HUX 530 - WAR & HUMAN EXPERIENCE
It is an unpleasant reality that the presence of war has loomed large in human life, past and present, and has therefore occupied a central and intimate role in human experience. Depending upon how we might wish to define it, war has apparently existed since the beginning of recorded history, if not earlier. In fact, some of the earliest historical documents and depiction of human activity we possess record warlike behavior. Subsequent history is likewise rife with descriptions and analyses of war; some years ago a Norwegian statistician calculated that in 5,560 years of recorded history there have been 14,531 wars, an average of 2.6 wars per year. The literature of war is equally extensive, including a vast number of plays, poems and novels dealing in some form with warfare. Its impact on the human imagination has obviously been great.
Given the centrality of warfare to human experience it behooves us to understand as well as we can the role it has played. War is a unique and yet pervasive human institution which inherently encompasses many paradoxes, combining sometimes simultaneously the best and worst of human behavior, good and evil, rational and irrational elements. Indeed, in studying warfare we are opening a window into a microcosm of human experience which reveals a wide spectrum of often-intense feelings, behaviors and relationships. Because war represents for the most part the manifestation of our darkest impulses, this also raises some profound questions about human nature.
The purpose of this course is to explore the relationship between war, the individual and human groups-the latter including families, cities and nations. We will approach these issues primarily through the study of works of literature and history, although for a general understanding of these phenomena we will also be drawing upon the disciplines of philosophy, anthropology, psychology and sociology. We will be focusing primarily upon the human dimensions of warfare; the literary selections in particular are designed to show the impact of war at the level of the individual and the small group, while other selections will provide more strictly descriptive accounts of warfare, generally from a broader perspective, as well as giving a historical context. We will therefore be concerned with technological, tactical and strategic aspects of warfare only insofar as they contribute to the above-mentioned goals. This is a course about war's significance, and not about military history per se.
We will begin by examining the nature of warfare, including basic terminology and concepts, human aggression and conflict and political, social, psychological, philosophical and religious aspects of warfare. We will then move to a consideration of the origins and evolution of warfare. Finally, we will focus on some specific instances of warfare in three temporal/spatial contexts: ancient Greece, medieval Europe and the modern world.
One note: as we shall see, war is predominantly and preeminently a male activity. Therefore the use of language that might in other contexts be considered sexist, such as "men" and "mankind," should be here considered descriptive rather than prescriptive.
War is part of a constellation of related terms and concepts, each of which intersects to some extent with the others. It will be useful therefore briefly to examine some of these terms and concepts in order to have some basic understanding of what they mean and to see how they are related to each other.
One key term is conflict. Conflict can occur as an outcome of disagreement involving differing goals, interests or desires. Although conflict can be felt or expressed in subtle ways, it is usually recognizable in the form of direct and conscious opposition. Given this definition, it is easy to see that conflict is inevitable to some extent in all societies, animal and human, since competing desires for basic necessities including food, shelter and sexual partners cannot always be satisfied. Although many conflicts can be resolved to the satisfaction of both or all parties, in many cases conflict is perceived as a zero-sum game, i.e., there must be a winner and a loser. There are many kinds or forms of conflict, which can take place on several levels, including quarrels between individuals, feuds between groups, conflicts between an individual and society—expressed as crime or delinquency—and conflicts within and between societies, taking the form of riots, civil disobedience and warfare.
A second related concept is competition. At least two kinds of competition have been identified. In emulative competition each competing individual attempts to outdo his rival by doing the same thing, only better. Emulative competition is most likely to occur when the participants feel that they have the opportunity to obtain their goal in the foreseeable future; in such circumstances competition is not viewed as a zero-sum game and the outcome of the competition can be stimulating, challenging and have positive social consequences, as in, for example, a competition to build a better automobile or computer chip.
Predatory competition, on the other hand, is dominated by the concept of limited good and is found primarily where rewards, prizes or goals are perceived as limited. It’s important here to stress that this perception need not necessarily coincide with reality; i.e., the situation is perceived as a zero-sum game even if this may not be "objectively" the case. Predatory competition tends to result in competitors trying to destroy or eliminate their rivals or even the competition itself. Jealousy and envy tend to be significant as both the cause and effect of such competition, which once established tends to create a feedback loop leading to further escalation. It’s easy to see, then, how predatory competition and conflict are closely related. And although seemingly opposed, competition and cooperation are not mutually exclusive, since at a level beyond the individual members of a group, be it a sports team or an army, people cooperate with each other in competition with other groups.
