Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of wars between democracies


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   No consensus to delete. A discussion on whether to merge is of course possible on the article talk page. Stifle (talk) 08:17, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

List of wars between democracies

 * – ( View AfD View log  •  )

Article is full of wp:synth and wp:or This is - and always will be - an indiscriminate collection of information; and is not for Wikipedia. Suggest merger to Democratic peace theory as a subsection mark nutley (talk) 20:59, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions.  — Cliff smith  talk  23:37, 15 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Merge to Democratic peace theory, as the information would best be presented as a section of that article, IMO. RadManCF &#x2622; open frequency 21:15, 15 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment - It doesn't have to be OR and SYN. There is one or two ways to avoid it:
 * Only list those conflicts that has reliable sources that explicitly lists the conflict as a war between democracies. This may possible violate WP:INDISCRIMINATE or WP:OR.
 * Find all reliable sources that list wars between democracies and list their lists, separately. This would violate nothing.
 * However, user Pmanderson has in practice take WP:OWNership of the article, and he has rejected both, and instead adds conflicts with sources that doesn't support the addition of the conflict, or adds the based on WP:SYN (that is source A calls the countries a democracy and source B calls it a war, hence it gets added as a war between democracies). As Pmanderson also doesn't want to engage on consensus building (he has been blocked numerous times for revert warring) that makes discussing the issue tricky. This means that I'm going to be for delete unless Pmanderson accepts a path forward that can avoid SYN and OR, or promises to keep away from the article. The first would definitely be preferable as he is good at finding sources and knowledgeable about the subject. But that doesn't help if he refuses to follow policies. I'll await Pmandersons reply. --OpenFuture (talk) 21:26, 15 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Speedy close. This article has been plagued by users who have been removing sourced material because they don't like it. They have been repeatedly asked to find sources for their points of view, which include such claims as that the Greeks had no democracys [sic] and that the United States had no elections before 1789. They are unable to continue this today; the article is protected: and so they come here, and ask that the whole article be deleted.


 * Then perhaps the rest of us can get back to the task which has been widely endorsed as appropriate: compiling a list of those conflicts which reliable sources consider wars between democracies.


 * Removal of sourced material by OpenFuture: 16:43 18 June, 17:21, 17:43, 21 June 04:13, 09:14, 10:18, 23 June 16:23, 24 June 07:42, 27 June 05:42, 28 June 04:23 and so on.
 * Removals of sourced material by Mark Nutley:21:17 14 July, 21:19, 21:21, 21:36 Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:09, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Do you not think the removal of said material was due to the fact that it was Synth and OR? Whic his why the AFD has been brought, a merger is the obvious choice here mark nutley (talk) 22:16, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
 * No, it was due - as the edit summaries will prove - to the fact that the blankers disagreed with the reliable source. Had they had reliable sources which disagreed, we would have included both, as policy requires - but they didn't and don't. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:27, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
 * My deletions are because the source didn't support the statement, ie it was SYN or OR. This has been explained to you multiple times. Your fail not only to assume good faith, but you completely refuse to accept that there can be good faith even after explanation of the delete. --OpenFuture (talk) 07:17, 16 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Merge to Democratic peace theory mark nutley (talk) 22:16, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
 * If it were on topic, and would get rid of these blankers, that would be worth it; but this has only the most tangential relationship with democratic peace theory; almost all of the many theories of the democratic or liberal peace deal only with established democracies with wide suffrage - precisely to avoid the wars between young democracies or democracies with limited suffrage. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:24, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Speedy Close, nominator is asking for a merge, not deletion. WikiuserNI (talk) 22:35, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
 * No i a masking for deletion, and suggesting a merger to preserve what little content is there mark nutley (talk) 22:39, 15 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Speedy close, the nominator does not seem to describe an issue that is appropriate for AfD. BigK HeX (talk) 22:37, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

I think that this is pretty interesting, and should stay. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rosepicou (talk • contribs) 22:59, 15 July 2010 (UTC) — Rosepicou (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.


