Braumoeller, Bear

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An End to Warhttps://mershoncenter.osu.edu/research/2012-2013/298-area-of-expertise/research-2012-2013/3145-an-end-to-war.html[7/25/2019 3:03:46 PM]Help BuckeyeLink Map Find People Webmail  You are here:   Home  Research  2012-2013  Research  Research 2012-2013  An End to WarAN END TO WARPrincipal Investigators: Bear Braumoeller, Department of Political ScienceIn his 2011 best-selling book The Better Angels of Our Nature, cognitivescientist Steven Pinker argues that war and other types of violence aredeclining because processes such as the rise of the modern state, commerce,and cosmopolitanism have favored human empathy, self-control, morality, andreason over predation, dominance, sadism and revenge.But is war really disappearing? In this project, Bear Braumoeller takes a freshlook at conflict between nations over the ages to conclude that while it mightappear war is in decline, that appearance is a statistical anomaly.Braumoeller examines two arguments. First, many argue that the 70-yearperiod without systemic war since World War II is evidence that war is indecline. In examining the past five centuries, however, Braumoeller finds anaverage of two systemic wars per century, or a 2 percent chance of warbreaking out in any one year. At that rate, the world would need to go 150 yearswithout systemic war before a definitive trend toward peace could beestablished. A 70-year period is not long enough to claim war is in decline.Second, Pinker and others have pointed to a decline in war deaths per capita toclaim war is in decline. But Braumoeller thinks this is a flawed measure. Adecline in war deaths per capita simply means growth in population is outpacingdeaths in war – and since world population has grown exponentially in recent decades, it would be shocking if war deaths keptup.A better measure of propensity to war, Braumoeller argues, is the frequency with which nations are willing to risk war throughactions such as missile strikes and armed skirmishes. For this Braumoeller turned to the Correlates of War Militarized InterstateDispute database. Here the data show the use of force held fairly even through World War I but then increased steadily.But this data didn’t take a key development into account: the creation of numerous new countries in the 20th century. SoBraumoeller made two new estimates. First, he divided each year’s use of force numbers by the sum of all possible countrydyads which could possibly have gone to war.Then he examined each dyad to see whether those countries were politically relevant. For example, Bolivia and Botswana are notpolitically relevant because they are small countries on different continents, so they would have no reason to go to war.Controlling for the irrelevant dyads, Braumoeller found essentially no change in the use of force over the last 200 years.The takeaway? Once you take into account the number of interaction opportunities, there's no obvious trend one way or another.Countries are neither less nor more warlike than they have been for the past two centuries.  2016-20172015-20162014-20152013-20142012-20132011-20122010-20112009-20102008-20092007-20082006-2007MERSHON CENTER About UsARTS AND SCIENCES College of Arts and SciencesINTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS Office of International AffairsRESOURCES Events CalendarABOUT US RESEARCH NEWS EVENTS GRANTS PEOPLE PUBLICATIONS CONTACTAn End to Warhttps://mershoncenter.osu.edu/research/2012-2013/298-area-of-expertise/research-2012-2013/3145-an-end-to-war.html[7/25/2019 3:03:46 PM]ResearchNewsEventsGrantsPeoplePublicationsContactAcademicsAbout the CollegeNews and EventsResearchArts and CultureAlumniCenter for African StudiesCenter for Latin American StudiesCenter for Slavic & East EuropeanStudiesEast Asian Studies CenterInstitute for Chinese StudiesInstitute for Japanese StudiesInstitute for Korean StudiesMiddle East Studies CenterE-NewslettersAnnual ReportsFact SheetExperts ListFaculty BooksFurniss AwardKnowledge Bank © 2013 Mershon Center for International Security Studies – College of Arts and Sciences1501 Neil Ave., Columbus, OH 43201Phone: 614-292-1681 | Fax: 614-292-2407Request an alternate format of this page.   

An End to War

https://kb.osu.edu/bitstream/1811/88181/1/Mershon_Research_Braumoeller_AnEndtoWar_2012-2013.pdf

An End to War

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