Towards a more peaceful world Trends in armed conflict

1
Towards a more peaceful world? Trends in armed
conflict

• Lecture at HEI, 22 March 2007Course E 584 Topics
  in Peace Research
• Nils Petter Gleditsch
• Centre for the Study of Civil War (CSCW),
• International Peace Research Institute, Oslo
  (PRIO)
• Department of Sociology Political Science
• Norwegian University of Science and Technology
  (NTNU)

2
The End of War

• Norman Angell (1910) The Great Illusion
• Gaddis (1987) The Long Peace
• Mueller (1989) The Obsolescence of War
• Mueller (2006) The Waning of War
• No wars between developed countries during the
  Cold War
• Remarkably few major international wars of any
  kind since World War II
• The only traditional interstate war since 1975
  Iran-Iraq
• No major war between Israel and its neighbors
  since 1973
• The remnants of war are largely crime

3
War Is Not (Necessarily) Waning

• Wallensteen (2006) Too early to tell
• Prussian War is declining (the two World Wars
  were atypical)
• No war between two Security Council members since
  the Korean War (1950 53)
• - and there were many proxy wars during the
  Cold War
• War is waning between industrialized countries
• - but industrialized countries are not lower
  in war participation
• There are many regional wars (Middle East,
  Central Africa in the 1990s)
• Many wars still have a global impact
• When will we have peace between major powers
  when we have cooperative and universalistic
  relations between major powers

4
War Is Not Waning

• Mearsheimer (1990) Back to the future
• Huntington (1993) Clash of Civilizations
• Gurr (1994) Surge of Ethnopolitical Conflict
• - but also Gurr (2000), Ethnic warfare on the
  wane
• Rice (1993) Wars of the third kind
• Kaldor (1999) New wars
• Marshall (1999) The Third World War
• Sarkees, Wayman Singer (2003) A Disturbing
  constancy of war
• - different types of war peak at different times
  and must be examined together
• - war shifts between regions (proxy wars)

5
A look at the evidence

• Number of wars
• Number of battle deaths
• Indirect deaths
• Number of countries in war
• Number of countries at war
• Area affected by war
• Non-state conflicts
• One-sided conflicts
• Indirect deaths
• Terrorism
• A longer time perspective
• A very much longer time perspective
• If war is waning why?

6
Armed Conflicts in 2005
Countries with conflict on their territory in
2005 (dark brown color), countries with conflict
on their territory after the end of the Cold War
(light brown color), and the geographical centre
of the conflict (red circle). Source Halvard
Buhaug, on the basis of the Uppsala/PRIO conflict
data, see www.prio.no/cscw/armedconflict.
7
Armed conflicts, 19462005
Source Harbom, Högbladh Wallensteen (2006).
For the data, see www.prio.no/cscw/armedconflict.
8
Armed conflicts, 19462005
For the data, see Harbom, Högbladh Wallensteen
(2006) and www.prio.no/cscw/armedconflict. In
this figure, the number of conflicts is
normalized by the number of independent
countries. Figure created by Lars Wilhelmsen.
9
Wars, 19462005
Only conflicts with more than 1000 battle deaths
in a single year. See Harbom, Högbladh
Wallensteen (2006) and www.prio.no/cscw/armedconfl
ict. In this figure, too, the number of wars is
normalized by the number of independent
countries. Figure created by Lars Wilhelmsen.
10
Probability of death in battle, 19002005 ()

Data for the number of battle deaths (civilian
and military) from the COW Project (190045) and
from our own data (19462005) at
www.prio.no/cscw/cross/battledeaths, cf. Lacina,
Gleditsch Russett (2006). The number of battle
deaths have been divided by the world population
in all independent countries for that year, based
on data in Gleditsch Ward (2006).
11
Probability of death in battle, 19462005 ()

Figure created by Lars Wilhelmsen. Data for the
number of battle deaths (civilian and military)
are from www.prio.no/cscw/cross/battledeaths,
cf. Lacina Gleditsch (2005). The number of
battle deaths has been divided by the world
population in all independent countries for that
year, based on population data in Gleditsch
Ward (2006).
12
The Iraq spike

