Being Consistent With or Differing From the Neighbours?: National Levels of Democracy and Militarization Versus Those of Neighbouring Countries.

It has been noted in the political science literature that small states and island states (many are both of course) are more likely to be democratic than larger states and non-island states. A parallel argument exists regarding militarization, namely that states with more neighbours defined as border countries (and thus, potentially, more hostile neighbours) are more likely to maintain large(r) armed forces. Of course, there is a linkage between these two arguments, in that militarization (size of armed forces per population) relates negatively to level of democracy. Finally, one can observe a contagion or neighbour effect in terms of political regimes, in that democracies tend to be surrounded by other democracies, and autocracies tend to be surrounded by other autocracies.This paper seeks to assess globally these various points by empirically testing the following relationships: (1) island states (those without neighbours) being more democratic (in terms of Freedom House scores) than all other states; (2) island states having smaller militaries (per 1000 population) than all other states; (3) the relationship between national level of democracy and the total number of neighbouring countries; (4) the relationship between national militarization and the total number of neighbouring countries; (5) the relationship between national level of democracy and the weighted level of democracy of neighbouring countries; (6) the relationship between national level of democracy and the weighted militarization of neighbouring countries; and (7) the relationship between national militarization and the weighted militarization of neighbouring countries. Neighbouring countries are weighted by the percentage share of a country’s total land borders â€" thus a more precise assessment of their contagion effects. For example, Slovakia’s border with Hungary is much longer than its border with Ukraine, so Hungary is assumed to be a more influential neighbour in terms of Slovakia’s levels of democracy and militarization. Finally, for the last three hypothesized relationships, key outliers will be noted and commented on. All of these relationships will be tested both with current data and with 1985 data, to see whether patterns were any different back in the Cold War era. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]