No democracy has ever declared war against, or fought against, another democracy.

Topic Questions:

(1.) Do you agree with this statement?

---- If no, give examples why the statement is false.

(2.) Is it in the best interest for a democracy to spread democracy for lasting peace?"

Update:

The term democracy will be defined as a government "for the people by the people" with regular free elections.

The discussion has pointed out democracies have declared war on other democracies. But has a democracy fought against a democracy in war?

Question:

Has a democracy fought against another democracy in war?

(1.) Do you agree with this statement? Yes and no. I think it needs to be qualified with a certain type of established democracy which gives power to the broad mass of people in fair or just way. A population with equal rights before the law, civil liberties protected, free markets, Constitutional limitations on government power, in addition to the elections which determine the leaders and policy decisions. Those types of democracies don't seem to war with each other.

If no, give examples why the statement is false.
Exceptions to the quote would be loose sorts of democracies that are not well established. The American civil war is an obvious one (I can't say the south was a true democracy with slavery). The war of 1812 between Britain and the US is another. I think that Argentina was a democracy during the falkland islands war with Britain. If so, that would be another exception. Can't think of any others at the moment.

(2.) Is it in the best interest for a democracy to spread democracy for lasting peace?"
Yes, stable established democracies seem to get along a lot better than those with heavily centralized government power and limited civil liberties.

Argentina was being ruled by a dictator president, the third after the 1976 coup, General Leopoldo Fortunato Galtieri. He decided Britian wouldn't put up a fight if he took the Falkland Islands. He decided wrongly.

Civil wars, since they are wars within a country's border would be still considered under one democracy. Since it is their own people fighting their own people in a civil war, a second democracy does not form until the country breaks in two. I guess the rules with that point would be internationally recognized borders? I do not know if the south even held elections by its people for its temporary goverment.

King George III called the shots for the war of 1812. Not the Parliament style British goverment we see today. Note that there was a Parliament in 1812, but ultimately the King called the shots, and it was not a democracy since the King was not elected.

No democracy has ever declared war against, or fought against, another democracy.

(1.) Do you agree with this statement?

This is a classic trivia question , and my (very classic) answer is no. The statement is false.

Finland declared war on Great Britain in December 1941, and Great Britain along with Australia, Canada, and New Zealand declare war on Finland in December 1941.

Leaders take nations to war when someone's interests require it. "Democracy" on either side of the line plays no part in the decision-making.

(2.) Is it in the best interest for a democracy to spread democracy for lasting peace?

I would have to answer no.

First, the question begs further questions concerning the idea of "democracy." Whose idea and interpretation of democracy are we talking about here? Does one size fit all? And who gets to decide the size?

Secondly, "spreading democracy" by military means, political coups, assassinations, and such, seem to be a source of animosity, a casus belli, in itself.

Larissa wrote:




This is very true, even though those countries declared war on Finland, they actually never fought with her or funded the fight with her by monetary and military means. So at least one part of the original statement No democracy has ever declared war against, or fought against, another democracy is false.

Has a democracy fought against another democracy in war?


Isn't a democracy "by the people for the people?" Regular free elections to determine who runs things.

Britain, France and Israel forces were involved in an invasion of Egypt during the Suez canal crisis.


It depends. Without the proper protections, Democracies can easily go into decline. This happened in Germany, for example, when Hitler obtained dictatorial powers. Another example, Iran voted itself into a theocracy.

Mrs. Pigpen wrote:



Egypt was not a democracy at the time of the Suez canal crises. Nasser had lead a coup against King Farouk in 1952. Nassar assumed leadership control without elections.




I agree, democratic governments can fail. Russia had a brief flight with democracy shortly after the beginning of the 20th century. We all know what happened after that. But in all cases of failed democratic goverments, inside or outside forces replaced democracy with a non-democratic goverment- ones that did not continue to hold regular free elections. Possible argument: Maybe this is why a democracy should help stabalize other democracies?

It says here that Nassar was elected in June of 1956. The airborne invasion involving British and French forces was in November.

Edited to add: Of course, I have no idea as to the validity of that election. For example, we "restored democracy" in Haiti, and then later helped to oust the "democratically elected" leader after a supposed faulty election. Does that apply as a democracy? Maybe, it's hard to say. Elections alone are not enough.

Mrs. Pigpen wrote:



Yeah, Nasser, in 1956 ran unopposed and was elected president of the republic of Egypt. Sort of like Saddam's elections where he won with 99.9% of the vote... the people who wrote in other candidates were jailed or killed. So Nasser's election was not free (the right of dissent). Even though the recent action in Haiti was not a decleration of war, Aristide refused to step down- stopping the regular free election obligation of a democracy and going against Haiti's own constitution. He also supressed free elections by intimidation with violence. One can argue that in the case of Haiti, the US stopped a democracy from failing. I guess that statement hinges on the free elections later this year.

Well, I just spoke with a friend who has a Phd in history, and he said that two true democracies have never waged war against one another. He claims that Finland was more of a totalitarian state at the time it declared war against Great Britain (and of course its involvement had more to do with the war against the Soviets than against Britain, as has been mentioned).