Figure created by Lars Wilhelmsen. The data for
the number of battle deaths (civilian and
military) are from the same sources as the
previous slide but the Lacina figures for Iraqi
battle deaths have been replaced by the median
estimate of a (somewhat controversial) article in
The Lancet (Burnham et al., 2006).
13
The blodiest conflicts after World War II
14
What is not included in these numbers?
15
Casualties in state, non-state, andone-sided
conflicts 200203

Kilde Human Security Report.
16
Genocide and politicide 19562001

The figures refer to the number of cases with
serious human rights violations in a given year.
The figure has been copied from Mack (2007) based
on data from Harff (2003), updated to 2005.
Please do not reproduce, since Mack (2007) is
still in press. An earlier figure (to 2001) is
available in Mack (2005).
17
Genocide and politicide 19892004

Source Eck Hultman (2007). The figure for
government in 1994 is 530,399 and is way above
the ceiling for the figure.
18
Democide in the twentieth century

The data are from Rummel (1994), updated on his
website http//www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/.
Definitions Genocide among other things, the
killing of people by a government because of
their indelible group membership (race,
ethnicity, religion, language). Politicide the
murder of any person or people by a government
because of their politics or for political
purposes. Mass Murder the indiscriminate
killing of any person or people by a government.
Democide The murder of any person or people by
a government, including genocide, politicide, and
mass murder.
19
Democide by year, 19001987

Source Rummel (1997) Table 23.1,
http//www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.FIG23.1.GIF.
Some of the democide estimates have subsequently
been revised upwards. Including them might make
the curve peak in a later year around the Great
Leap Forward in China, 195861), but would
probably not affect the inverted U-shape. (This
figure was added to the ppt presentation after
the lecture.)
20
Indirect deaths in selected conflicts in Africa
Eritrea rebellion not included. Source Lacina
Gleditsch (2005)
21
Good news about international terrorism,number
of episodes, 19822003

Source Mack (2005), based on data from the US
Department of State
22
Bad news about international terrorism,number of
deaths 19822003

Source Mack (2005), based on data from the US
Department of State
23
Military expenditure, 19852003
Source Bonn International Center for Conversion,
www.bicc.de
24
More countries are involved in conflict
Figure created by Lars Wilhelmsen on the basis of
www.prio.no/cscw/armedconflict .
25
Average number of countries per conflict
Figure created by Lars Wilhelmsen on the basis of
www.prio.no/cscw/armedconflict. Number of
conflict participants for all conflicts divided
by the number of on-going conflicts.
26
A smaller share of countries havea conflict on
their own territory
Figure created by Halvard Buhaug, based on the
conflict locations reported by Buhaug Gates
(2002).
27
The size of the conflict zones are declining
Computed by Lars Wilhelmsen, based on the
circular conflict zones reported by Buhaug
Gates (2002).
28
Great power wars 15002000

The frequency of great-power wars graphed by
quarter centuries. From Levy, Walker Edwards
(2001), Figure 2 (20).
29
War in Primitive Societies

• Keeley (1996)
• LeBlanc (2003)
• Pinker (2007)
• - against the myth of the peaceful savage

Source
30
Modern and primitive warfare

Scale 0 .2
.4 .6 .8
1.0 1.2 Annual war deaths
as of population. Source Keeley (1996 89,
Figure 6.1)
31
Why was primitive warfare so deadly?

• The prevalence of wars
• Frequent low-casualty battles
• High participation of tribesmen
• High-frequency deadly raids
• Customary killing of all adult males
• Poor treatment of women and children

Source Keeley (1996), ch. 6.
32
How to account for the move to peace?

• Liberalism Spread of democracy, economic
  integration, and international organization
• Realism Lack of great-power confrontations
• Structuralism Hegemonic rule
• Conflict resolution More peacekeeping and
  peacemaking

33
The growth of the liberal factors
-
Source for democracy Marshall Jaggers (2003),
for trade/GDP Gleditsch (2002), for IGOs
Pevehouse, Nordstrom Warnke (2004)
34
Peacemaking and peacekeeping

• Conflict resolution
• Peacekeeping
• Peacemaking
• - but Luttwak Give war a chance

35
Trends in peacemaking

• Preventing conflict onsets A six-fold increase
  in UN preventive diplomacy missions (1 ? 6)
  between 1990 and 2002
• Ending ongoing conflicts A five-fold increase in
  UN peacemaking missions (3 ? 15) between 1989 and
  2002
• Preventing restarts A Four-fold increase in UN
  peace operations (5 ? 20) between 1987 and 1999
• Support local actors A twelve-fold increase in
  Friends of the Secretary-General and other
  mechanisms (3 ? 36) between 1989 and 2004

Source Mack (2007 3)
36
Distinguishing between the explanations?

