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Kantian Liberalism and the Collective Defense of Democracy in Latin America

RANDALL PARISH and MARK PECENY
Journal of Peace Research 2002 39: 229
DOI: 10.1177/0022343302039002005

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05parish (ds) 7/2/02 2:39 pm Page 229

2002 Journal of Peace Research,

vol. 39, no. 2, 2002, pp. 229250
Sage Publications (London, Thousand Oaks,
CA and New Delhi)
[0022-3433(200203)39:2; 229250; 022960]

Kantian Liberalism and the Collective Defense of

Democracy in Latin America*
RANDALL PARISH & MARK PECENY
Department of Political Science, University of New Mexico

This article highlights a systemic aspect of the liberal peace that has been underemphasized by the exist-
ing literature. It argues that the liberal peace is constructed in part by the active efforts of a variety of
liberal states and international organizations to promote democracy within states. This article examines
the collective defense of democracy regime in the Americas to illustrate this political dynamic and applies
Immanuel Kants original formulation of the liberal pacific union to understand the contemporary inter-
American system. The combination of a stronger Organization of American States built on a liberal
democratic consensus among member-states, increasing trade interdependence, and a more liberal
regional hegemony has transformed the inter-American system. One of the principal manifestations of
this enhanced liberalism is that states in the Americas have agreed to intervene collectively in the domes-
tic affairs of member-states to ensure the continuation of democratic regimes. For elected leaders and
economic elites throughout the region and US policymakers, this support for democratic rule reflects
material self-interest more than liberal idealism. While this collective defense of democracy regime,
codified in the Santiago Commitment of 1991, clearly reflects the increasingly liberal character of the
inter-American system, this regime also challenges the principled commitment to self-determination
that was essential to Kants original formulation of the liberal pacific union. We examine the regional
response to the first three overt challenges to the Santiago Commitment, in Haiti (1991), Peru (1992),
and Guatemala (1993) to show how the collective defense of democracy has become a crucial element
of how liberalism shapes international politics in the Americas.

Introduction 1999). Increasingly, scholars have empha-

sized more systemic components of the
What best explains the liberal peace? Many
liberal argument. Some focus on the alliances
scholars focus on the purely domestic sources
liberal states form with one another and on
of the liberal peace. Liberal cultural values,
their shared membership in a variety of inter-
the constraints imposed by republican insti-
national organizations (Gaubatz, 1996;
tutions of governance, the transparency of
Risse-Kappen, 1996; Russett & Oneal, 2001:
liberal polities, and/or other domestic charac-
157196). Others suggest that trade inter-
teristics account for the relative absence of
dependence provides a critical foundation of
conflict between liberal democracies (Dixon,
the liberal peace (Russett & Oneal, 2001:
1994; Fearon, 1994; Gaubatz, 1991; Morgan
125155). Still others argue that liberal states
& Campbell, 1991; Russett, 1993; Schultz,
are peaceful toward one another because their
* An earlier version of this article was presented at the strength and war-fighting capabilities make
Western Political Science Association Conference, Seattle, them formidable adversaries in the global
WA, March 1999. We thank Jennifer Bailey, Wade Huntley,
Torbjrn Knutsen, Marcus Kurtz, Ken Roberts, and Bill balance of power (Bueno de Mesquita et al.,
Stanley for their comments on earlier drafts. 1999; Lake, 1992).

229
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230 j ou r n a l o f P E A C E R E S E A RC H
We argue that systemic forces are becom-
ing increasingly important in shaping a
liberal peace in the inter-American system.
Only in the past decade has this system taken
on a consistently liberal character. The preva-
lence of authoritarian governments, insular
economic models, and US preoccupation
with Cold War security meant that the
system rarely functioned as a liberal union
prior to the 1990s. Today, however, nearly all
Latin American states are governed by
directly elected civilian regimes. The
Organization of American States (OAS), the
principal international institution in the
region, is therefore composed almost entirely
of liberal states for the first time in its history.
In addition, virtually every state in the region
has embraced liberal economic reforms and
full integration into global markets. Finally,
the systems strongest power, the United
States, behaves more like a liberal state in the
post-Cold War era, actively promoting
multilateral cooperation and democratic
institutions. Together, a stronger OAS,
increasing trade interdependence, and a more
liberal regional hegemony have brought
about an unprecedented transformation of
the inter-American system. While a variety of
studies have begun to emphasize these factors
(Farer, 1996; Lowenthal & Treverton, 1994;
Pastor, 1992; Remmer, 1993), none has fully
integrated them in a theoretical framework
that draws explicitly on the liberal argument.
The inter-American system contains one
important element that is not captured by
existing systemic explanations of the liberal
peace. At its 1991 General Assembly meeting
in Santiago, Chile, the OAS institutionalized
its transformation by creating formal
mechanisms to address internal threats to
democracy within member-states. The
Assembly Resolution, commonly called the
Santiago Commitment, commits the
members to specific, although open-ended,
procedures in the event of the sudden, or
irregular interruption of the democratic
volume 39 / number 2 / march 2002
political institutional process (OAS, 1991).
States in the Americas have banded together
in the collective defense of democracy and
indicated a willingness to intervene in the
domestic affairs of member-states to ensure
the continuation of democratic regimes
(Farer, 1996).
Concrete material interests provide the
foundations of the collective defense of
democracy regime. Civilian political leaders
oppose coups anywhere in the region in a
collective effort to protect their own weakly
institutionalized and unconsolidated demo-
cratic regimes. Business and political leaders
fear the disruption of mutually beneficial
trade relations that could emerge from
political change in neighboring countries.
The USA has embraced a strategy of demo-
cratic enlargement and liberal international-
ism to legitimate its continued hegemony to
domestic and international audiences. Local
actors considering the overthrow of elected
regimes fear isolation by their neighbors, the
imposition of economic sanctions, and the
opposition of the United States.
This collective defense of democracy
regime illustrates a central element of the sys-
temic forces shaping the liberal peace. The
liberal peace does not merely arise from
domestic liberalism. The international
system does not simply reinforce the ties
between liberal states. The liberal peace is
constructed and reproduced in part by the
active efforts of a variety of liberal states and
international organizations to promote
democracy within states.
This article analyzes the inter-American
systems performance as a liberal union under
the Santiago Commitments regimen. We use
Immanuel Kants original conceptualization
of the liberal peace to establish a theoretical
framework, which we then compare with the
evolving structure of the inter-American
system. Then we examine the regional
response to the first three overt challenges to
the Santiago Commitment, in Haiti (1991),
05parish (ds) 7/2/02 2:39 pm Page 231
R a n d a l l Pa r i s h & Ma rk Pe c e n y
Peru (1992), and Guatemala (1993), to show
how the collective defense of democracy has
become a crucial element of how liberalism
shapes international politics in the Americas.
The Kantian Definitive Articles
Immanuel Kants 1795 essay Perpetual
Peace (Kant, 1995) provides the theoretical
basis for much of todays debate about the
liberal peace. Kant develops three logical
premises, which he calls definitive articles,
that promote cooperation between people
and states from self-interest. Using the defin-
itive articles as building blocks, he hypothe-
sized first that citizens of an increasing
number of states would adopt republican
constitutions to secure their own protection
and rights from each other, from powerful
elites, and from despots. Second, from
similar motives, republican states would
form federations to guarantee reciprocal
cooperation and collective security in a
threatening, anarchic world. Finally, these
federations would foster free flows of people,
goods, and ideas that would enhance cooper-
ation through a spirit of commerce (Kant,
1995: 114). These three elements form what
Russett & Oneal (2001: 3542) call the
Kantian triangle.