Awsome! The reason I started this thread is because I always hear the argument against spreading democracy and that we should stop meddling in other countries business and they will in turn leave us alone. Isolationism was shown not be the safest course for protecting America by Woodrow Wilson. Then Ronald Reagan and now George W. Bush have made the connection that how a country trusts other countries is directly related to how it trusts its own people. If it can't trust the will of its own people to survive, how is it going to survive with the will of other countries? The answer Reagan and Bush conclude is democracy. If no true democracy has ever waged war against another true democracy... that is a pretty stiff argument for why democracy should be spread. I guess the true nature of the libral's argument should be exactly how to spread democracy.

Haha, my friends and I were just debating this on another forum a few days ago. One only has to look at the Mexican-American War, have you forgotten how you took Arizona, New Mexico, and California from another democracy by FORCE?

[editted for mis-spelling]

Mexico a was dictatorial centralist government at the time. Not meeting the conditions of this thread discussion. Try again.

I wish people would actually research their answers before posting. I hope I am not being too harsh. All apologies.

This is the first time I have read anyone--let alone a historian (!)--claim Finland has been a totalitarian state at some point of her history. This is such a curious a claim I must ask if Mrs. Pigpen or this "friend who has a Phd in history" of hers could clarify a bit and give examples just how was Finland considered to be a totalitarian state. How did this curious "totalitarianism" manifest itself in Finland? Also, are there perhaps documents, history journal articles, the like to show that this is more than just one person's ("the friend with a Phd's") opinion/unbacked claim?

Then there is the curious question of "true democracies." What is a "true" democracy? The most basic right of a citizen in a democracy is the right to vote. Do we agree on this? If yes, can a country that promotes such state-sponsored practices as "literacy tests" and "poll taxes" to discriminate and deny voting rights from voting-age black/African American (and in some cases also Jewish and Asian-American) citizens be considered a "true" democracy? How about a country whose parliament has an unelected champer of "hereditary peers" (read aristocrats) and lords, can it be considered a "true" democracy?

Germany had taken control of Finland to attack Mumansk, Russia. The normal run of the government was changed during this time period.

Just something he told me at starbucks this morning, since I mentioned the forum topic. He taught Russian history at a college. But, fair enough, I looked it up. There's a brief timeline here. Oops..I'm late, phobosmoon already answered this one. Looks from the timeline as though the Russians also occupied parts of Finland during this time.

Okay, although José Joaquín de Herrera had to ask Mexico's Congress nicely for money for the war, you can call him a dictator if you want. Maybe I should start a thread called "Can democracies be the aggressor and take territory from other countries as they will?"

I will just ask this, how did Herrera become the leader of Mexico? My fingers are getting too tired to keep writing history.

Finland allowed German troops to transit through Finland in the north and attack Soviet Union from Finnish airfields in the Lapland, which is not quite the same as the bold statement that "Germany had taken control of Finland." German (Luftwaffe) units arrived to Finland mostly through and from Norway and were stationed in Lapland.

"The normal run of the government was changed during this time period."

How?

Perhaps you could find something to substantiate this claim?

The "normal run" of any government that participated in the war was changed during this period, agreed?

But, bearing in mind that democracy means a government "for the people by the people" with regular free elections, how did the democratically elected government of Finland ("by the people") fail to serve the interests of the Finnish citizens ("for the people") during the war years? Finland did not surrender and was the only country on the losing side of WWII that was not occupied by foreign troops. Finland saved her independence and her democratic government, which is what those Finns and their government were fighting for, wasn't it?

Something along the lines of suspending the popular elections.



http://www.uta.fi/FAST/FIN/HIST/sm-ryti.html

It is not to say that democracies can't make wrong decisions, but when aligning with the German's, the government of Finland was forced to abandoned democracy by suspending normal voting habbits during its war years. It was by Hitler's gun, and Ryti hated every minute of it. Ryti was later found guilty of war crimes... no thanks to the Soviets. But his place in history is seen as one who saved Finland from the war. Good try though Larissa, I accepted your answer when you first posted, but digging some more on the subject I found out otherwise.

In some cases, such as Iraq right now, democracy will not equal peace, at least not in itself. The reason is that Iraq is made up of a number of tribes and groups who do not sit comfortably alongside each other. It took a strong (and brutal, murdering etc.) leader to hold the country together. In Yugoslavia, it took a strong dicator to ensure a modicum of peace. As soon as he died, the people took it on to themselves to break up and declare war on each other.

Sometimes a strong leader is what is needed, rather than an elected and power-weak democracy. How many times have democracies been the target of miliary coups?

On top of that, the US has a strong (maybe too strong) democratically elected leader, and that has not brought peace to the world, because he can just about do what he wants, without much domestic challenge to his position.

The US (and UK) system is an interesting one, because although you can chose to vote someone in, the power players in the parties and behind the scenes choose who you can choose from. Is that a true democracy? Money has a major play in the US candidate race (more so than here), without which you might be the best potential leader, but never get to power. But then, i'm increasingly cynical and jaded about the way we elect a leader.

