Does competition within a democracy prevent it from going to war? This article argues that institutionalized political competition is central to democratic peace, particularly when states are potential initiators.

Political Competition Theory: The authors develop a dyadic explanation for democratic peace based on the vulnerability of high-competition democracies.

* Incumbents face strong opposition criticism regarding war justification (normative), costs/benefits (practical), and win probability.

* This contrasts with traditional mechanisms like audience costs or public goods logic.

Why It Matters: Their approach synthesizes recent literature while directly addressing critiques of democratic peace research. They contend that previous explanations often relied on monadic logic for a dyadic phenomenon.

New Evidence: The authors present robust empirical evidence showing democratic peace is not spurious or methodological artifact.

* This supports the idea that high-competition states avoid initiating conflicts with democracies.

The findings suggest political competition fundamentally shapes how democratic leaders view international disputes.