• Realism, structuralism, and peacekeeping
• Change occurs at 1989
• - number of conflicts
• - conflict zone
• Liberalism
• Longer-term change
• - battle deaths
• - great-power war

37
Accounting for the increase in countries at war

• Realism
• - more countries assuming regional power role
• Structuralism
• - hegemon is commanding more countries into war
• Liberalism
• - international norms pursued by more countries
• Peacekeeping
• - peacekeeping wars

38
Number of participants in the 'largest' conflicts
39
Participants in the two recent Iraq conflicts
199091 (28 countries vs. 1) USA, Canada,
Honduras, Argentina, UK, Netherlands, Belgium,
France, Spain, Portugal, Czechoslovakia, Italy,
Greece, Norway, Denmark, Senegal, Niger, Morocco,
Kuwait, Egypt, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain,
Qatar, Oman, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Australia vs.
Iraq 2003 (35 countries vs. 1, 13 old 23
new) USA, Dominican Republic, Honduras, El
Salvador, Nicaragua, UK, Netherlands, Spain,
Portugal, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia,
Italy, Albania, Macedonia, Bosnia-Herzegovina,
Bulgaria, Moldova, Rumania, Estonia, Latvia,
Lithuania, Ukraine, Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan,
Norway, Denmark, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Republic
of Korea, Japan, Philippines, Australia
Tonga vs. Iraq
40
Problems in testing the general models

• - not all effects linear (in particular
  democracy, but perhaps economic interdependence
  and IGOs)
• democracy where?
• cannot predict annual changes very well
• sensitive to single wars
• but wars backed by major powers on opposite
  sides seem less likely hence cautious optimism