Edited to add:

Hitler was voted in. Did it stop being a democracy when he took more power? He had already been voted in. OF course, he couldn't be voted out by the time he declared war, but then neither could Bush or Blaire because it was between elections...

Then would it not be fair to say that by aligning with the Allies, Britain was forced to abandoned democracy ("true" democracy, as stated by phobosmoon3) by suspending normal voting habits during the war years, as British general elections were postponed during the war and held again in July 1945 (same year as the Finnish elections)? I imagine it is quite difficult to have any kind of elections if the majority of the countries military-aged men (and women ) are deployed and perhaps already at the front.

The information you provide is correct, however, I would say your interpretation of this brief snippet is somewhat incorrect (in the kindest possible sense ). Be it hereby noted that the Finns did not "suspend their normal voting habits" by request of Nazi-Germany, as a direct consequence of "aligning with the German's," as your statement seems to suggest.

First, the presidential elections were premature and necessitated by President Kyösti Kallio’s resignation due poor health, not by request of the German's as in "aligning with the German's."

Secondly, Mr. Ryti did not come out of nowhere, so to speak. As a Prime Minister (elected by the Finns, I might add, as was the government of Finland, democratically elected in 1939 for an extended duty 1939-1945 but still by and for the people), he took over as acting head of state. The Prime Minister "stands in for the President of the Republic of Finland whenever the President is prevented from carrying out his or her duties."Official duties of the Prime Minister

[Sidebar: You might want to note the elections of 1982 when Prime Minister Koivisto, again acting as head of state due President Kekkonen's premature resignation (the poor health thing again), also became elected President. Given the position and duties of the office of Prime Minister in Finland, that is not so surprising.]

Third point, the electors chosen in 1937 elections (by the Finns) elected President in Dec. 1940 only for the remainder of Kallio’s term rather than for the full six years, because "it was not considered possible to arrange elections for electoral colleges in the exceptional circumstances," the "exceptional circumstances" being, of course, that Finland was at war.The Office of the President of the Republic of Finland.

Indeed, just last July 2004, the White House and the US Justice Department were considering options and "steps" of delaying the US Presidential Elections in case of an attacked, as a war time measure, I imagine.

Finland, it might also be noted, was not at war and did not fight for German interests. Finland fought for her own interests, which is why--as you noted--she aligned with Nazi-Germany instead of the totalitarian Soviet Union, as did, say, the United States of America. From USAian point of view, aligning with the grand communist totalitarian Stalin was probably the right decision. From Finnish point of view, the right decision was (in hindsight, of course) to ally with the ultimate nazi Hitler in order to keep her independence rather than to be conquered by the Soviet Union and lose that independence.

As a whole, I would say that it seems to me that whenever democracies embark on war, "democracy" takes a backseat, civil rights of certain citizens being of certain "ancestry" get suspended by Executive Orders, classified memos of secret practices and budgets abound, and so forth. Indeed, I would argue that in waging a war democracies scale down (by necessity or by choice?--I would say by choice) their "democracies."

The simple fact is that Finland stopped being a democracy during its war years. It did the best it could to save for a democratic future, but at the time, it was not a democracy. Ryti was never elected by the people of Finland to be president, or to stay as president. During two separate occasions, the two missed elections, the people of Finland could not vote against Ryti if they felt he was not doing his duties properly. They probably would have kept him in power, but they had no dissent power. The US has an emergency plan if our elections were prevented, and if that happened the US would cease to be a democracy until elections were restored. In the case of Finland, the voice of the people had been taken away by outside forces. Hitler and the Soviets undermined the Finnish government's ability to function as a democracy.

P.S. Ryti was appointed as Prime Minister, not elected. He never wanted to be Prime Minister, he tried to turn down the offer of Kyösti Kallio's Prime Minister appointment. Ryti resigned before a national election could ever be held by the Finnish people, upon wich, an emergency election was held to pick his successor- and restoring Finland as a democracy.

In 1965, there was a (US-backed) military coup in the Dominican Republic. When the populace rose up to re-instate their (elected) president, the United States sent 22,000 troops to put down the "uprising." Not only did we have a hand in changing their government from a republic to military authoritarianism, we then lent a hand in suppressing democracy (killing some 3,000 Dominicans in the process).

The corrupt regime in Vietnam, a leftover from the French colonial years, was on the verge of elections (as has been noted here previously). Our invasion of South Vietnam was an effort to preserve friendly authoritarian power rather than see a people freely elect a socialist government.

The United States sent Marines to Lebanon, a republic, siding with Israel and the (right-wing) Phalange Militia.

(2.) Is it in the best interest for a democracy to spread democracy for lasting peace?"

Sure. But does the relative peace between democracies justify the astonishing death toll the United States has left in its wake? Not hardly. The US has committed troops more often, to more nations, than any other modern state. For the most part our history courses teach us that the US has not been an aggressor nation, that we have only responded, reacted, defended. Of course this is simple propaganda, countered by even a cursory study of publicly available facts.

