4 - The Shrewd Sheriff on the Beat

Summary

This chapter takes the approach of quantitative analysis to test the book’s theory: It shows that there is a systematic connection between the domestic institutions and the US ability to attend to its double tasks of maintaining friendly relations while fostering good governance and more respect of human rights. The chapter shows that partner nations with domestic political institutions that allow for more open and competitive political processes of leadership turnover have closer foreign policy alignment with the United States, experience fewer coups, enjoy better governance, and have more respect for human rights than the ones that do not. That is the case both among democracies and autocracies: in parliamentary democracies more than in presidential democracies; in autocracies with multiparty legislatures than in autocracies with personalist leaders or single-party legislatures.