Liberal, constitutional, sovereign republics
form the component parts of the model feder-
ation. Kant observed that authoritarian
regimes, subject to the whim of unrestrained
rulers, were inherently untrustworthy and
unlikely to enter binding agreements that
would limit their ambition, either domesti-
cally or internationally. Republics, however,
would behave differently, constrained by the
weight of the citizenry expressed through
representative institutions and norms. Their
norms would be emphatically liberal, shaped
by respect for equality, freedom, and basic
human rights, expressed and protected
through formal constitutional guarantees.
The state would have constitutional authority
KANTIAN LIBERALISM 231
to compel observance of law and mutual
rights and obligations by force. Certain insti-
tutions would be essential to republican con-
stitutions, including separation of legislative
and executive powers, representative legisla-
tures, and the rule of law. Finally, to formulate
and execute the will of their citizens, and to
enter and comply with agreements reliably,
republics would have to be sovereign states,
free of external domination (Kant, 1995:
99102; see also Doyle, 1983; Ray, 1995;
Russett, 1993).
Sovereign republics would bind them-
selves into a federation of free states for the
same reasons that republics form, to protect
their security, freedom, and rights against
aggressive outsiders and from each other
(Gaubatz, 1996; Risse-Kappen, 1996;
Russett & Oneal, 2001: 157196). Agree-
ments would be formal, explicit treaties out-
lining the federations objectives and the
members reciprocal rights and obligations,
arrived at through transparent, legal insti-
tutions. Although states accept obligations
on entering the federation, they are still
sovereign and not subject to coercion by
other members or the union as an entity, as
non-interference in their affairs was the
prime reason for the federation (Kant, 1995:
101105). Kant does note two cases in which
intervention is acceptable. First, wherever in
the world there is a threat of war breaking
out, they will try to prevent it by mediation,
and, second, when a nation is split into two
parts through internal contention, outsiders
may support one side (Kant, 1995: 96, 114).
With reciprocally peaceful relations estab-
lished between members of the federation, an
interstate flow of people, goods, and ideas
would produce an increasingly dense inter-
dependence. Liberal states would permit
foreign travel from and into their territory,
and unchecked, safe movement of people
would foster mutually profitable trade, com-
munication, and cooperative cross-border
networks. With expanded trade, financial
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232 j ou r n a l o f P E A C E R E S E A RC H
power would displace military power
between states, encouraging states to reduce
the size of their armed forces and defense
expenditures (Kant, 1995: 105108, 114; see
also Russett & Oneal, 2001: 125155).
While scholars of the liberal peace have
focused most intently on the domestic-level
republican-institutions aspect of the Kantian
argument, a central purpose of this article is
to give equal emphasis to the systemic com-
ponents of Kants model. As Huntley (1996)
illustrates, Kant envisioned an interactive
model of factors operating at the domestic
and international levels. Kant believed that
liberal states would have a profound com-
petitive advantage in the global balance of
power (see also Bueno de Mesquita et al.,
1999; Lake, 1992). The extraordinary wealth
generated by free enterprise would greatly
enhance the resources available to liberal
states for protection in a dangerous world.
The legitimacy achieved by liberal govern-
ments would lead their citizen armies to fight
with greater conviction than the armies of
illiberal states because liberal states would go
to war only for a just cause like self-preser-
vation. Coalitions of states equally commit-
ted to peace and prosperity through the
creation of a pacific federation of free states
and mutual trade would collectively become
more powerful. Thus, liberalism mitigates
the security dilemma not only by reducing
the fear that like-minded states might attack,
but also by increasing the power of liberal
states to protect themselves, both individu-
ally and collectively.
Kant even leaves room for an argument
focused on the importance of liberal
hegemony for the creation of the federation
of free states and the spread of free trade and
cosmopolitan law among the members (see
also Ikenberry, 1998; Ruggie, 1997).
For if fortune directs that a powerful and
enlightened people can make itself a republic,
which by its nature must be inclined to perpet-
ual peace, this gives a fulcrum to the federation
volume 39 / number 2 / march 2002
with other states so that they may adhere to it
and thus secure freedom under the idea of the
law of nations. By more and more such associ-
ations, the federation may be gradually
extended. (Kant, 1957: 1819, quoted in
Huntley, 1996: 56)
This powerful republic would help spread the
liberal federation almost exclusively through
the powers of example and attraction, not
through imposition. Others would join
because they wished to emulate the success of
the powerful and prosperous republic, and
gain the benefits of mutual peace and trade
with that state and its partners.
Thus, the success of liberal states in a com-
petitive international system would be a prin-
cipal cause of the adoption of liberal
institutions within states. Existing liberal
states would be more secure from inter-
national threats to their domestic institutions
and illiberal states would adopt liberal insti-
tutions to gain the concrete economic and
security benefits associated with liberty.
The Inter-American System
The inter-American system approximates
this Kantian ideal in important respects. To a
substantial degree, the collective defense of
democracy reflects the shared interests of the
liberal states of the region, as suggested by
domestic variants of the democratic peace
argument. Other important aspects of the
regional effort to promote democracy repre-
sent systemic forces. We see the inter-Ameri-
can system as consisting of three central
components: the OAS, the increasing
regional economic integration formalized in
pacts such as the North American Free Trade
Agreement (NAFTA) and the Southern
Common Market (MERCOSUR), and the
hegemony of the United States. We argue
that the OAS increasingly resembles Kants
conception of a federation of free states.
Economic integration is beginning to lead to
the emergence of cosmopolitan law. Finally,
05parish (ds) 7/2/02 2:39 pm Page 233
R a n d a l l Pa r i s h & Ma rk Pe c e n y
the USA is increasingly acting as the fulcrum
of an emerging liberal regional order, rather
than as a traditional dominant power.
The Charter of the OAS, adopted in
1948, laid out a liberal vision for the
organization. It insisted that representative
democracy is an indispensable condition
for the stability, peace and development of
the region, and cited such liberal purposes
as:
To strengthen the peace and security of the
continent; to promote and consolidate
representative democracy, with due respect for
the principle of nonintervention; to provide
for common action on the part of those States
in the event of aggression; to seek the solution
of political, juridical and economic problems
that may arise among them; to promote, by
cooperative action, their economic, social and
cultural development, and to achieve an effec-
tive limitation of conventional weapons that
will make it possible to devote the largest
amount of resources to the economic and
social development of the Member States.
(OAS, 1948)
Until recently, this liberal vision foundered
on the illiberal character of many of the
regions states. This began to change with a
wave of democratization that started with the
1978 opposition victory in presidential elec-
tions in the Dominican Republic. In 1979,
Ecuador joined its Andean neighbors
Colombia and Venezuela in the democratic
camp. Peru elected a new president in 1980,
and Bolivia resumed civilian rule in 1982.
Honduras elected a civilian president in
1982, which meant that Costa Rica was no
longer the sole electoral regime in Central
America. Argentina joined the ranks of the
new democracies in 1983, followed by its
neighbor Uruguay the next year. El Salvador
and Nicaragua elected civilian presidents in
1984, followed by Guatemala in 1985,
beginning transitions that would lead toward
more democratic regimes in the 1990s. Brazil
selected a civilian president in 1985. Person-
alist dictators were removed from power in
KANTIAN LIBERALISM 233
Paraguay and Panama in 1989. The Mexican
single-party regime embraced substantial
political liberalization during the 1980s.