When faced with a choice between freely chosen "Communism" (in quotes because that is in itself a gross mis-definition) and imposed authoritarianism, the US has tended to back authoritarian structures. In the case of Spain, the spectre of Anarcho-syndicalist rebels had us backing naked fascism.

One could easily paint a skewed picture with a topic question like this. Without any context, it might seem that the relative peace between democracies is an end worth any means.

We have a history of imposing democratic structures with the bludgeon of military might. Even if ultimately it sometimes works, it isn't worth the blood price, or the price we pay in moral integrity. Democracy can be achieved through economic means - restructuring debt, trashing neo-liberal trade policies; through investing in infrastructure; through building cooperative indigenous markets rather than supporting sweeping capital flight; through trade status rewards; and mostly, by example. Right now, we are doing especially badly on that last one.

None of these were declaration of wars on our part. But most definitely we were forcing our muscle.... mainly as a middle finger to the spread of communism wich used corrupted elections to justify itself winning control of DR... and had undermined the would be elections in Vietnam. Even though Lebanon called itself a republic, it was not one. It was not a "government for the people by the people with regular free elections." So it was not a democracy. Everything sighted above was a "free elections" issue.

Edit: Actually the DR statement I said was wrong, the elections were free. A CIA backed coup later formed out of fear the newly elected leader, Juan Bosch, was leaning towards a communist revolution like the one in Cuba. Props to quarkhead. I could be wrong about Vietnam too, I am checking on that a little deeper.

Edit: I can not find any information detailing the CIA's involvement with the DR coup. It is not said if the CIA backed the coup from the beginning, or later helped it out by keeping the coup leaders in power. If the CIA did not help start the coup, the US did not fight against a standing democracy (since it had fallen), we just fought for a new goverment by not trying to reinstate a fallen government. The reason being? To prevent communism from setting up a new government out of fears the old government was at risk of turning communist. So quarkhead is not out of the woods yet.

Interesting quote though:


http://www.history.navy.mil/colloquia/cch2b.htm

Edit: The best I can come up with, by means of the resources at hand, is the CIA and the US publicly supported the coup, but did not aid in the fighting otherwise. The democratic government fell, and later in a state of civil war over the issue we actually aided the coup leader, Colonel Wessin y Wessin, with planes for his airforce along with 23,000 troops. Technically speaking the US never fought against the freely elected government. The US just publicly supported elements inside the democracy that wanted the current administration to fall, once it fell, we helped protect the new administration. Basically, the US told Colonel Wessin y Wessin that if he fought and won power, the US would keep him there. This is why the operation was classified as a US intervention. So for now, quarkhead, you lose on that example.

Edit: Since Vietnam never held elections, it was never a democracy during US involvement. We never fought against an established Vietnam democracy.

I stick by my answer on the Lebenon, it was not a democracy because the manner of its elections and how its leaders ran the government even though it called itself a republic. Just like Egypt during the Suiz Canal Crises.

I uphold the fact: No democracy has ever declared war against, or fought against, another democracy.

Questions for possible further debate (I'm a newbie--am I allowed to do this?), related to my earlier pondering "but what is a 'true' democracy?"

1. Which description do you think is more accurate. A. Wartime Finland was a democracy which had scaled down her "democracy" (as discussed in this thread) due to the war. B. Finland was more of a totalitarian state at the time of war, as suggested by Mrs. Pigpen.

How about Britain. 2. Which description do you think best describes wartime Britain. A. Wartime Britain was a democracy which had scaled down her "democracy" by postponing the general elections due to the war. B. Britain was more of a totalitarian state at the time of war.

The United States of America then, which to the best of my knowledge was able to carry out all coming elections but did not allow all her citizens to vote. 3. Was the United States of America at WWII A. a scaled down democracy due to the Executive Order Number 9066 and discriminating practices such as "literacy tests" and "poll taxes" to keep certain citizen from participating in the democratic process, or B. The United States of America was more of a totalitarian state at the time war and/or until the Voting Rights Act in 1965.

My premise: In waging a war democracies by necessity and by choice scale down their "democracies"--democracy and peace may be soul mates, but democracy and war cannot exist peacefully together.

I dispute that just because a war is on, a democracy is any less a democracy. Did the UK and the USA stop being a democracy when we started the iraq wars? No, we were just between elections.

An elected representative is no less elected just because there is a war on, or that they have (in the standard situation) the freedom to make more unilateral decisions. I'd suggest that they don't stop, in normal situations, and yet by a normal defination they've stopped being a classic democracy.

On the other hand, as mentioned above, can something that doesn't give voting rights to every resident adult (male and female, of any ethnic background, or religion) be considered a true democracy?


Is democracy a peaceful process in itself? Depends how far you'd take the defination of peace (e.g. more peaceful than just "not at war").

Is democracy then the frame and process within which the people have the negotiation of ideas through discussion, whereas war is its antithesis, negotation through military means (whereby who's strongest wins)?

War between nations simply means there is no democractic process between them, not necessarily excluding the process of democracy within them. However, Democracy is arguable a weak and vulnerable state (necessarily including indecision).