A third related term is aggression, which can be characterized as assertive, intrusive or attacking behavior, often directed toward causing physical injury. Aggression can also be defined as the mobilization of energy in order to satisfy needs and/or desires. In this sense some measure of aggressive behavior may be necessary or inevitable in order to insure individual or group survival, access to food or sexual partners, as well as other things considered desirable. Aggression thus can be both a cause and effect of conflict and would almost certainly be involved in predatory competition. Aggression can take a variety of forms, ranging from subtle, covert or nonviolent expression to overt and violent attack.
Obviously, too, violence and aggression are often linked. In fact, violence can be seen as a destructive form of aggression in which physical damage is inflicted upon persons, other living things or property. However, violence can also occur without aggression, as in the outcome of certain natural forces such as earthquakes, storms or volcanic eruptions. Both conflict and competition can also be violent, although not inevitably so. Like the other terms already discussed, violence too can take a variety of forms and can occur at various levels from that of an individual to that of an army. We can distinguish, for example, between violence that is sanctioned by society or the state and that which is unsanctioned or criminal violence.
This brings us, finally, to war and warfare. Although distinctions have sometimes been made between these two terms, in this course they will be treated as synonymous and used more or less interchangeably. Rather than offer a single definition here, I present on the following pages a number of definitions. I suggest that you examine these definitions and try to see how they are similar to and different from each other. You may note, for example, that violence, groups of people and some form of organization are common components of many of the definitions.
How is warfare related to the other concepts discussed above? Well, warfare most certainly is a form of aggressive conflict. It is equally clear that not all aggression or conflict involves war. In fact, the relationship between warfare and aggression is complex and reciprocal and not a simple matter of cause and effect; there is, for example, more evidence that war produces aggression than that aggression, in itself, causes war. As we will see, the more complex war becomes, the less impact individual aggression has. As indicated by the definitions on the following pages, war is an organized form of violence, usually but not always on a large scale. War can also be seen as an extreme form of predatory competition.
In general, then, war may be viewed as a subset or an aspect of human behaviors and actions including conflict, competition, aggression and violence. In all instances, war represents a extreme form of these behaviors. Conversely, war as a phenomenon incorporates all of the above concepts, and many others as well. It should thus be apparent that war, a unique but all-too-human institution, is an extremely complex phenomenon which has had manifold causes, expressions and consequences throughout the world and through time.
"War is an act of violence by means of which we force the adversary to do our will." (Clausewitz, On War)
"In the broadest sense war is a violent contact of distinct but similar entities." (Quincy Wright, A Study of War)
"War is large-scale violent conflict between organized groups that are or that aim to establish governments." (Ronald J. Glossop, Confronting War: An Examination of Humanity’s Most Pressing Problem)
"Almost the only thing that can be said of all wars is that they involve sustained large-scale organized violence and more or less skilled use of weapons." (Anatol Rapoport, The Origins of Violence: Approaches to the Study of Conflict)
"Even if neat, restrictive definitions are not possible, I believe that the basic underlying phenomena characteristic of war can be described as follows: organized, purposeful group action, directed against another group that may or may not be organized for similar action, involving the actual or potential application of lethal force." (R. Brian Ferguson, "Introduction: Studying War," in Warfare, Culture and Environment, R. Brian Ferguson, ed.)
"… ‘war’ refers to organized, premeditated, socially approved action involving groups of men in relatively complex operations of aggression and defense, and pursued in a rational fashion in order to accomplish certain goals." (Sue Mansfield, The Gestalts of War: An Inquiry Into Its Origins and Meanings as a Social Institution)
"War is a special type of aggression. It involves aggression between groups in which the individuals are in some degree organized towards achieving the common goal. It is usually institutionalized, with individuals occupying distinct roles …" (Robert A. Hinde and Jo Groebel, "The Problem of Aggression," in Aggression and War: Their Biological and Social Bases, Jo Groebel and Robert A. Hinde, eds.)
"[War is an] armed contest between two independent political units, by means of organized military force, in the pursuit of a tribal or national policy." (Bronislaw Malinowski, "An Anthropological Analysis of War")
"War is the sanctioned use of lethal weapons by members of one society against members of another. It is carried out by trained persons working in teams that are directed by a separate policy-making group and supported in various ways by the non-combatant population. Generally, but not necessarily, war is reciprocal." (Anthony F.C. Wallace, "Psychological Preparations for War," in War: The Anthropology of Armed Conflict and Aggression, Morton Fried, Marvin Harris and Robert Murphy, eds.)
