Liberal Peace, National Interest, and Asymmetric Perceptions in the 1895 Venezuela Boundary Crisis

This article examines the Venezuela Boundary Crisis of 1895, in which the United States and Great Britain, two major democratic powers, nearly went to war. The crisis does not fit neatly within standard liberal or realist explanations. While liberal perceptions and national interests both shaped the outcome, they did so unevenly. British elites and the British public broadly viewed the United States as a fellow liberal democracy, but this perception was not consistently returned in the United States. This made compromise more acceptable in Britain, but public opinion and commitments by U.S. leaders limited their ability to back down if their demands had not been met. The case suggests that liberal peace mechanisms depend not only on whether states are democratic but also on whether they perceive one another as such, and that these perceptions can be asymmetric. While democratic politics can constrain war, they can also intensify crises when issues of national honor and credibility are at stake.