Finally, when Chile and Haiti held elections
in 1990, only Cuba, which had been expelled
from the OAS nearly three decades earlier,
was not governed by an elected civilian presi-
dent. By 1991, many countries were cele-
brating historic second and third peaceful
transfers of power between civilians. Demo-
cratization led to increased cooperation
throughout the region (Parish, 2001). It took
the spread of elected governments to all
members of the OAS, however, to transform
the mission of that organization.
By the early 1990s, the OAS was in a
position to exercise its role as the central insti-
tution of the inter-American system, particu-
larly in the expansion of democracy and
economic integration. It created several
agencies especially to strengthen democratic
institutions, including the Unit for the Pro-
motion of Democracy in 1990, to provide
advice and technical assistance for electoral,
legislative, and educational bodies; and the
Special Committee on Hemispheric Security
in 1991, to promote transparency and
mutual confidence in security affairs and
thereby to consolidate civilian political
control. The June 1991 Santiago Commit-
ment, however, was the most significant step
in erecting an institutional wall around con-
stitutional democracy and asserting that this
time there would be no going back (Acevedo
& Grossman, 1996; Bloomfield, 1994;
Muoz, 1998). This Commitment set the
OAS agenda for the coming decade. It
reaffirmed the organizations commitment to
defense and promotion of representative
democracy and human rights . . . and respect
for the principles of self-determination and
non-intervention, and, in Assembly Resolu-
tion 1080, recognized that member-states
still faced serious political, social, and econ-
omic problems that may threaten the stability
of democratic governments. It called for
05parish (ds) 7/2/02 2:39 pm Page 234
234 j ou r n a l o f P E A C E R E S E A RC H
specific, although open-ended, procedures in
the event of sudden, or irregular interruption
of the democratic political institutional
process or of the legitimate exercise of power
. . . in any of the Organizations member
states. The Secretary General would call for
an immediate meeting of the Permanent
Council which would conduct an investi-
gation before convening either an ad hoc
meeting of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs or
a special session of the General Assembly, all
of which must take place within a ten-day
period. The purpose of the meetings would
be to adopt appropriate measures, in accord-
ance with the Charter and international law
to resolve the democratic interruption collec-
tively (OAS, 1991).
Thus, the OAS has become the insti-
tutional embodiment of the regional consen-
sus in support of the collective defense of
democracy. While the Santiago Commit-
ment would not have been possible without
the consensus of the member-states, effective
collective action on behalf of democracy
might not have occurred in the absence of an
institution that brought the regions democ-
racies together in a single forum.
This collective defense of democracy
regime also rested on a foundation of
increased economic integration. The new
democracies that emerged in the 1980s
almost universally embraced market-oriented
policies to encourage international credit,
investment, and trade (Stallings, 1993;
Yergin & Stanislaw, 1998). Prior to this time,
most states in the region had pursued protec-
tionist, state-led import substitution indus-
trialization (ISI) economic strategies that
inhibited integration and cooperation
because they emphasized production for the
domestic market rather than international
trade. By the 1980s, unmanageable debt,
unproductive industry, growing inflation,
and endless deficits discredited the ISI model
and pushed the newly democratic govern-
ments to look outward for hard currency. In
volume 39 / number 2 / march 2002
the context of this economic crisis, local
economic actors who benefited from inte-
gration in global markets constructed
liberalizing coalitions in support of neo-
liberal economic reforms and free trade
(Solingen, 1998). Most Latin American
states were successful in inserting themselves
into the global economy and stimulating
macroeconomic growth. From 1988 to 1993,
direct foreign investment in Latin America
increased over 160%, and annual portfolio
investment passed from a $427 million
decline to a net of almost $19 billion. Over
the same time, total regional trade increased
from 20% to just under 30% of GDP, and
the regions aggregate GDP had its best
growth since the 1982 debt crisis (IDB,
1996). As Stallings (1993) has noted,
however, the regions economies became
more vulnerable to external forces than they
had been during the heyday of dependency
theory a decade earlier, vulnerability that
increased the potential leverage of inter-
national economic sanctions.
The change to market-economic policies
produced a new wave of subregional inte-
gration in the late 1980s that grew remark-
ably in the following decade. Integration
rhetoric was nearly universal, with George
Bushs Enterprise for the Americas Initiative,
talk of a Western Hemisphere Free Trade
Association, and near constant trade negoti-
ations throughout the region. There was
movement in older integration projects, as
the Caribbean Community, the Central
American Common Market, and the Andean
Group revitalized themselves as outward-
looking free traders. Most importantly, two
extraordinary projects on either end of the
hemisphere, the Southern Common Market
(MERCOSUR) and the North American
Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), were
among the most successful integration
projects anywhere in the world. MERCO-
SUR includes a variety of initiatives in
security cooperation, a customs union,
05parish (ds) 7/2/02 2:39 pm Page 235
R a n d a l l Pa r i s h & Ma rk Pe c e n y
reduced restrictions on travel in the region,
and liberalization of telecommunications
and media (Parish, 2000; Smith, P., 1993;
Solingen, 1998: 119164). Thus, MERCO-
SUR represents the greatest movement
toward the full embrace of cosmopolitan law
consistent with Kants conception.
One of the most distinctive aspects of the
collective defense of democracy regime and
contemporary inter-American relations more
broadly is that Latin American countries have
displayed an unprecedented willingness to
enter into relatively uncoerced partnerships
with the USA (Lowenthal & Treverton,
1994). Prior to the 1990s, Latin American
states had clung tenaciously to the principle
of non-intervention, in large part because
they feared that the United States would use
the excuse of support for democracy to legiti-
mate interventions undertaken for other pur-
poses (Ferguson, 1972; Forsythe, 1996).
Throughout the Cold War, US foreign policy
tolerated, and occasionally supported anti-
communist dictators, while it opposed, and
occasionally undermined, reformist govern-
ments selected in free and fair elections. At
the OAS, the USA consistently pressured its
neighbors to support anti-communist inter-
ventions that left the resulting government
less democratic than the one overthrown, and
over time Latin resistance to intervention
grew stronger (Smith, P., 1996; Smith, T.,
1994a).
This resistance reached its greatest height
in the response of the regions young democ-
racies to the Central American civil wars of
the 1980s. Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela,
and Panama formed the Contadora Group
to find a negotiated solution, joined later by
the Support Group comprising Argentina,
Brazil, Uruguay, and Peru. Their activities
evolved into the Rio Group, a continuing
organization for regional integration. Thus,
Latin American states used their newly won
shared democracy to oppose US initiatives in
Central America and work for peace (Karl,
KANTIAN LIBERALISM 235
1987). Costa Ricas President, Oscar Arias,
renewed the effort in 1986 as a Central
American initiative with links to the OAS
and the UN. The Arias Plan culminated in
1987 with Esquipulas II, named for the
Guatemalan city where the five civilian-
elected presidents of Central America com-
mitted to ceasefires throughout the region,
amnesties, truth and conciliation commis-
sions, free elections, arms reduction, and the
end of foreign support for military activity
(Smith, G., 1994: 208). During the 1980s,
the Reagan administration had used the pro-
motion of democracy in Central America as
part of a counter-insurgency strategy to
defeat leftist guerrillas and governments
(Carothers, 1991; Peceny, 1999). In contrast,
Arias used democracy promotion as a means
to resolve the regions civil wars and limit US
hegemony in the region (Smith, G., 1994).
