Centers of Gravity: Regional Powers, Democracy, and Trade

Timothy M. Peterson and Thomas Lassi

International Interactions, 2017, vol. 43, issue 2, 326-348

Abstract: Classic studies on hegemonic stability and power transition suggest that concentration of capabilities favoring a single state can promote economic cooperation and discourage militarized conflict. However, tests of these arguments have been primarily limited to examining temporal variation in global capability distributions and corresponding levels of system-wide cooperation; few have examined the impact of capability concentration at the region level. In this article, we contend that concentration of regional military capabilities corresponds to lower trade costs for states throughout a region and to an incentive for weaker states to de-prioritize expenditure on the military, freeing resources that can be used to promote trade. As a result, this condition promotes higher levels of trade, particularly within the region. We also argue that democratic regional powers are better able to foster confidence in the sustainability of cooperation; thus, the trade-enhancing impact of concentrated regional capabilities is stronger when the predominant state is more democratic. We find evidence in support of our expectations in statistical models examining state trade between 1960 and 2007.

Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/03050629.2016.1184661 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:ginixx:v:43:y:2017:i:2:p:326-348

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/GINI20

DOI: 10.1080/03050629.2016.1184661

Access Statistics for this article

International Interactions is currently edited by Michael Colaresi and Gerald Schneider

More articles in International Interactions from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().