The more democratic freedom a people have, the less severe their internal political violence. - Rudolph Rummel

Democracy says, ‘Govern yourself, but do so in a manner consistent with the same right of others.’ Democracy does not lay down a template for each person’s life, as do dictatorships.

Socialism aside, there also has been a rejection of Western values, of which individual freedom is prominent, and acceptance of some form of value-relativism (thus, no political system is better than any other). In some cases this rejection has turned to outright hostility and particularly anti-Americanism, and thus opposition to American values, such as freedom. To accept, therefore, that democratic freedom is inherently most peaceful, is to the value-relativist, to say the unacceptable—that it is better.

What is the democratic peace? In the literature on or referring to the democratic peace, this means the idea or fact that democracies do not (or virtually never) make war on each other.