Yet, by 1991, the USA and Latin democ-
racies worked together to create and then
apply the Santiago Commitment. Latin
states took the lead in forging this commit-
ment (Bloomfield, 1994). In part owing to
Venezuelas enthusiastic support, the Andean
countries of Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador,
Peru, and Venezuela had announced their
commitment to an even stronger defense of
democracy regime more than a month before
the Santiago meeting (Munz, 1998). It is
not surprising that the Venezuelans played a
leading role in pushing for the
Santiago Commitment. Former Venezuelan
President Romulo Betancourt had been one
of the first and strongest advocates of the
premise that all Latin democracies possessed
a collective stake in the preservation of
democracy throughout the region (Ferguson,
1972). In addition to the Andean countries,
as host of the 1991 summit meeting, newly
elected President Patricio Aylwin of Chile,
who replaced military dictator General
Augusto Pinochet as President, was eager to
enshrine this new principle of the collective
defense of democracy in the Americas. Chiles
05parish (ds) 7/2/02 2:39 pm Page 236
236 j ou r n a l o f P E A C E R E S E A RC H
neighbor, Argentina, was also a strong sup-
porter of this new standard. The USA partici-
pated in crafting the Santiago Commitment,
but it did not impose it on its regional allies.
This new partnership was made possible
by the increasing commitment to liberal
internationalism that emerged in US policy
in the post-Cold War era. The USA replaced
anti-communism with democratic enlarge-
ment as the cornerstone of US policy (Lake,
1993). Policymakers began to accept the pro-
motion of democracy as a means to resolve
the regions civil wars rather than win them.
With the collapse of Soviet communism,
policymakers no longer perceive the same
kinds of strategic or economic threats in their
backyard. The USA, therefore, possesses
fewer incentives to embrace autocratic
regimes. This has allowed vocal advocates of
a more liberal internationalist foreign policy
in the interest group community and Con-
gress to have a more powerful impact in the
policy process. Meanwhile, democratic
enlargement offers a useful means of building
a domestic consensus in favor of an active
foreign policy while simultaneously legiti-
mating US leadership in the western hemi-
sphere and the world (Peceny, 1999). This
shift in US foreign policy has made it possible
for Latin American and US leaders to engage
in unprecedented cooperation in the collec-
tive defense of democracy.
This liberal regional order diverges from
Kants ideals in important ways. While the
United States has treated Latin Americas
liberal states with more respect and a greater
commitment to multilateral cooperation
than in the past, it still often acts as a tra-
ditional Great Power, using military inter-
vention to achieve its political and economic
goals. While economic exchange has bound
the economies of the regions states more
closely together, and such economic inte-
gration has enhanced the commitment of
economic elites to liberal democracy, this has
not clearly led to the kind of region-wide
volume 39 / number 2 / march 2002
cosmopolitan law that would be consistent
with Kants vision. Only in the Southern
Cone has economic integration been coupled
with a commitment to the free movement of
people and ideas enshrined in international
legal covenants.
While elected governments exist in virtu-
ally all the regions states, few fulfill all the
requirements of liberal republican govern-
ance outlined by Kant. Scholars routinely
classify Latin American democracies as
weakly institutionalized, unconsolidated,
and dominated by overly powerful presidents
(Hagopian, 1998; ODonnell, 1994;
Roberts, 1998). Many of the regions democ-
racies, therefore, lack the liberal qualities of
limited government, individual liberty and
the rule of law essential to Kants vision of
perpetual peace. Indeed, this is why the
elected leaders of the regions democracies
have banded together. They see the primary
threats to their power and to the liberal insti-
tutions that brought them to power as
coming from inside their countries rather
than from some external aggressor. Thus, the
collective defense of democracy regime in the
Americas reflects a pact among elected
leaders to support one another against inter-
nal enemies. This approximates the political
dynamic Moravcsik (2000) found in the
creation of the European Human Rights
regime in the wake of World War II. It also
leads to the central way in which this regime
contradicts Kants vision. To the extent to
which the OAS encourages the interference
of member-states in the internal affairs of
other members in order to promote democ-
racy, this violates Kants principled commit-
ment to self-determination. Collective
security pacts against external aggressors can
reflect cooperation on behalf of self-determi-
nation. Collective defense against internal
enemies turns this principle on its head.
In sum, the collective defense of democ-
racy in the inter-American system represents
the increasingly liberal nature of that system.
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To some extent, this reflects the emergence in
the Western Hemisphere of the kind of
liberal pacific union that Kant believed
would emerge from the spread of republican
governance. Even those elements of the
system that violate Kants precepts, however,
are linked to the liberal character of the states
of the region and of the regional institutions
and relationships they have spawned. It is too
soon to tell whether the divergences from
Kants ideals reflect necessary transitional
steps toward the fulfillment of Kants defini-
tive articles or enduring elements of liberal
internationalism.
Challenges to the Santiago
Commitment
There were three sudden interruptions of
democratic political processes in the first years
after the adoption of the Santiago Commit-
ment, in Haiti (1991), Peru (1992), and
Guatemala (1993). In the Haitian and Peru-
vian cases, the inter-American system counter-
acted domestic conditions that favored
authoritarian rule. In Guatemala, domestic
and international factors worked together to
bring about the restoration of democracy. In
each case, the procedures established at Santi-
ago unfolded as they were designed to, and the
OAS functioned as a Kantian federation to
restore constitutional democratic institutions
in member-states. The delegitimation func-
tion of the OAS worked most powerfully in
the Haitian and Guatemalan cases. The threat
or application of economic sanctions was most
effective in bringing about redemocratization
in the Peruvian and Guatemalan cases. The
USA played an important role in the restora-
tion of at least limited democracy in each case,
most crucially, of course, through its military
intervention in Haiti.
The Haitian Case
On 30 September 1991, the armed forces of
Haiti launched a military coup that sent that
KANTIAN LIBERALISM 237
countrys first freely elected president, radical
priest Jean Bertrand Aristide, into exile.
Within hours of the coup, the Venezuelan
delegation to the OAS requested a meeting of
the Permanent Council to begin the process
embodied in the Santiago Commitment. The
Permanent Council condemned the coup
and scheduled a meeting of foreign ministers
for 3 October. The foreign ministers passed a
unanimous resolution calling for members to
refuse diplomatic ties to the de facto regime
and suspend economic ties with Haiti. After
the Haitian junta refused to meet with a del-
egation headed by OAS Secretary General
Joao Baena Soares, the foreign ministers
passed a resolution to freeze Haitian state
assets and impose a trade embargo (IACHR,
1994: 44). Venezuelan President Carlos
Andrs Prez summed up the logic of the
OASs response: If the coup in Haiti is
successful, it would not only break the con-
stitutional order, but might foster the illusion
in other countries of the region that it is
possible to take a step back in history (FBIS,
18 October 1991).
For the next three years, the international
community relied on increasingly harsh
economic sanctions to compel the Haitian
junta to relinquish power. These sanctions
twice convinced junta leader, General Raoul
Cdras, to sign agreements to transfer power
to Aristide. Cdras failed to fulfill his part of
the bargains, however. On 23 February 1992,
Aristide and the regimes spokesman signed a
negotiated settlement, brokered by the OAS
Special Representative to Haiti, Colombian
Foreign Minister Augusto Ramrez Ocampo.
Months after this agreement broke down, the
leading role in resolving the Haitian crisis
passed to the UN, at Baena Soaress request.
Argentine diplomat Dante Caputo was
named the Special Representative to Haiti of
both the UN and OAS. In June 1993, the
UN imposed a total embargo on oil and
arms, and the USA froze all assets and can-
celed visas for Haitian individuals supporting
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238 j ou r n a l o f P E A C E R E S E A RC H
the coup. These pressures produced a new
round of negotiations at Governors Island,
New York, and a new agreement signed by
Aristide and Cdras providing for amnesties,
Aristides return on 15 October, and an inter-
national force to train and reform the army
and police. This agreement foundered on a
new wave of violence and broken promises.
