CSS Fellow Ben Denison on the Failure of Forcible Regime-Change

On February 26, CSS Post-Doctoral Fellow Ben Denison spoke on a panel at the Cato Institute (Washington, D.C.), on “The Failure of Forcible Regime-Change Operations.” The panel also featured Lindsey O’Rourke (Boston College), Alexander Downes (George Washington University), and Christopher Preble (Cato Institute).

Click here to watch a video of the panel discussion.

Event Description:

The United States has, at various times in its history, used military force to overthrow foreign governments. In recent years, however, there has been a growing scholarly consensus that these regime-change operations are often ineffective and produce deleterious side effects. Scholars have found that regime-change missions, whether trying to achieve political, security, economic, or humanitarian goals, do not succeed as envisioned. Instead, they are likely to spark civil wars; lead to lower levels of democracy; increase repression; and, in the end, draw the intervener into lengthy nation-building projects. Instead of promoting more democracy and advancing American security, forcible regime change undermines the effectiveness of other foreign policy tools. Such operations therefore ultimately harm America’s ability to achieve its policy goals.