Militarization, globalization and liberal democracy: a nexus?

Purpose Using composite indices, the paper examines nexus between militarization, globalization and liberal democracy. The democratic peace theory, conflict inhibiting effects of international trade – a key dominant facet democracy promoting hypothesis form theoretical underpinnings empirical investigation. Design/methodology/approach To probe into issue at hand, adopts dynamic panel VAR estimation procedure. Given usual data constraints, sample consists 113 countries, estimations span period 1995–2019. Findings findings from suggest presence negative statistically significant level militarization. No traceable was found. Research limitations/implications offer support to that strong links interdependence shaped by reduce need for military preparedness. results lead tentative inference in favor doux commerce thesis. Nonetheless, given historically specific entire post-bipolar era inferences stem should be treated with caution. Originality/value best authors’ knowledge, indices Bonn International Centre Conflict Studies (BICC) militarization index, index Swiss Economic Institute (Konjunkturforschungsstelle) (KOF), LibDem, polyarchy have not hitherto been jointly used previous studies examine