bq. We may be reaching a point where war – in both its international and civil varieties – ceases, or nearly ceases, to exist …
That’s the always-provocative John Mueller, writing in the most recent issue of Political Science Quarterly (here, gated).
Now that sounds counterintuitive, doesn’t it? Even flat-out wrong. Just pick up the morning paper or turn on the TV, and what do you see? All sorts of bloody mayhem in distant spots around the globe. After all, war is inevitable. We all know that, and we have scores of explanations — sociobiological and psychological and psychological and economic and structural, and, well, just keep going — of why it’s true.
But follow along. Mueller does a detailed accounting, of which I’ll just touch on the highlights.
Wars come in four flavors.
Wars among developed countries: There have been zero since 1945. “Shattering centuries of bloody practice, these countries have substantially abandoned war as a method for dealing with their disagreements.”
Other international wars: “Rather rare.” Since the end of the Cold War, only one “fits cleanly into the classic model in which two countries have it out over some issue of mutual dispute” (the 1998-2000 conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea).
Imperial and colonial war: “Colonialism’s demise has meant … an end to its attendant wars.”
Civil war: Fairly common, but most “have been more nearly opportunistic predation waged by packs – often remarkably small ones – of criminals, bandits, and thugs engaging in armed conflict either as mercenaries under hire to desperate governments or as independent or semi-independent warlord or brigand bands.” “Many of these wars – or competitive criminal enterprises – have exhausted themselves, and new ones have failed to arise in sufficient numbers to maintain the same frequency.”
Thus, “war, as conventionally, even classically, understood, has, at least for the time being, become a remarkably rare phenomenon. Indeed, if civil war becomes (or remains) as uncommon as the international variety, war could be on the verge of ceasing to exist as a substantial phenomenon. …If this happens …. It would constitute one of the most monumental developments in the history of the human race.”
And it might even cause us to rethink some of our favorite theories.