Further, do we actually enjoy proper democracy between elections, because only at elections do we reasonably have the power to exercise our voice. We give the elected person or party the power to make decisions for us. If that is democracy, then the event of war does not have to detract from the democracy we think we enjoy.

(I apologise for going around in circles...)

Wow. What a thought-provoking post, Genesisblade. Thank you!

While I ponder the ideas and questions you raised, I’ll throw in the concepts of responsibility, accountability, transparency, especially relating to this notion:



Something for further consideration:

What happens to “democracy” if the otherwise perfectly democratically elected representatives, between the elections, intentionally deceive (e.g. secret pacts, secret budgets, and the like) the very people they were to represent? Come the day of reckoning, the next election day, how can the voters be expected to make an informed decision (the “right” decision, if you like) if they do not fully know what their representatives have been up to (in representing them, in making decisions for them) between the elections in the first place?

So, is it enough to carry out successful elections, come rain or shine, to have “democracy?” How does responsibility (accountability, transparency) to the electorate figure in the concept of “democracy”?

Ah come on Larissa.. during its war years, through a series of tragic events, Finland had a de facto government. For that time period, Finland was not an acting democracy, it had to assume its power without its people's say. It could only assume it was acting in the best interests of a democracy because its people had lost their voice. The experts agree with me. Enough said. You are running the subject in circles. Debating responsibility, accountability, transparency of a democracy, would make this thread come off subject, if you would like you can start another thread discussing those issues.

But that is only one instance. What of England, and the USA during war? did they stop being democratic? Weren't we at war with Iraq?

We were both democracies by 1812, so surely that one counts...(albeit democracies where not everyone can vote..)

(Note: in terms of the UK being a democracy, there is no clearly defined moment when the UK became a democracy, it simply evolved into over time. Successive monarchs largely gave up their powers to the elected Parliament and once surrendered, the Parliament rarely chose to give them back. 1812 was during the Regency period, so in effect Parliament ruled the UK.)

1. I think having a democratic system is certainly a vehicle for lasting peace, but there are caveats. The democracy must be founded on a carefully structured constitution that limits and separates powers into different branches. The government must be based on a free market system.

2. This gets into issues of how far we should push our views on others. While I agree that promoting democracy would make the world a more peaceful place, should we use non-peaceful means to get there? I think this has to be looked at on a case-by-case basis.

I understand, and even agree with, what you are saying, as long as we are talking about “degrees,” if you like , of democracy. However, I did and I (still) do strongly object to Mrs. Pigpen’s characterizing Finland as “more of a totalitarian state.” I disagree and keep disagreeing; so far you have not and, I'm afraid, will not convince me of the totalitarian nature of the Finnish system/state during the Second World War.

My interpretation of a totalitarian state is one in which all human activity has been subordinated to and aggressively and absolutely controlled by a one-party, one-ideology machine, one in which any and all opposition is suppressed.

Such was hardly the case in Finland.

First, there was no state-sponsored ideology imposed upon the Finns (if “nationalism” does not count). Neither the Finnish government nor the Finnish people embraced the nazi ideology of their wartime ally, for instance.

Secondly, the issue of suppressing political opposition in favor of the ruling party. Nothing of that in Finland. After the general elections of 1939, six different political parties had elected representatives in the Finnish National Parliament (Eduskunta) as well as in the Government(s) (Valtioneuvosto), according to, for instance, this and this .pdf document (which also lists two “others,” what ever that means, so it could actually be eight different political parties). This alone defies my understanding of a “totalitarian state” ruled by one-party, one-ideology.

P.S. Pardon my cluelessness , but what does “de facto government” mean in this context? (I’m referring to the general elections of 1939, in which the members of the parliament and the government were elected).

P.P.S. Okay. I have to ask this. Who are the experts (who agree with you?) Why have I not seen them? Where do they derive their expertise from? Are they, perhaps, by any chance, Finnish historians?

Genesisblade, no, the US and Britain did not stop becoming democracies during the war. Go back and read the clips posted of the situation in Finland during the period in discussion.

Edit to add: I reconsidered, if Britain did infact post pone its elections, it too ceased to be a true democracy until it could hold elections again.

Larissa de facto means by rule with out a base or official establishment. Finland's goverment became de facto when popular elections were not held after the resignation of Kyösti Kallio as ordered by the constitution. I agree that Mrs. Pigpen's reference to Finland being totalitarian during its wars was not true. I have been wrong in some of my sitings on Finnish history myself too during the thread... Finnish History is not something most people study in the US. So Mrs. Pigpen and I have had to take a crash course on the subject. I hope I have cleared up those errors. As for my friends, they are professors at a local University. I do not want to say the University because I do not want to give away my location, but their degrees are in 20th century European history. I trust them.

Ptarmigan The king in 1812 still had authority over the elected parliment in matters of war. Since he was not elected, or appointed by elected officials, Britain was not a democracy for the people by the people, even though it had some aspects of that.

I'll eat crow on that one. Per the democratic aspect of Finland at the time of WWII, I think it could be argued either way.

