ABSTRACT
The liberal tradition in thinking about security dates as far back as the philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), who emphasized the importance of ‘republican’ constitutions in producing peace. His pamphlet, Perpetual Peace contains a peace plan, and may fairly be called the first liberal tract on the subject. But liberal thinking on security has been elaborated by different schools within a developing tradition of more general liberal thought. Andrew Moravcsik (2001) has distinguished between ideational, commercial and republican liberalism following Michael Doyle (1998) who had earlier distinguished between international, commercial and ideological liberalism, each with rather different implications for security planning; and Zacher and Mathews (1995) who identified four different tendencies in liberal security thought. Each of these thinkers is reflecting upon a family of loosely knit concepts, containing in some cases rather opposed approaches. Kant believed that trade was likely to engender conflict, while later ‘commercial’ liberals saw in trade a beneficial and beneficent development. Republican liberals argue that peace is rooted in the liberalism of the liberal state – the internal approach – while neoliberal institutionalists emphasize the role of international institutions, which could ameliorate conflict from without.