41
References (1)
Angell, Normann, 1910. The Great Illusion A
Study of the Relation of Military Power in
Nations to Their Economic and Social Advantage.
London Heinemann. Reissued in a new edition,
same publisher, 1934. Shorter version published
1909 as Europes Optical Illusion Buhaug,
Halvard Scott Gates, 2002. The Geography of
Civil War, Journal of Peace Research 39(4)
417433. Burnham, Gilbert Riyadh Lafta, Shannon
Doocy Les Roberts, 2006. Mortality after the
2003 Invasion of Iraq A Cross-sectional Cluster
Sample Survey, Lancet 368(9545)
14211428. Eck, Kristine Lisa Hultman, 2007.
One-Sided Violence against Civilians in War
Insights from New Fatality Data, Journal of
Peace Research 44(2), in press. Gaddis, John
Lewis, 1987. The Long Peace Inquiries into the
History of the Cold War. New York Oxford
University Press. Gleditsch, Kristian Skrede,
2002. Expanded Trade and GDP Data, Journal of
Conflict Resolution 46(5) 712724 Gleditsch,
Kristian Skrede Michael D. Ward, 2006. 'The
Diffusion of Democracy and the International
Context of Democratization', International
Organization 60(4) 911933 Gurr, Ted Robert,
1994. Peoples against States Ethnopolitical
Conflict and the Changing World-System,
International Studies Quarterly 38(3) 347377
Gurr, Ted Robert, 1994. Ethnic Warfare on the
Wane, Foreign Affairs 79(3) 5264 Harff,
Barbara, 2003. No Lessons Learned from the
Holocaust? Assessing Risk of Genocide and
Political Mass Murder since 1955, American
Political Science Review 97(1) 5773 Harbom,
Lotta Stina Högbladh Peter Wallensteen, 2006.
'Armed Conflict and Peace Agreements', Journal of
Peace Research 43(5) 617631. Hewitt, Joe Jon
Wilkenfeld Ted Gurr, eds, 2007. Peace and
Conflict 2007. Boulder, CO Paradigm, in
press Huntingon, Samuel P., 1993. The Clash of
Civilizations, Foreign Affairs 72(3) 2249
Kaldor, Mary, 1999. New and Old Wars Organized
Violence in a Global Era. Stanford, CA Stanford
University Press Keeley, Lawrence H., 1996. War
before Civilization. New York Oxford University
Press Lacina, Bethany Nils Petter Gleditsch,
2005 'Monitoring Trends in Global Combat A New
Dataset of Battle Deaths', European Journal of
Population 21(23) 145166. Lacina, Bethany
Nils Petter Gleditsch Bruce Russett, 2006. 'The
Declining Risk of Death in Battle', International
Studies Quarterly 50(3) 673680
42
References (2)
LeBlanc, Steven A., with Katherine E. Register,
2003. Constant Battles The Myth of the Peaceful,
Noble Savage. New York St. Martins. Levy, Jack
S Thomas C. Walker Martin S. Edwards, 2001.
Continuity and Change in the Evolution of
Warfare, in Zeev Maoz Azar Gat, eds, War in a
Changing World. Ann Arbor, MI University of
Michigan Press (1548) Luttwak, Edward, 1999.
Give War a Chance, Foreign Affairs 78(4)
3644 Mack, Andrew, ed., 2005. Human Security
Report 2005. War and Peace in the 21st Century.
New York Oxford University Press, for Human
Security Centre, University of British Columbia,
www.humansecurityreport.org. Mack, Andrew, ed.,
2005. Human Security Brief 2006. New York Oxford
University Press, for Human Security Centre,
University of British Columbia,
www.humansecurityreport.org. Mack, Andrew, 2007.
Global Political Violence Explaining the
Post-Cold War Decline. Coping with Crisis.
Working Paper Series. New York International
Peace Academy, in press Maoz, Zeev, 2001.
Democratic Networks Connecting National,
Dyadic, and Systemic Levels of Analysis in the
Study of Democracy and War, in Maoz Gat, eds
(143182) Maoz, Zeev Azar Gat, eds, War in a
Changing World. Ann Arbor, MI University of
Michigan Press. Marshall, Monty G., 1999. Third
World War System, Process, and Conflict
Dynamics. Lanham, MD Rowman Littlefield Marshal
l, Monty G. Keith Jaggers, 2003. Polity IV
Project. http//www.cidcm.umd.edu/inscr/polity/. M
earsheimer, John J., 1990. Back to the Future
Instability in Europe After the Cold War,
International Security 15(1) 556 Mueller, John,
1989. Retreat from Doomsday. The Obsolescence of
Major War. New York Basic Books. Mueller, John,
2004. The Remnants of War. Ithaca, NY Cornell
University Press Mueller, John, 2006. Accounting
for the Waning of Major War, ch. 2 in Väyrynen,
ed. (6479) Pevehouse, J., T. Nordstrom and K.
Warnke, 2004. Intergovernmental Organizations,
1815-2000 A New Correlates of War Data
Set. http//cow2.la.psu.edu/COW220Data/IGOs/IGOv
2-1.htm Pinker. Steven, 2007. Were Getting
Nicer Every Day, New Republic, 19 March Rice,
Edward E., 1993. Wars of the Third Kind Conflict
in Underdeveloped Countries. Berkeley, CA
University of California Press Rummel, Rudolph
J., 1994. Death by Government Genocide and Mass
Murder in the Twentieth Century. New Brunswick,
NJ Transaction Rummel, Rodolph J., 1997.
Statistics of Democide. Genocide and Mass Murder
Since 1900. Charlottesville, VA Center for
National Security Law, School of Law, University
of Virginia Transaction Publishers, Rutgers
University, http//www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/NOTE5
.HTM Sarkees, Meredith R. Frank W. Wayman J.
David Singer, 2003. Inter-state, Intra-state,
and Extra-state Wars A Comprehensive Look at
Their Distribution over Time, International
Studies Quarterly 47(1) 4970 Väyrynen, Raimo,
ed., 2006. The Waning of Major War. Theories and
Debates. London New York Routledge Wallensteen,
Peter, 2006, 2006. Trends in Major War Too
Early for Waning, ch. 3 in Väyrynen, ed.