A country can dodge military modernization for any one of four independent reasons

Evidence

For the basic-level cause of “absence of military revolution,” the relationship with the secondary level is one of equifinality. Four secondary-level variables are alternative causes of the absence of a military revolution. Thus, when faced with heavy warfare, a country can avoid a substantial mobilization of national resources for the military if one or more of the following causes are present: (a) a geography that provides a natural barrier to invading armies, (b) commercial wealth that allows the country to protect itself while mobilizing only a proportion of resources toward war, (c) foreign resource mobilization that takes place when war is conducted primarily outside a country’s territory, and (d) alliances that reduce the extent of domestic resources that must be mobilized (1992, 78–79, 240). A key aspect of Downing’s argument involves exploring the different ways that specific countries avoided a military revolution and stayed on a path leading to democracy. — Gary Goertz, Social Science Concepts and Measurement, 1601

Categorization

• XREF: Complements the equifinality structures traced in the Haiti and Ottoman security chapters — many roads to the same outcome.
• CANDY: The four escapes from a ‘military revolution’ — natural barriers, commercial wealth, fighting abroad, alliances — are a crisp cocktail-party list.