Death squad activity increased, the ship
bringing US and Canadian advisers sailed
away on meeting demonstrators at the Port-
au-Prince dock, and the commanders of the
armed forces and police refused to resign.
Thus, while economic sanctions brought
Cdras to the bargaining table, they failed to
compel him to implement the agreements he
had signed. Because Haiti is one of the Latin
states least integrated into global and regional
markets, Haitian economic elites suffered less
from economic sanctions than would be true
for other states in the region. They were not
dependent on access to foreign markets for
their economic survival. Initially, they did
not believe that sanctions would last long, be
seriously enforced, or severely affect them
(French, 1991). Pervasive cheating justified
elites confidence in their ability to avoid
economic penalties. The HaitianDomini-
can border was the site of large-scale smug-
gling of a variety of goods, especially oil
(EIU, 1995). Sanction evasion in some cases
was open and officially recognized. During
1993, the volume of USHaitian trade
actually increased by almost 19%, mostly in
maquiladora-produced clothing and base-
balls that were under a presidential exemp-
tion (LADB, 10 March 1994). Since the
elites who controlled these industries were
the most integrated into the global market,
their exemption seriously weakened the sanc-
tions impact. The Haitian case also illus-
trates the limitations of sanctions that are not
global in scope, as France replaced the USA
as Haitis main trading partner. This dynamic
helped lead the OAS to cede responsibility to
the UN.
volume 39 / number 2 / march 2002
When the Governors Island Accords col-
lapsed in October 1993, UN/OAS monitors
moved across the border into the Dominican
Republic. Sanctions were reinstated, and the
UN authorized a naval blockade, enforced by
six US warships. Under pressure, the
Dominican Republic allowed tighter
enforcement on the land border. In May and
June 1994, the UN took additional measures
to isolate Haiti. Despite continuing econ-
omic disintegration, the besieged military
remained in power until September 1994.
Throughout the three years of economic
sanctions, local elites feared that Aristides
populism would threaten their interests more
than the sanctions. As the crisis deepened and
the repression of Aristides supporters inten-
sified, military and economic elites feared
retribution if the president were allowed to
return.
On 31 July, the Security Council
approved all necessary means, including
military force, to remove the regime, opening
the way to a US invasion. For three years, the
USA and the Latin members of the OAS had
behaved as a Kantian federation, relying on
mediation, diplomacy, and economic forces
to restore democracy to Haiti, but they never
reached a consensus on the use of military
force. Many OAS members experienced the
contradictory pressures of liberal interven-
tionism. On the one hand, liberal values can
lead states to engage in moral crusades to
liberate countries oppressed by tyranny
(Doyle, 1983). At the outset of the crisis,
several Latin American states expressed a
stronger willingness than the USA to use
military force to restore democracy. The
governments of Venezuela, Argentina, and
the Central American republics declared
themselves ready to support armed inter-
vention by a multilateral force under OAS
auspices (FBIS, 2, 5 October 1991). These
states, joined by Canada and the Caribbean
anglophones, supported the US intervention
in 1994. Argentinas Carlos Menem, with
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R a n d a l l Pa r i s h & Ma rk Pe c e n y
customary exuberance, offered 600 troops
for the invasion force, although, faced with
an 82% disapproval rating in public opinion
polls, downgraded the offer to logistic
support and finally to non-specific aid
(Brooke, 1994). On the other hand, the
Kantian argument suggests that liberal states
will be reluctant to pay the costs associated
with the use of force, especially in ways that
violate the liberal norm of respect for self-
determination. Many Latin states con-
sistently opposed the use of force. Brazil, the
regional representative to the Security
Council for the all necessary means vote,
abstained. Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador,
Peru, and Mexico all refused to send troops.
The US intervention of September 1994
appeared to represent a genuine effort to
pursue the liberal goal of promoting democ-
racy (Smith, 1994b; White House, 1994).
The USA intervened to restore a radical
leftist priest to the presidency of Haiti.
During the Cold War, it was more likely to
use force to overthrow such leaders rather
than support them. The USA was pushed
toward intervention by domestic pressure
from a liberal coalition of interest groups like
Transafrica, Americas Watch, and Amnesty
International, and members of Congress,
especially from the Congressional Black
Caucus (Congress, 1994: 8, 51, 61). The
USA certainly intervened, in part, to staunch
the flow of Haitian refugees, but domestic
pressure ensured that this goal would be
pursued through an intervention to restore
democracy rather than through the forced
repatriation of refugees. Most members of
Congress, however, agreed with Senate
Minority Leader Robert Dole, who pro-
claimed in 1993 that, I wouldnt risk any
American lives to put Aristide back in power
(Friedman, 1993). Opinion polls indicated
that 73% of the US population opposed
intervention.
Despite the domestic pressure against a
military intervention, Clinton announced on
KANTIAN LIBERALISM 239
15 September that the only option left was
the use of force. Two days later, he sent
former president Jimmy Carter, former chair
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Colin Powell and
Senator Sam Nunn to arrange for the per-
missive occupation of Haiti. Only at the last
moment was Clinton able to resolve the con-
tradictory impulses of the liberal dynamic.
With this last-minute diplomatic gambit, he
managed to achieve his objectives without
having to fight. Furthermore, as expected by
the liberal argument, US troops arrived with
the explicit authorization of the UN and with
commitments of eventual multilateral
participation. Thus, with its commitment to
achieve liberal goals, its reluctance to send
troops, and its increased sensitivity to the
concerns of its partners in the inter-American
system, the US intervention in Haiti rep-
resents perhaps the USAs most liberal inter-
vention ever in the Americas.
The Peruvian Case
On 5 April 1992, Alberto Fujimori, the
popular president of Peru, provoked the
second challenge to the Santiago Commit-
ment by staging an autogolpe, a presidential
coup against the other branches of govern-
ment. Backed by the armed forces and police,
Fujimori closed Congress, suspended the
Constitution, imposed press censorship,
began a purge of the judiciary, and arrested
political rivals. Within weeks, however, he
announced a plan to return democracy to
Peru (LAWR, 1992a). Domestic politics
cannot explain Fujimoris shift back toward
democracy, as virtually the entire population
of Peru greeted his dismantling of democracy
with great enthusiasm because they blamed
the traditional political elites for the econ-
omic collapse and revolutionary violence that
had afflicted Peru during the previous decade
(Stokes, 1996).
International opposition to Fujimoris
actions was stronger than the domestic
response. On the day after the coup, an
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240 j ou r n a l o f P E A C E R E S E A RC H
emergency meeting of the Permanent
Council of the OAS confirmed a new Santi-
ago crisis. The foreign ministers, meeting in
Washington on 13 April, adopted Resolution
1/92, which deplored the events in Peru,
appealed for immediate re-establishment of
democratic institutional order and an end to
all actions impairing human rights, and
requested member-states to reassess their
relations with Peru. The foreign ministers
dispatched to Lima the Secretary General
and Uruguayan Foreign Minister Hector
Gros Espiell to facilitate a compromise
between the parties toward reestablishing the
democratic institutional order (OAS,
1993a). A number of countries condemned
the tragic mistake implicit in the coup, with-
drew their ambassadors, and suspended aid
and credit. Panama and Venezuela severed
diplomatic relations, and the Rio Group
expelled Peru.
The OAS response to the autogolpe was
more restrained than its response to the coup
in Haiti because many leaders sympathized
with Fujimoris situation. Those in neighbor-
ing capitals were concerned by the possibility
of the Peruvian states collapse and infection
from its economic, guerrilla, and drug prob-
lems. Furthermore, this was not an unam-
biguous, unpopular military coup, but an
extra-constitutional assumption of power by
a demonstrably popular, elected president.