My personal definition for a true democracy would include individual rights and protections for the citizens as well as proper representation. Without fundamental civil liberties and Constitutional limitations on government power I don't think a government will remain a democracy long...certainly not in any meaningful way. I also agree that in times of war, certain civil liberties might go by the wayside for a time. It happened here during the Civil war and WWII, that I know of.

I'm dragging this on, I know, and I apologize...

Ah, but you see, Kyösti Kallio was the President. His premature resignation in 1940 did not render either the Finnish Parliament (Eduskunta) or the Finnish Government (Valtioneuvosto/Hallitus) de facto, as they were perfectly democratically elected in the general elections of 1939. The Finnish Constitution, English version found here, states that:

Composition and term of the Parliament
The term of the Parliament begins when the results of the parliamentary elections have been confirmed and lasts until the next parliamentary elections have been held. (Chapter 3, Section 24)

Which happened after the war in 1945.

And:

Formation of the Government
The Parliament elects the Prime Minister, who is thereafter appointed to the office by the President of the Republic. The President appoints the other Ministers in accordance with a proposal made by the Prime Minister. Before the Prime Minister is elected, the groups represented in the Parliament negotiate on the political programme and composition of the Government. On the basis of the outcome of these negotiations, and after having heard the Speaker of the Parliament and the parliamentary groups, the President informs the Parliament of the nominee for Prime Minister. The nominee is elected Prime Minister if his or her election has been supported by more than half of the votes cast in an open vote in the Parliament. (Chapter 5, Section 61)

And furthermore:

The Ministers are responsible before the Parliament for their actions in office. (Chapter 5, Section 60)

Note, not before the President.

EDITED TO ADD: And further furthermore:

Democracy and the rule of law
The powers of the State in Finland are vested in the people, who are represented by the Parliament. (Chapter 1, Section 2)

Nowhere in the Finnish Constitution does it order that parliamentary elections must be held if the President resigns.

Finland held parliamentary elections in 1939. Therefore, both the Finnish Parliament as well as the Finnish Government were legitimate and constitutional.

Larissa, I do not know where your 1939 parliamentary elections are coming from, whatever the case the electorial collage from 1937 was used that elected Kallio to elect Ryti and then again to re-elect Ryti. What happened to the 1939 parliament then? Did Ryti ignore them, did Ryti control them? Are elections today different than the elections in 1937? You have to answer that one for me because I do not know. I will post my information again- please read carefully.



http://www.uta.fi/FAST/FIN/HIST/sm-ryti.html

This information makes it clear that the political process in Finland was interrupted during these times and the people could not stay in touch with its government. Why else did the government keep using the same electorial collage over and over again? Therefor, Finland was not able to be classified as a democracy during those years.

Anyway, Britain never faught against Finland. Even though she declared war, she never faught against Finland.

No democracy has ever gone to war against another democracy

This is sub issue, but i'm sure that the British Government can call or delay an election without it being any less a democracy. We vote in a leader on the understanding that, should war be called, they have increased powers, and that elections won't be run (under normal circumstances). That doesn't mean that the leader can't be replaced by the people, as long as parliament isn't disbanded.

It has also been questioned whether war (and threat of war) has been used as an excuse to take more powers into the position of leader than would otherwise be accepted. The power to invade people's privacy through tapping of calls, and checking of emails, being one; this is a fundamental right, that has been eroded under the banner of the war of terror. I question whether keeping the terror alert at a high level is something of a similar vein.



The more democratic a society is, and the more freedoms people have (to make mistakes and break the laws) doesn't directly make peace. If the people are granted too much freedom (or inversely have freedoms taken away), this can easily lead to civil unrest and civil war, no? We elect representatives, democractically. But we don't democractically agree to up Underground travel fares in London (we didn't get a choice - and as far as i'm aware they're not a private company). This notion of living in a "true democracy" is fundamentally flawed.

Think 1984. If you all you have to vote in are the pigs, then what democratic choice is that?

Phobosmoon3,

First, let me say that I take off my hat to your and Mrs. Pigpen’s willingness to take a crash course on Finnish History! I am seriously impressed.

As to the Ms. Mäkiranta’s student paper you refer to, as I said before, as far as I can see the information there is correct. However, it is a summary written not by a student of history but by a student of translation studies (with all due respect to Ms. Mäkiranta). The paper certainly gives an idea of the big picture, but not all the pertinent details, which make all the difference, IMO.

So, to answer your questions, no, Prime Minister Ryti did not ignore the Parliament nor did he “control” the Parliament. Apparently, he was highly respected throughout the political board and therefore could work well together with the Parliament, but that is a different thing. By all accounts, he was not a power-hungry wanna-be mini-Hitler who grabbed and stole the Finnish Presidency, and Ms. Mäkiranta’s paper certainly makes no such claim nor does anyone else. The Finnish (wartime) Presidency was more or less thrust upon Ryti because he, as Prime Minister and acting head of state, was an experienced statesman. Frankly, it would have been sheer madness to elect a greenhorn out of the woods when the country was fighting for its very existence, agreed? Given Finland’s dire situation squeezed between the Soviets and the Germans, the Finnish Presidency in the eve of yet another war was an office few men (or women) wanted. And, as noted elsewhere, President Ryti did pay dearly for having accepted that office. I doubt he actually never really and truly wanted the office. After all, he was comfortable as the Governor of the Bank of Finland. But he did his duty to his country and one cannot but respect him for that. [Insert Finnish flag here]