 * Delete - Per above. There aren't that much to merge currently. --OpenFuture (talk) 06:54, 16 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment (again) - Although the content as it is now is a source of never ending disputes, the content, when merged into Democratic peace theory would *not* be that. The source of the content dispute is the desire to use synthesis/original research (which I also fell or in the beginning) namely the desire to use one definition of democracy and apply that to one definition of war, and then list the resulting outcome. But as a part of Democratic peace theory the article do not suffer from that problem, as you simply list the most prominent researchers examples of wars between democracies there. The definition of democracy then becomes irrelevant. (The same would go for my solution 2 above, but I seem to be the only one who likes that, so I guess that's a lost cause. :-) ) --OpenFuture (talk) 07:14, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
 * This reads like a promise not to vandalize this material, if most of it is removed and the remainder is inserted in an article to which it does not belong (and in which it is already mentioned in passing). If sincere, it might be worth considering such blankmail. But I would prefer to find that it was not so intended; OpenFuture may wish to rephrase. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:11, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
 * No, it reads like nothing of the sort. Your comment however reads like you call me a vandal and fail to assume good faith. --OpenFuture (talk) 19:19, 16 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep and close no valid delete rational, this is not the appropriate forum for requesting a merger. Verbal chat  21:20, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Comment. This AfD appears to be part of an ongoing campaign on the part of the nominator of forum shopping, edit warring, and generally doing anything but actually resolving the underlying content dispute through discussion. --erachima talk 22:09, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
 * You ever hear of wp:agf? You accuse me of edit warring and now forum shopping? Please retract your accusations mark nutley (talk) 22:12, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I will not retract them, and I have assumed good faith. Your recent actions could indeed be the result of ignorance of policy and process if taken in a vacuum, but you have demonstrated familiarity with policy in our conversations and my review of your general editing behavior. As such, speaking as an editor uninvolved in this dispute, it is my assessment that you are deliberately attempting to game the system in order to circumvent the need for editorial consensus. I welcome you to disprove my assessment by abandoning these inappropriate behaviors and engaging in proper dispute resolution. --erachima talk 22:34, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I`m not gaming anything. I`ll look through the dispute resolution stuff. Thank you mark nutley (talk) 22:45, 18 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Merge to Democratic peace theory, or Delete. This article seems to have WP:POV and WP:SYNTH issues; at the very least, it should be renamed to List of alleged wars between democracies, as the inclusion of some or all of the conflicts here is contentious. Preferably though, it should be merged into Democratic peace theory as a list of alleged counterexamples, but only the parts that are sufficiently referenced as such. Robofish (talk) 00:55, 19 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep - an interesting and well-sourced list, with a topic that is both coherent and interesting. It dovetails nicely with the Democratic peace theory; merging to that article is not appropriate: the article is an explanation of the theory and this list is a list of counter-examples.--GrapedApe (talk) 01:28, 19 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep. The References section clearly shows that numerous academic articles have been written about this very subject. Since those articles don't list every war ever fought, clearly not an indiscriminate collection of information. There certainly are edge cases, where it's debatable what should be in and what should be out, but few lists don't have those. --GRuban (talk) 07:10, 19 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Delete or userify as incurable ("If the page can be improved, this should be solved through regular editing" - no prospect of improvement, and no prospect of regular editing, short of banning all the editwarriors). I don't see much use for Democratic peace theory either - this historical curiosity had already demonstrated its falsifiability so there's no need to shovel more arguments into it.
 * We have lots of articles on disproved theories, and democratic peace theory is in better condition that Phlogiston - except for the attention-grabbing extremists, most theorists hold that wars between established democracies are less likely, not impossible, and there is non-trivial evidence for that. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:15, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Back to the "list": This is just another case of abstract humanitarian science where collation of different sources in one list is unacceptable: evidence provided by A dilutes the arguments of B, entries from B contradict the theories of A etc. Such lists must be, ideally, limited to a single author, or, if wider presentation is preferred, a single school of thought, a single theory. If the holy cow of NPOV requires a second opinion, this must be presented as a separate list, not inserted into the main one. East of Borschov 04:10, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Exactly! Finally somebody else that gets this. :-) --OpenFuture (talk) 07:09, 20 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Delete - Lists like this are inevitably POV fests with cherry picking of sources. Basic problem is that there are multiple definitions of democracy and even where 2 people agree on a definition it is still often difficult to decide whether states come up to scratch.Dejvid (talk) 20:26, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
 * That would be a fair description of Articles for deletion/Mass killings under Communist regimes, which was kept. Here, however, there is consensus of all who have seen it (mark nutley and OpenFuture excepted) that all sources are welcome, and the test is whether there is a reliable source that such-and-such event was a war, or was between democracies. If there is a dispute between sources, and in some cases there is, we should, and intned to, include both sides. This nomination arose from two editors who have strong opinions and no sources. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:33, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * No it would not be a fair description for that page, and your description of the content dispute is completely incorrect. This is about your WP:SYN and WP:OR. There is nothing wrong with your sources, they just don't support the assertions you make. --OpenFuture (talk) 05:08, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Matters to be dealt with (were they genuine) by normal editing, not by deletion. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:22, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Deleting things that should not be on Wikipedia is perfectly normal. --OpenFuture (talk) 18:40, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * While there are multiple definitions of communism the definitions of communist regimes that have actually existed is far less problematic. In any case Mass killings under Communist regimes is not a list. Lists require a yes/no for inclusion. Finally even were the two cases the same, it would still be open to say that decision was wrong and vote for delete in this case (but note the unreal conditional).Dejvid (talk) 18:49, 21 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep or merge with redirect. This information is useful, if not perfectly presented. --Yopienso (talk) 03:01, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.