Martin Wolf, Why Globalization Works?. Yale University Press. 2004. ISBN 0-300-10777-3. pp 33. – Liberal democracy does not only have domestic virtues. It is also the only system of governance for which harmonious and co-operative inter-state relations are a natural outcome. This important proposition was put forward by the German philosopher Immanuel Kant in his tract Perpetual Peace. Liberal democracies may fight with other states, but have no reason to fight with one another. When Norman Angell, the British liberal, wrote in his subsequently derided masterpiece, the Gran Illusion, published in 1909, that a war among the great powers could only prove mutually ruinous, he was correct…Liberal democracy is conducive to harmonious international relations because the prosperity of a nation derives not from the size of the territory or population under its direct control, but from the combination of internal economic development with international exchange. The insight is the heart of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations. It was not just a point about economics, but an equally original and important point about international relations. Mercantilism – the view that the aim of trade is the accumulation of treasure – was worse than bad economics. It was also lethal politics, because it led to conflict where conflict was unjustified.”
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