Anyway, what happened to the democratically elected Parliament of 1939 is that the Parliament used the representative powers vested in it and passed an Act dictating how the coming presidential election should be conducted (by using the 1937 Electoral College), which is in tune with the Finnish Constitution and therefore not unconstitutional (“un-democratic”), as the Finnish Constitution notes:

Section 2 - Democracy and the rule of law
The powers of the State in Finland are vested in the people, who are represented by the Parliament.
The exercise of public powers shall be based on an Act. In all public activity, the law shall be strictly observed.

And, concerning the Parliament:

Section 3 - Parliamentarism and the separation of powers
The legislative powers are exercised by the Parliament, which shall also decide on State finances.

The Constitution of Finland

It seems that 65-year-old Acts are not as yet available on-line (or then I did not look hard enough). You don’t suppose we want to make a trip to the Finnish archives…? But, in lack of anything better, here is an old Dec 1940 newspaper headline from a reference source called ”Agricola.” Agricola is the largest and best-known Finnish on-line history cooperative, maintained by university history departments, libraries, museums, archives, and historical societies. If you take my word for it, of course.

December 1, 1940 headlines reads: November 30 Parliament approved the Presidential Elections Act.

1.12. 30.11. eduskunta hyväksyi presidentin vaalilain.

It is in Finnish, but it’s easy enough to figure out. A crash course to Finnish:

Eduskunta = Parliament
Presidentti/presidentin = President/president’s
Vaali = Election
Laki/lain = Act
Hyväksyä/hyväksyi = Approve/approved

To sum up, three things happened here, all according to the Finnish Constitution.

1. First, the democratic parliamentary elections of 1939, which gave the Finnish Parliament its legitimacy as noted in the Finnish Constitution 1/2 and 3/24.

2. The Parliament then exercised the legislative powers vested in it (1/2; 1/3) and passed the Presidential Elections Act, which legitimated the use of the 1937 Electoral College in the Presidential Elections of 1940, as the “exercise of public powers shall be based on an Act” (1/2).

3. The Electoral College of 1940 then “exercised the public powers” and elected Risto Ryti as the President of Finland.

This proceeding is not as unusual in Finnish history as one might think, as the presidential institution of Finland (as opposed to the Parliament) is not nearly as strong as, say, in the United States of America; for instance, in 1994, Finland changed from electoral college to direct presidential election.



First point, the political process in Finland was not interrupted since the democratically elected Parliament clearly exercised the representative powers vested in it. That is what the ”political process” is all about, isn’t it?

Second point, the "people could not stay in touch with its government"? Based on what? How do we know that the average Finn could no longer stay ”in touch” with her or his parliamentary representative? Clearly, at any rate, the Finnish newspapers of the era, for example, were still writing and highlighting the proceedings of the Parliament. The plenary sessions of the Parliament were open to the public and the Acts were public.

Third point, the Parliament kept using the same Electoral College on grounds of the Presidential Elections Act of Nov 30. Whatever else we might think of the Act itself, point is, it did not go against the democracy and the rule of law as stated in the Finnish Constitution. Isn’t that what this whole question of “democracy or no democracy” comes down to?

My reading of all this is that the Finnish Parliament went to great length to keep the process within the rule of law and therefore as democratic as possible. In the same sense than, for instance, I view the US Presidential Elections of 2000 as legitimate and certainly (!) democratic but not as ideally democratic as possible, given the US Supreme Court’s involvement in the process. I hope this makes sense to you.

As to why were the “normal” elections for the Electoral College deemed impossible under the Dec 1940/early 1941 circumstances, I won’t go into details (unless you ask me to ). I will just point out that in the March 1940 armistice Finland was forced to cede a considerably large territory (read: former constituencies) to the Soviet Union, which resulted in a large number of internally displaced persons (read: voters without a permanent address). It took an organization as resourceful and experienced as the United Nations a year and a half to organize the Iraqi elections of 2005. I suppose Finland could have, in theory, gone without a President, the Prime Minister acting as head of state, long enough to have the sufficient legislation for new constituencies, voter registration and such in place. The Parliament certainly could have functioned on its own. This is, had there not been the looming new war. To cut some (minor) corners here, in order to mobilize her defense forces, Finland nominally needed a President.

Well, can we now debate to what degree Britain was a democracy when she declared war on Finland?

We can debate ourselves blue over this, but still Britain never attacked Finland. If you want to argue that they both were still democracies then you can argue that because of democratic processes, they avoided fighting each other.

Oh yeah, and at least one of us has. Literally. [picture me blue here]



I not only settle for this but actually agree with the last sentence. Wheeeew...

True, but the Monarch still has that power today. Constitutionally there has been no change (but then, there never is in the UK). In theoretical terms the UK is as democratic - or undemocratic - as it was in 1812.