This ambiguity was heightened by Fujimoris
steps two days following the coup to ease
censorship, promise a plebiscite on a new
constitution, and pledge to leave office at the
end of his term in 1995. Thus, this case did
not represent the kind of direct attack on the
principle of elected government that the
Santiago Commitment was designed to dis-
courage.
Despite these mitigating factors, the inter-
national community remained skeptical of
Fujimoris intentions. A second OAS delega-
tion in May indicated in private that Fuji-
mori had been intransigent and arrogant in Fujimoris neoliberal economic reforms,
volume 39 / number 2 / march 2002
negotiations. On 18 May, however, Fujimori
attended the OAS annual meeting in the
Bahamas to make his case. At the same
meeting that voted a hemispheric trade ban
on Haiti, Fujimori established a partnership
with the Organization, promising to restore
constitutional rights immediately, hold elec-
tions for a constituent congress within five
months, and enlist the OAS to provide tech-
nical advice, assistance, and observers for the
elections. While Fujimori had clearly
planned to govern by plebiscite from the first
days of his post-coup regime, he initially
wished to avoid the reconstitution of a legis-
lative branch that could thwart his policy
initiatives (Cameron, 1997). The strong
international response that greeted the 5
April coup pushed Fujimori to liberalize his
personalist regime more than he had
originally intended.
Economic pressure was crucial in bringing
about this shift. Many countries suspended
economic aid in April 1992. More import-
antly, the Inter-American Development
Bank (IDB), the World Bank, and the IMF
suspended their loans. Since these insti-
tutions controlled hundreds of millions of
dollars earmarked for Peru, their decision to
withhold funds presented the government
with a difficult dilemma. The suspension of
international financial assistance exacerbated
short-term cash flow problems, raising the
possibility of default. More broadly, Fujimori
had embraced harsh structural adjustment
policies, including trade liberalization,
privatization, deregulation, tight monetary
policies, and overvalued exchange rates, to
end the economic crisis that had gripped
Peru during the 1980s. Repairing Perus ties
to international lending institutions was the
essential first step in rebuilding the countrys
credibility in international markets (Wise,
1997).
Therefore, when international lending
agencies cut ties to Peru, the architects of
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R a n d a l l Pa r i s h & Ma rk Pe c e n y
especially the Minister of the Economy,
Carlos Boloa, played the crucial role in con-
vincing the President to call for elections for
a new Congress. Boloa threatened to resign
because he feared that the international
reaction to the autogolpe would jeopardize the
success of his economic reforms. Peruvian
economic elites underscored this danger by
shifting their capital out of Peru, causing a
run on the sol (Cameron, 1997: 66).
The reluctance of the international finan-
cial institutions to loan money to the Fuji-
mori government in the wake of the coup is
puzzling, given that Fujimori had expressed a
stronger commitment to their economic pro-
grams than had any previous Peruvian presi-
dent. In part, the delegitimation of the
regime by the OAS made possible the inter-
national financial institutions opposition to
the autogolpe. It was the power of the US
government within these institutions,
however, which solidified their refusal to
bankroll Fujimoris dictatorship.
US opposition to Fujimoris autogolpe pro-
vides an excellent example of the increasingly
liberal character of US policy. The Fujimori
regime promised a more vigorous war against
the Maoist guerrillas of Sendero Luminoso, a
greater commitment to combating drug
trafficking, and a more complete embrace of
the neoliberal economic reforms that the
USA was urging all states in the region to
accept. Despite Fujimoris commitment to
policies that served US material interests, the
Bush administration condemned the April
coup. Assistant Secretary of State Bernard
Aronson, who arrived for a visit on the day of
the coup, immediately left, announcing the
suspension of military assistance and most
economic assistance (Congress, 1992). This
public denunciation was matched in private
meetings with Peruvian officials, who were
told, We will not allow this. We will close
you down (Cameron, 1997: 65). Because
Bushs Andean Initiative to combat drug traf-
ficking in the region had made Peru the
KANTIAN LIBERALISM 241
largest recipient of US aid in Latin America,
with $168.8 million planned for fiscal year
(FY) 1992, the suspension of most US aid
had an important impact on Peru (WOLA,
1991: 10). When the USA used its vote in
international financial institutions to have
international lending stopped, this further
hurt Perus economic prospects.
This decision reflected the political
dynamics that are pushing the USA toward
more liberal policies throughout the region.
By 1991, liberal interest groups like the
Washington Office on Latin America
(WOLA), working with liberal members of
Congress, had succeeded in compelling Bush
to forego part of his planned military assist-
ance to Peru because of human rights abuses
committed by the armed forces (Congress,
1992; WOLA, 1991). Thus, the continu-
ation of aid to Fujimori after the coup would
have met with domestic opposition in the
USA. More broadly, the Bush administration
had embraced the liberal logic embodied in
the Santiago Commitment. As one official
informed Fujimoris representatives, We
cannot allow you to take this decision, it
could lead other countries to take similar
decisions (Cameron, 1997: 65).
In November, Fujimori achieved a legis-
lative majority in Constituent Assembly elec-
tions witnessed by 230 OAS observers,
including the Secretary General (LAWR,
1992b). In mid-December, the ad hoc
Meeting of Ministers of Foreign Affairs
adopted Resolution 3/92, declaring that it
had concluded its work and would cease to
exist with the installation of the new Con-
gress at the end of the month. This decision
signaled to the international community that
it was appropriate to normalize relations with
the Peruvian government. With that, most of
the world resumed full diplomatic and econ-
omic relations. The USA continued to hold
out, owing largely to domestic pressure and
the presidential transition in the USA. Only
in February 1993, following municipal
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242 j ou r n a l o f P E A C E R E S E A RC H
elections and new Peruvian pledges to co-
operate with human rights nongovernmental
organizations (NGOs), did Fujimori get the
final prize. The USA and Japan provided a
bridging loan that allowed Peru to pay its
arrears to the IMF and World Bank, and
proceed with its program of structural adjust-
ment.
The Guatemalan Case
Guatemala presented a third Santiago chal-
lenge when, on the morning of 25 May 1993,
President Jorge Serrano attempted his own
version of an autogolpe, closing the legislature
and the courts, suspending basic rights, and
arresting opposition figures. Within a week,
however, Serranos coup unraveled and the
president was forced to leave the country. On
5 June, Congress selected the popular
Human Rights Ombudsman, Ramiro de
Leon Carpio, to be president.
Serranos coup was overturned by the
unprecedented and nearly unanimous oppo-
sition of a mobilized Guatemalan civil
society, interacting with and reinforced by
international factors. Business, labor, peas-
ants, students, the press, political parties, the
Church, Indians, teachers, the guerrillas,
retired generals, and others came together to
demand Serranos ouster. They issued denun-
ciations in the media, demonstrated in the
streets, and energized links with foreign
governments and NGOs that had formed
through years of political protest. To coordi-
nate their efforts, the groups formed an
umbrella organization, the Forum for
National Consensus, that sent Congress a list
of three candidates for the presidency and
packed the gallery of Congress on the night
one of those candidates, de Leon Carpio, was
chosen to be the next president.
