The basis of this book is the freedomist's triangle. The bottom line for the freedomist is the freedom of the individual to live his own life, consistent with a like freedom for others. And the freedomist is trying to secure and further this freedom at home while fostering it abroad. This is not only a matter of lobbying politicians, helping fledging democracies, supporting democratic movements, and so on. Many institutions and experts are at work on this. It is a matter of communication, of spreading the WORD about the power of freedom to solve many of humanities most pressing problems, such as war, democide, collective violence, famines, and mass impoverishment.

Ideas are more powerful than the sword, as anyone who has traced the influence of Karl Marx, Adam Smith, and F.F. Hayek could see. If the idea of freedom is to be fostered effectively, such effort should be based on a triangular relationship between three essential elements: clear and well tested theory; the interpretation of relevant events in its light; and a related mission -- a program -- for applying the theory within the context of current events. This is all abstract, of course, and can make for good philosophical chatter over drinks and among friends. The problem is how to make it all concrete in the furtherance of freedom.

Since 9/11, I've been troubled by this question. For virtually my entire scientific career, even beginning as an undergraduate in the mid 1950s, I've tried to explain why war occurs, and later why democide does as well, in the hope of doing something about this killing and murder of hundreds of millions of human beings. To do so, I applied statistical and mathematical methods to historical data, and tried to understand the research results through traditional historical scholarship. Out of this emerged in my Understanding Conflict and War, Vol. 4 the conclusion that in fact and in theory a democratic peace existed. With more tests by me and many replications by others, the idea of the democratic peace is now a well tested, social scientific theory. It says this: the more freedom a people have, the less they suffer from death and destruction in international and domestic wars and violence; the less likely their government will murder them; and when the people of two countries are free, they don't make war or violence against each other. In other words:

To foster freedom is to foster a solution to war and democide, and to minimize domestic collective violence.

All this is documented on this website in professionally oriented books and articles, and with references to the body of supporting literature and statistics that people can gauge for themselves. It also contains a full bibliography and what is probably the most extensive Q and A in the literature. The website now constitutes the first corner of knowing and doing -- well tested theory.

But, theory is not sufficient. It is often dry and technical stuff, too often abstract and unrelated to current events. To make sense, theory must be related to current events, the more important the events, the better. I set up a blog for this purpose , and there are many other blogs that are doing this as well for freedom or liberty. This effort is the second corner of the freedomism's triangle.

Now, based on the theory and facts on my website and other studies, and through their application to current events, I have included a third corner of the triangle in the above blog. Its mission is to link to those who believe in freedom at home and abroad and to enhance communicating freedom's power, and through the spread of this knowledge, to further the globalization of freedom. I mean this to contribute to a network of freedom blogs and websites that I am convinced can have an effect in time on the growth of freedom -- the evidence, desire, and moral justifications for freedom are just too great.

No, this isn't idealistic dreaming. Already, the President of the United States is aboard, although I'm sure he knows nothing of my blog or website. His foreign policy is explicitly based on the democratic peace, and there are other democratic leaders who have joined him in this.

What follows in this book is at the center of freedomism's triangle. It is part the basic supporting theory, part real and hypothetical events, part what to do. It is the democratic peace, but it is also about freedom where it contributes to other aspects of human security and peace. It is overall, knowing and doing freedom.