By 1812, the balance of power in the UK lay with Parliament, it had done since the start of the Hanoverian Kings. The elected representatives controlled the treasury and were able to dictate spending. The Monarch was the head of the armed forces and had control of the army, however that is equally true today (and equally meaningless).

Certainly the Regent did not involve himself in military affairs. It had become an accepted dictum that Royalty hold only ceremonial roles in the military, leaving foreign affairs and warfare up to Parliament. In 1812, Britain's predominating concern was the rise of the Napoleonic empire, to the extent that Prince George involved himself in military affairs, his involvement was confined exclusively to matters concerning France.

However, the question really lies in how you define a democracy. It isn't really possible to say when Britain became a democracy - and some would argue that , as we cannot elect our head of state, we are not yet truly a democracy. It depends where you draw the line be being a democracy in effect and a democracy in principle.

(This doesn't mean that George did not interfere with politics - he did. However he was often held in check by Parliament.)

Aren't these the very situations where democracy is the answer? What other system would enable these groups to peacefully coexist? Iraq is a perfect example. Sure, Saddam held the country 'together' for quite some time...through brutally exterminating and terrorism any who might oppose him. That's hardly the model to follow. No, situations where there are opposing groups vying for power are exactly where democracy is indeed the solution...no other system allows a peaceful means of resolving such disputes.

In an ideal world, yes. However, all these people have known for a very long time, is taking arms against each other to get their way. If the US can't resist using military might to sway the argument, what makes you think that democracy would work in war-torn Iraq? They need to be rebuilt, supported, educated and have democracy built, their own version not some western template of democracy.

There is an element in the democracy that small countries have to demonstrate - that of yeilding to the big dog. However around Iraq, there are more than a couple of big dogs. It can either get the best deal for itself, or just do what the US says it should do.

Well, Herrera was not elected by the people directly, but his predecessor -- Santa Ana was. Santa Ana declared a state of emergency after rebellions broke out in Texas, but was subsequently ousted by his own military. That's about it in a nutshell. But I digress.

In a post in the "China's Arms Ban" thread under "International Exchange," Mr. Titus has brought to my attention that the Confederate States of America had their own democratically-elected president, their own currency, and their own army, and therefore qualifies as an independent nation. Although I disagree with his assessment that the CSA is an independent nation, I'm curious if you agree that the CSA qualifies as a democracy.

We might be defining democracy a little too strictly.



If the Confederate States (CSA) were not a democracy in 1863, then the USA was not a democracy in 1812, having been started much the same way and still under slavery in 1812.

Furthermore, government "of the people, by the people and for the people" had never even existed at the time Lincoln first uttered the words-- the Emancipation Proclamation left no USA-allowed slaves in the CSA, while some portions of the USA still had legal slavery, so neither side of the Civil War was a democracy, by the slavery caveat.

Women didn't get the right to vote until 1920, and there were discriminatory voting practices that significantly disenfranchised Americans until the late 1960's (right up to today if you believe P. Diddy). Looking into the future, if Roe v. Wade is overturned, then millions of future voters have been denied the right to life since 1973, meaning America is still not a democracy-- if we are to disqualify past democracies using future criteria.

We can conveniently redefine democracy to fit our assertions about whether democracies have fought one another. Depending how strict your qualifications are for democracy, either there have never really been any democracies, therefore leaving no one to fight; or there have been plenty of democracies occasionally fighting one another, but not very frequently.

Precursors to the Declaration of Independence vilified parliament, but for effect, charged the king with parliament's violations, justified by the fact that the king had not used his veto power, even though no British monarch had actually vetoed anything for 300 years. So if the US was legally independent in 1776 and run by elected officials, the Revolutionary War could be construed as a war between democracies, using broader definitions for democracy and independence.

There are no perfect democracies, and no countries with a perfect human rights record. Slavery was absolutely horrible-- but great strides toward an increasingly inclusive ideal of democracy were made even by the slave owners we now consider hypocrites. We would do well to give past and current democracies credit for being on the right path even though they would not all pass a modern "sniff-test" for good democracy. We should cut historical democracies some slack so that future democracies will cut us some slack.

Perhaps governments with elected officials are occasionally moved to violence against one another-- but far less frequently than military dictators, which I think is the point.

The common factor in the two examples--the War of 1812 and the Finnish declaration of war on the British Empire/Commonwealth--is that in both cases, the British were already at war with a non-democratic state (Napoleonic France and Nazi Germany, respectively), which was a decisive factor in sparking the examples.
In the run-up to 1812, Britain had been waging economic warfare on France by means of blockade, among other things, and this brought Britain into conflict with the US, which resented having its shipping interfered with. In the case of Finland, its declaration of war would appear to have been a condition imposed by Nazi Germany in exchange for assistance against the Soviet Union.
In both cases, the declarations of war were a consequence of an already existing war, and are therefore not prime examples.

Concerning the overall question, though, I think the minimal standard for determining what is a "democracy" in this context is universal male suffrage; in other words, does the common soldier have the vote (or will he at some point in the not too distant future, such as when he turns 21)?