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Liberalism in the Post 9/11 World
Peter Boettke, Christopher Coyne
December 1, 2005
The current approach to the war on terror is largely ineffective. Central to this approach are negative sanctions against actual and potential terrorists coupled with attempts to spread democracy through war, occupation and reconstruction. In this working paper, Boettke and Coyne argue that negative sanctions are unsuccessful and in many cases counter productive in reducing terrorism. Further, the authors postulate that efforts to impose democracy in weak and failed states via occupation and reconstruction have largely failed. Only by returning to a position of principled non-intervention can the war on terror ultimately be won. JEL Codes: B52, B53, O17
The ideas presented in this research are the authors' and do not represent official positions of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University.
