Liberal institutionalists believe that democracies naturally lead to peace because the many govern and not the few, and therefore those who decide to go to war will be the many that serve.
[23] The heart of Keohane and Nye's argument is that in international politics there are, in fact, multiple channels that connect societies exceeding the conventional Westphalian system of states.
The line between domestic and foreign policy becomes blurred in this case, as realistically there is no clear agenda in interstate relations.
The idea is developed that between countries in which a complex interdependence exists, the role of the military in resolving disputes is negated.
[24] Norman Angell, a classical London School of Economics liberal, had held: "We cannot ensure the stability of the present system by the political or military preponderance of our nation or alliance by imposing its will on a rival.
The central point in Keohane and Martin's idea is that neo-realism insists that, "institutions have only marginal effects ... [which] leaves [neo-realism] without a plausible account of the investments that states have made in such international institutions as the EU, NATO, GATT, and regional trading organizations.
In doing so he dismisses Keohane and Martin's NATO argument in favor of the example of the European Community and the International Energy Agency.
"[30] In essence, Mearsheimer believes that Keohane and Martin "are shifting the terms of the debate, and making realist claims under the guise of institutionalism.
[30] Mearsheimer criticizes Martin's argument that the European Community (EC) enhances the prospects of cooperation, particularly in the case of Great Britain's sanctioning of Argentina during the Falklands War, where it was able to secure the cooperation of other European states by linking the issues at hand to the EC.
Mearsheimer purports that the United States was not a member of the EC and yet the US and Britain managed to cooperate on sanctions, creating an ad hoc alliance which effected change.
"... Issue linkage was a commonplace practice in world politics well before institutions came on the scene; moreover, Britain and other European states could have used other diplomatic tactics to solve the problem.