LIBERAL INTERNATIONALISM:
FREE TRADE AND DEMOCRATIC PEACE
International Political
Economy
Ryan Cloyd Q. Villanueva
BA-Political Science 4

LIBERALISM
 Most well-developed paradigmatic challenger to realism.
 Global cooperation is possible and that we can move
beyond the power politics at the heart of the realist
paradigm.
 The key assumption is PEACE and COOPERATION among
states to produce absolute gains for all.
*Absolute Gains – for clear and more conducive to
international cooperation.
 Origin and Proponent: German philosopher Immanuel
Kant.

Immanuel Kant
He argued that the natural states of
human kind is one of war and
conflict. However, he also suggested
that states can establish peace
among themselves.

The state of peace would be the result of several factors:
1. The creation of a loose “federation of free states”
whose members are committed to maintaining
international order and security.
2. The “spirit of commerce” which in Kant’s view is
incompatible with war sooner or later gains the
hand in every state.
3. The creation of republican governments in which
executive power is checked by an independent
legislature.

LIBERAL INTERNATIONALISM
People do not want war.
However, instances comes that war will exist but
to prevent war, it is necessary to promote
democratic political systems and the principles of
self-determination.

Republican government is an important source of
“perpetual peace”. Accordingly by Kant’s view,
places were government is based on the consent of
the people, there will be reluctance to go to war
because of the hardships that war invariably
impose on those citizens.

On Kant’s federation of free states, it was premised
on the assumption that its members would be
republics with this domestic political disincentive
to go to war.

Accordingly to the liberal internationalist, the key
to peace is to expand the number of republics. In a
democratic state, citizens made decision directly,
but in the modern world, states are characterized
as liberal democracies which generally equates to
the republican government.

The KantianTriangle
Institutions
PEACE
Democracy
Economic
Interdependence

Conclusively, the vicious circle of fear, mistrust,
and conflict that characterizes the realist “security
dilemma” can be replaced by a “virtuous circle” of
mutual interests and cooperation produced by
mutually reinforcing impact of all three points of
the Kantian Triangle.