This book challenges the way that the relationship of "democracy", "liberalism" and "war" has been framed in terms of (outdated) assumptions about the state and the international system. The authors place these key concepts in historical and social context and interrogate the claim that liberal democratic states do not go to war with each other. Rejecting simple causal connections, they reveal instead the multiple and changing relations among systems of government, liberal ideology and the use of force. Their critique opens up new space for the analysis of the roles of democracy, liberalism and war in the making of the international system.