War has diverse and seemingly contradictory effects on liberal democratic institutions and processes. It has led democracies to abandon their principles, expanding executive authority and restricting civil liberties, but it has also prompted the development of representative parliamentary institutions. It has undercut socioeconomic reform, but it has also laid the basis for the modern welfare state. This landmark volume brings together distinguished political scientists, historians, and sociologists to explore the impact of war on liberal democracy - a subject far less studied than the causes of war but hardly less important. Three questions drive the analysis: How does war shape the transition to and durability of democracy? How does war influence democratic contestation? How does war transform democratic participation? Employing a wide range of methods, this volume assesses what follows in the wake of war. It is an urgent question for scholars, and even more for citizens, especially in our anxious post-9/11 age.

Challenging the conventional wisdom that mass mobilization warfare fosters democratic reform and expands economic, social, and political rights, War and Democracy reexamines the effects of war on domestic politics by focusing on how wartime states either negotiate with or coerce organized labor, policies that profoundly affect labor's beliefs and aspirations. Because labor unions frequently play a central role in advancing democracy and narrowing inequalities, their wartime interactions with the state can have significant consequences for postwar politics. Comparing Britain and Italy during and after World War I, Elizabeth Kier examines the different strategies each government used to mobilize labor for war and finds that total war did little to promote political, civil, or social rights in either country. Italian unions anticipated greater worker management and a "land to the peasants" program as a result of their wartime service; British labor believed its wartime sacrifices would be repaid with "homes for heroes" and the extension of social rights. But Italy's unjust and coercive policies radicalized Italian workers (prompting a fascist backlash) and Britain's just and conciliatory policies paradoxically undermined broader democratization in Britain. In critiquing the mainstream view that total war advances democracy, War and Democracy reveals how politics during war transforms societal actors who become crucial to postwar political settlements and the prospects for democratic reform.

In this innovative theoretical book, Elizabeth Kier uses a cultural approach to take issue with the conventional wisdom that military organizations inherently prefer offensive doctrines. Kier argues instead that a military's culture affects its choices between offensive and defensive military doctrines. Drawing on organizational theory, she demonstrates that military organizations differ in their worldview and the proper conduct of their mission. It is this organizational culture that shapes how the military responds to constraints, such as terms of conscription set by civilian policymakers. In richly detailed case studies, Kier examines doctrinal developments in France and Great Britain during the interwar period. She tests her cultural argument against the two most powerful alternative explanations and illustrates that neither the functional needs of military organizations nor the structural demands of the international system can explain doctrinal choice. She also reveals as a myth the argument that the lessons of World War I explain the defensive doctrines in World War II. Imagining War addresses two important debates. It tackles a central debate in security studies: the origins of military doctrine. And by showing the power of a cultural approach, it offers an alternative to the prevailing rationalist explanations of international politics. Originally published in 1999. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

In this innovative theoretical book, Elizabeth Kier uses a cultural approach to take issue with the conventional wisdom that military organizations inherently prefer offensive doctrines. Kier argues instead that a military's culture affects its choices between offensive and defensive military doctrines. Drawing on organizational theory, she demonstrates that military organizations differ in their worldview and the proper conduct of their mission. It is this organizational culture that shapes how the military responds to constraints, such as terms of conscription set by civilian policymakers. In richly detailed case studies, Kier examines doctrinal developments in France and Great Britain during the interwar period. She tests her cultural argument against the two most powerful alternative explanations and illustrates that neither the functional needs of military organizations nor the structural demands of the international system can explain doctrinal choice. She also reveals as a myth the argument that the lessons of World War I explain the defensive doctrines in World War II. Imagining War addresses two important debates. It tackles a central debate in security studies: the origins of military doctrine. And by showing the power of a cultural approach, it offers an alternative to the prevailing rationalist explanations of international politics. Originally published in 1999. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

War has diverse and seemingly contradictory effects on liberal democratic institutions and processes. It has led democracies to abandon their principles, expanding executive authority and restricting civil liberties, but it has also prompted the development of representative parliamentary institutions. It has undercut socioeconomic reform, but it has also laid the basis for the modern welfare state. This landmark volume brings together distinguished political scientists, historians, and sociologists to explore the impact of war on liberal democracy - a subject far less studied than the causes of war but hardly less important. Three questions drive the analysis: How does war shape the transition to and durability of democracy? How does war influence democratic contestation? How does war transform democratic participation? Employing a wide range of methods, this volume assesses what follows in the wake of war. It is an urgent question for scholars, and even more for citizens, especially in our anxious post-9/11 age.