The international reaction was spon-
taneous and nearly unanimous condemna-
tion, with the wry exception of Perus
Fujimori. In Latin America, Venezuela,
Argentina, Brazil, and Ecuador were
volume 39 / number 2 / march 2002
especially outspoken, while Guatemalas
neighbors in Mexico and Central America
took a unified but less outspoken position
against the coup (LADB, 28 May 1993). The
OAS, led again by the Venezuelan delegation,
convened an emergency meeting of the Per-
manent Council. For the third time in less
than two years, the Council deplored the
breach of constitutionality, urged the restora-
tion of lawful authority, dispatched the Sec-
retary General on a fact-finding mission, and
convoked an ad hoc meeting of ministers of
foreign affairs. As Serranos coup began to
unravel, he tried to strike a deal with Baena
Soares, whose delegation had arrived in
Guatemala, offering to restore the old consti-
tutional order after purging Congress and the
Supreme Court (OAS, 1993b). Baena Soares
refusal to negotiate on those terms removed a
potential international avenue through
which Serrano could have saved his position
in the face of mounting domestic opposition.
By the time Baena Soares returned to
Guatemala after briefing the OAS Foreign
Ministers on 3 June, Serrano was in exile and
Vice President Gustavo Espina had been
forced to resign because of his initial support
for Serranos autogolpe. Soon afterward, Con-
gress selected de Leon Carpio for the presi-
dency, Baena Soares congratulated the
winner and returned to Washington. On 8
June, the foreign ministers held a second
meeting, expressed their satisfaction with the
peaceful, constitutional resolution of the
crisis, and adjourned (OAS, 1993c). Thus,
the specific actions of the OAS during this
crisis were less consequential than domestic
forces in overturning the coup. International
forces shaped the domestic response in
important ways, however.
The local reaction would have been
impossible without years of organization by
peasant, Indian, labor, student, human rights
and other groups that had taken advantage of
political openings under two civilian govern-
ments to form networks inside the country
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R a n d a l l Pa r i s h & Ma rk Pe c e n y
and outward. Because of its dismal history,
Guatemala had been the object of intense
scrutiny by governments and NGOs that
offered tutelage, material support, and a
degree of protection to local organizations.
Both were ready and able to bring immedi-
ate, effective pressure on the coup leaders
(Sikkink, 1996). Thus, while we have
emphasized the transnational economic link-
ages that emerge from the cosmopolitan law
of the Kantian federation, a wide variety of
transnational connections favoring democ-
racy can emerge in the increasingly liberal
inter-American system (Sikkink, 1993).
International economic pressure was
crucial because of the business elites
reaction and the fissures that the pressures
exploited within the armed forces. The USA
and European states suspended $150
million worth of non-humanitarian aid, and
the USA threatened to curtail trade under
the General System of Preferences and the
Caribbean Basin Initiative (CBI) and to
vote against credit from international finan-
cial institutions (Golden, 1993a). A coali-
tion of labor unions and business leaders,
formed to oppose an authoritarian govern-
ment, is inconceivable in Guatemala
without the economic elites increasing
dependence on international and regional
capital and markets, and the elites fear that
a move toward autocracy threatens access to
those factors. US action was especially
significant, as the USA was the primary
market for Guatemalan products, many of
which owed their existence to favorable
treatment under the CBI, and US influence
on lending agencies was decisive (Golden,
1993b). The opposition of the economic
elite to the autogolpe strengthened the
position of institucionalistas within the
armed forces and moved the army away
from its original support for the coup
attempt, thus removing the only insti-
tutional support that Serrano enjoyed. Two
days after his inauguration, de Leon fired
KANTIAN LIBERALISM 243
the hardline minister of defense and
replaced him with an institucionalista.
Conclusion
Scholars of inter-American relations have
long viewed the inter-American system as
fundamentally exploitative and dominated
by US power. The experience of the Santiago
Commitment, however, demonstrates that
the spread of liberalism is changing the char-
acter of inter-American relations. With the
spread of democracy throughout the hemi-
sphere, the OAS increasingly resembles a
Kantian federation of free states. Economic
integration is generating a commitment to
cosmopolitan law. The USA is increasingly
behaving like the leader of a liberal com-
munity rather than as a traditional dominant
power. Inter-American relations are becom-
ing fundamentally more cooperative.
For scholars of the liberal peace, the collec-
tive defense of democracy regime suggests the
importance of looking not just at how democ-
racies behave in the international system but
also at how the international system promotes
democracy within states. The literature on the
liberal peace started by looking at the distinc-
tive behavior of democracies in the world. It
then expanded to examine a variety of inter-
national forces that emerged from domestic
liberalism and have had an independent
impact in cementing the peace among liberal
states. Only recently have some scholars of the
liberal peace begun to examine the feedback
loop by which international actors can
support democracy within states (Russett &
Oneal, 2001: 200211). The collective
defense of democracy regime in the Americas
is but one example of a broader phenomenon,
as the USA, the EU, NATO, the UN, inter-
national financial institutions, and a variety of
other actors have placed democracy pro-
motion higher on their agendas (Carothers,
1999; Diamond, 1999; Peceny, 1999; Peceny
& Stanley, 2001). These have promoted
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244 j ou r n a l o f P E A C E R E S E A RC H
democracy, often in the context of military
interventions, even though this violates the
Kantian principles of self-determination and
non-intervention in the internal affairs of
other states.
We argue that constructivist approaches
to international relations are useful for
understanding how the collective defense of
democracy regime functions. The Santiago
Commitment represents an attempt to
strengthen a norm of democratic governance
for the Americas (Muoz, 1998). It reflects a
growing intersubjective consensus among
elites that liberal democracy is the most
appropriate form of government and that all
illiberal forms of government should be con-
sidered illegitimate. According to construc-
tivist scholarship, international institutions
often serve as the primary proselytizers of
shared norms. They are agents of socializa-
tion and legitimation in the international
system (Finnemore, 1996). The OAS serves
precisely this role in the collective defense of
democracy regime. The Santiago Commit-
ment does not compel states to do anything.
There are no automatic sanctions. The OAS
possesses no enforcement power. All the
Santiago Commitment demands is that the
Permanent Council meet within 24 hours of
any disruption of democratic rule, that the
Secretary General and Council collect infor-
mation on the situation, and that the foreign
ministers of the OAS countries meet within
ten days. In all three cases discussed here, the
primary power of the OAS has been sym-
bolic. It condemns those who attempt to
overthrow democracy and encourages
member-states to take collective action. It
signals to third parties what actions are con-
sidered legitimate and illegitimate. Target
regimes seek its formal approval as a sign to
others that a restoration of diplomatic and
economic ties is appropriate.
Therefore, even though many members of
the OAS were reluctant to use military force
to overthrow the military junta in Haiti, the
volume 39 / number 2 / march 2002
consistent strong denunciations of that
regime by the OAS helped legitimate the
USAs 1994 military intervention in that
country. The OAS opposed Fujimoris self-
coup in Peru with less intensity than the
straightforward military coup in Haiti
because Latin leaders saw it as a less serious
threat to their own legitimacy as elected
heads of state. Nevertheless, the OAS did
send a message that Fujimori had violated an
important regional norm, and actors in the
region did not restore normal relations with
Peru until the OAS had indicated that the
Fujimori government had made sufficient
efforts to restore democracy to Peru. The
OAS played a similar delegitimating role in
Guatemala, although in this case the OAS
reinforced a nearly universal consensus in
Guatemala that Serrano had engaged in
illegitimate behavior.
How can we say that there is a regional
norm of liberalism when elected govern-
ments throughout the region are weakened
by profound inequality, corruption, crony-
ism, violence, overwhelming executive
power, and the disintegration of democratic
political institutions? We find that the spread
of the democratic norm throughout the
hemisphere reflects the pattern seen in the
spread of other global norms (Finnemore &
Sikkink, 1998). The democratic norm
emerged first in those societies in which it
built upon strong domestic roots. It was
embraced by elected leaders who sought
international legitimation from the OAS
because they realized their regimes still lacked
deep roots in their societies and feared that an
authoritarian reversal anywhere in the hemi-
sphere could threaten their own regimes.
