Democracy and the Settlement of International Borders, 1919 to 2001

There is increasing evidence that territorial conflict is associated with centralized and nondemocratic regimes. We explore whether this relationship is due to the facility of democratic regimes to settle their international borders. Using Owsiak’s data set on border settlement processes, we find little evidence that democratic regimes are more likely than other types of regimes to settle their borders. In fact, joint democracy rarely precedes the first border agreement or full settlement of the border, and there is almost no qualitative evidence suggesting a link between democracy and border settlement in the rare instances of successful agreements. Democracies are also not more likely to keep their borders settled or even to be more peaceful during settled-border years. Overall, our findings suggest that border settlements lead to peace in the dyad and affirm a clear temporal sequence of border settlement, then peace and democracy for neighboring dyads.