conflict in a peaceful manner (Hegre 160). While the desire to go to war is prevalent in personalist regimes, it is not the most important factor in determining why personalist regimes are the most likely to engage in conflict. The most significant aspect is the nation’s ability to go to war. In democracies and even certain single-party authoritarian regimes, there are a series of checks and balances of power, and multiple veto voters along the way (Peceny and Butler 569). Due to this, it is a much longer and more critical process to actually declare war in a democracy in comparison to other regimes, given that the power is checked and balanced.
Furthermore, “democratic leaders are constrained by other bodies (such as parliaments) which ensure that the interests of citizens and powerful organizations are taken into account” (Hegre 161). Even in single-party authoritarian regimes, the main leader is surrounded by a group of elites who hold enough power for reconsideration of war, and there may even be veto voters to undermine the decisions made (Peceny and Butler 569). However, in personalist regimes, the system is drastically different. As the leader holds an extensive amount of power compared to the other regime types mentioned, they are able to make decisions much more freely compared to democracies and single-party regimes. The leader, instead of surrounding themself with a reliable, experienced group of elites, often chooses to employ an elite circle of people close to them, people who will essentially tell him anything he wants to hear (Peceny and Butler 569). This inner circle holds no real power in terms of convincing the leader to change their decision or even reconsider. The leader has absolute power to make decisions and declarations. Without any real criticism and balance of power, personalist regimes have a lot more freedom to make war than other regimes, therefore allowing them to make war more frequently and ineffectively. An example of this would be Islam Karimov, a prior leader of Uzbekistan. His political policies as a leader changed Uzbekistan from a communist to an autocratic regime, and he “kept the presidential guard, army, and internal security agency “under his close supervision and control” (Geddes et al. 61). Karimov’s internal political strategy demonstrates a clear example of the nature of personalist governments, and the power that is distributed within them. Karimov’s inner circle was nothing but cronies who wanted to benefit off him, and who would not disobey his orders out of fear that they would not be exiled from the small elite. Another prime example would be Saddam Hussein, the leader of Iraq prior to his overturning by the US government. Hussein structured his security apparatuses in such a way that no one would have the power to prevent him from assigning the most significant positions in the government to his relatives and close family, such as his sons (Colgan and Weeks 167). These two examples exemplify how ‘corruption’ of sorts is present within a personalist government, and how the power distribution is done in such a way that dictators would be able to make war without internal disagreement.
In terms of an application of this concept to a scenario with actual war involvement, we need not dig too far into history. Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine serves as a genuine instance where a singular personalist leader wields enough power to declare war without oppression within the State itself. Author Dmitry Shlapentokh states, “[Putin] does not have any drive or fixed goal besides maintaining his power, maintaining the status quo and expanding Russia's influence. The latter is the most important endeavour for Putin, and the Russian elite, which is anxious to restore the prestige of the former Soviet Union.” This magnifies all three arguments of how personalist nations desire to combat democracy, gain/maintain power, and expand in terms of territory, all through the usage of military force. The reason Putin was able to pursue these goals through military involvement was because he faced no major disaccord within his inner circle and government.
In general, personalist regimes are more risk-prone, because there is no system in which government actions can be reviewed and criticized prior to their approval. This single-power system is the main component that enables personalist regimes to so easily and readily make war, therefore increasing their likelihood of making war. The basis upon which war initiation is determined is not decided by a nation’s desire to make war, but rather the ease and ability to. In this sense, personalist regimes are the most prone to initiate and partake in war due to their desire to combat democratic ideals, their desire to gain territory, and their desire to prove themselves as a legitimate government and nation.
Bibliography
Colgan, Jeff D., and Jessica L.P. Weeks. “Revolution, Personalist Dictatorships, and International Conflict.” International Organization, vol. 69, no. 1, 2015, pp. 163–194., doi:10.1017/S0020818314000307.
Dmitry Shlapentokh. “Putin and Ukraine: Power and the Construction of History.” New Zealand International Review, vol. 47, no. 3, 2022, pp. 6–9, https://doi.org/10.3316/informit.437720093233952.
Hegre, Håvard. “Democracy and Armed Conflict.” Journal of Peace Research, vol. 51, no. 2, 2014, pp. 159–72, https://doi.org/10.1177/0022343313512852. Peceny, Mark, and Christopher K. Butler. “The Conflict Behavior of Authoritarian Regimes.” International Politics (Hague, Netherlands), vol. 41, no. 4, 2004, pp. 565–81, https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.ip.8800093.
“Power Concentration: The Effect of Elite Factionalism on Personalization.” How Dictatorships Work: Power, Personalization, and Collapse, by Barbara Geddes et al., Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2018, pp. 61–94.
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