Local actors who violated this norm
eventually bowed to outside pressure because
international actors possessed material capa-
bilities to reward compliance with global
norms or punish those who did not comply.
Thus, in Peru, where Fujimori urgently
needed external finance, economic sanctions
05parish (ds) 7/2/02 2:39 pm Page 245
R a n d a l l Pa r i s h & Ma rk Pe c e n y
were decisive in pushing him to restore
limited democracy. The threat of trade sanc-
tions helped shape the outcome in
Guatemala. Economic sanctions pushed the
Haitian junta to sign the Governors Island
Accords even though Haitis limited inte-
gration into global markets lessened the
impact of those sanctions and necessitated
military intervention to restore an elected
president to power.
The USA was an important actor in all
three cases. Fujimori had to modify his stance
because of US power within the multilateral
financial institutions that controlled
resources desperately needed by Peru.
Guatemalan economic elites needed access to
the US markets, and the threat this market
would be cut off led them to oppose Serranos
coup. Finally, US military power was essen-
tial for the restoration of democracy in Haiti,
where the Aristide government returned
thanks to US soldiers acting under UN
authorization. Thus, as suggested by realism,
the USAs ability to punish defectors and
reward participants plays an important role
in the success of the collective defense of
democracy regime.
US support for a radical leftist president
of Haiti and opposition to a Peruvian presi-
dent committed to market-based economic
reforms and more effective wars against
leftist guerrillas and drug traffickers suggests,
however, that a straightforward realist
approach to understanding US hegemony is
insufficient. US policy reflects a more con-
sistent commitment to liberalism than in the
past. This shift in policy has resulted, in part,
from the kinds of political dynamics
expected by the Kantian argument, as influ-
ential members of Congress and the interest
group community have used democratic
political processes to push for more liberal
policies toward the region. This domestic
pressure was probably most important in
pushing the Clinton administration to inter-
vene in Haiti, but was also important in
KANTIAN LIBERALISM 245
shaping US policy toward Peru and
Guatemala.
The increased commitment of the USA to
liberal democracy and multilateral institutions
in the Americas also reflects a grand strategic
vision. US policymakers have argued through-
out the 20th century that the USA was dedi-
cated to building a peaceful and prosperous
world order based on liberal free market
democracy. In addition, it has developed a
dense web of international institutions that
would force it to act in concert with its liberal
allies (Ikenberry, 1998; Ikenberry & Kupchan,
1990; Ruggie, 1997). If the USA is accepted as
the leader of a like-minded group of liberal
states rather than as a traditional dominant
power, it can reap the benefits of an inter-
American system that serves its material inter-
ests without having to pay the high costs of
imposing its will on others. Latin American
leaders are still wary of US power, but they
increasingly accept the legitimacy of the liberal
regional system proposed by the USA. There-
fore, the USA has supported the initiative of
the liberal democracies of the region to create
a collective defense of democracy regime both
because it shares a normative commitment to
liberal democracy with its neighbors and
because it is attempting to create an ideological
hegemony in the region that will allow it to
exercise its hegemony through consent rather
than coercion. Both aspects of US policy can
be understood from constructivist approaches.
Despite many analysts concerns about
the diminishing quality of democracy in the
Americas and the reduced vitality of the
collective defense of democracy regime,
what is most striking is that actors appear to
recognize a clear line that they are extremely
reluctant to cross. While none of the first
three targets of the Santiago Commitment
has instituted fully consolidated liberal
democracy, none has reverted to unambigu-
ous authoritarian rule. While Haiti has been
plagued first by a paralyzed national
government and more recently by an
05parish (ds) 7/2/02 2:39 pm Page 246
246 j ou r n a l o f P E A C E R E S E A RC H
overwhelmingly powerful chief executive, it
experienced its first two peaceful transfers of
office from one freely elected president to
another under the US/UN mandate. Even
though Fujimori became increasingly auto-
cratic over time, international pressure
nevertheless compelled him to restore at least
limited democracy to Peru with elections for
a constituent assembly in 1993 and relatively
free and fair presidential elections in 1995
(Cameron, 1997; McClintock, 2000;
Mauceri, 1997; Roberts, 1995; 1998). His
personalist regime later collapsed in the face
of widespread local and international con-
demnation of his manipulation of the 2000
presidential election and a bribery scandal
surrounding Fujimoris alter ego Vladimiro
Montesinos (OAS, 2000). In Guatemala,
even though the military and other pillars of
previous authoritarian regimes still possess
substantial power, and full civil and political
rights are not guaranteed, that countrys
transition toward democracy has been suf-
ficient to lead to a resolution of its decades-
long civil war (Stanley & Holiday, 2000). In
each of these cases, local actors who sup-
ported authoritarian rule sought the most
limited form of democratization that would
be considered acceptable by the inter-
national community, but at least they
maintained a minimal commitment to
democratic rule.
Since the early cases discussed here, no
Latin American state other than Cuba has
sustained an unambiguously authoritarian
regime. Brazil and Argentina thwarted a
1996 coup attempt in Paraguay by threaten-
ing to exclude that country from MERCO-
SUR. Even in Ecuador, where a military
coup succeeded in ousting President Jamil
Mahuad in January 2000, the presidency
was awarded to his constitutional successor,
Vice President Gustavo Noboa, rather than
to a military junta. Others, like President
Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, have dismantled
volume 39 / number 2 / march 2002
many of their countries liberal institutions
in an effort to consolidate power in presi-
dential hands, but even these autocrats have
been careful to accomplish these changes
through the electoral process. The collective
defense of democracy regime was designed
to stop military coups and blatant violations
of the norm that Latin American leaders
should be selected through free and fair elec-
tions. For the most part, it has succeeded in
this task.
Over time, according to constructivist
arguments, norms adopted initially as an
instrumental strategy to obtain resources
from the international community or avoid
punishment become habitual and become
firmly embedded in local practice. It is too
soon to tell if this will indeed be the case in
the Americas, but there is considerable room
for optimism. At the very least, however, the
collective defense of democracy regime has
led to the maintenance of a limited formal
democracy in all the members of the OAS
and allowed the unprecedented trend toward
regional cooperation to continue.
Immanuel Kant believed that enlightened
reason would eventually lead all peoples to
adopt liberal republican institutions of
governance. Perpetual peace would flow
naturally from the growth of liberal republi-
canism within states. The logic of Kants
argument suggests that intervening in sover-
eign states to promote democratic insti-
tutions is both immoral and unnecessary.
Thus, the collective defense of democracy
regime in the Americas and the broader inter-
national efforts to promote liberal democracy
diverge from the Kantian argument. Never-
theless, a failure to include international
efforts to construct the liberal pacific union
by promoting liberal institutions within
states misses one of the most important sys-
temic forces shaping the liberal peace today.
The inter-American system provides an
excellent example of this dynamic at work.
05parish (ds) 7/2/02 2:39 pm Page 247
R a n d a l l Pa r i s h & Ma rk Pe c e n y
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volume 39 / number 2 / march 2002
RANDALL PARISH, b. 1950, PhD Candi-
date in Political Science (University of New
Mexico); current research interests: Latin
American politics, inter-American relations,
international cooperation.
MARK PECENY, b. 1961, PhD (Stanford
University 1993); Associate Professor of
Political Science, University of New Mexico
(1992 ); author of Democracy at the Point of
Bayonets (Pennsylvania State University Press,
1999); current research interests: democracy
and the international system.