"War (a form of aggression) is in the most general sense a conflict of values between any two parties expressed through the instrumentality of physical weapons (arms) and forces (prisons, concentration camps, blockades, bacteria, etc.) that injures or destroys, partially or totally, human bodies, persons, interpersonal relations, social institutions, societies, intersocietal relations, and the ecological environment." (Howard L. Parsons, "Some Human Roots of Inhuman War," in The Critique of War: Contemporary Philosophical Explorations, Robert Ginsberg, ed.)
"War is organized continuous conflict of a transient character between or among collectives of any sort capable of arming and organizing themselves for violent struggle carried on by armies in the field (or naval units on water) and supported by civil or incompletely militarized populations back of the battle areas constituted for the pursuit of some fairly well-defined public or quasi-public objective." (Luther Lee Bernard, War and Its Causes)
"War is seen as an instrument that is directed at dictating to and enforcing on one group any or all of the following conditions: 1) the rules under which individuals who have organized themselves and decided to act contrarily will be required to cooperate in any delineated territory; 2) the rules of access to a particular territory, and 3) the permissible mix of material output to which the material resources in a territory will be allocated." (Horace R. Canby-Samuels, "War: Another Fact of Human Evolution," in War, Its Causes and Correlates. Martin A. Nettleship, R. Dale Givens and Anderson Nettleship, eds.)
"… war refers to publicly legitimized and organized offensive and/or defensive deadly violence between polities. Parts of polities may engage in violent and organized actions for reasons of vengeance, inherited feuds, communal hunts, and raiding for material, social, or prestige rewards. This action is warlike and people who do more of it than most are warlike people.
But warlike and war are different. Warlike refers to activity that involves the organized use of violence. Thus a communal hunt is a warlike activity… . That the hostilities are inter-specific does not reduce the violence nor the warlike quality of the activity… .
War, on the other hand, is an aspect of public policy concerning interpolity violence. This means there is no mandatory means by which mediation between the disputants can or must be submitted to arbitration unless both decide to do so independently. War is thus intergroup violence for which there is no easy solution, outside of victory for one side and defeat for the other." (Ronald Cohen, "Warfare and State Formation: Wars Make States and States Make War" in Warfare, Culture and Environment, R. Brian Ferguson, ed.)
War is part of a constellation of related terms and concepts, each of which intersects to some extent with the others. It will be useful therefore briefly to examine some of these terms and concepts in order to have some basic understanding of what they mean and to see how they are related to each other.
One key term is conflict. Conflict can occur as an outcome of disagreement involving differing goals, interests or desires. Although conflict can be felt or expressed in subtle ways, it is usually recognizable in the form of direct and conscious opposition. Given this definition, it is easy to see that conflict is inevitable to some extent in all societies, animal and human, since competing desires for basic necessities including food, shelter and sexual partners cannot always be satisfied. Although many conflicts can be resolved to the satisfaction of both or all parties, in many cases conflict is perceived as a zero-sum game, i.e., there must be a winner and a loser. There are many kinds or forms of conflict, which can take place on several levels, including quarrels between individuals, feuds between groups, conflicts between an individual and society—expressed as crime or delinquency—and conflicts within and between societies, taking the form of riots, civil disobedience and warfare.
A second related concept is competition. At least two kinds of competition have been identified. In emulative competition each competing individual attempts to outdo his rival by doing the same thing, only better. Emulative competition is most likely to occur when the participants feel that they have the opportunity to obtain their goal in the foreseeable future; in such circumstances competition is not viewed as a zero-sum game and the outcome of the competition can be stimulating, challenging and have positive social consequences, as in, for example, a competition to build a better automobile or computer chip.
Predatory competition, on the other hand, is dominated by the concept of limited good and is found primarily where rewards, prizes or goals are perceived as limited. It’s important here to stress that this perception need not necessarily coincide with reality; i.e., the situation is perceived as a zero-sum game even if this may not be "objectively" the case. Predatory competition tends to result in competitors trying to destroy or eliminate their rivals or even the competition itself. Jealousy and envy tend to be significant as both the cause and effect of such competition, which once established tends to create a feedback loop leading to further escalation. It’s easy to see, then, how predatory competition and conflict are closely related. And although seemingly opposed, competition and cooperation are not mutually exclusive, since at a level beyond the individual members of a group, be it a sports team or an army, people cooperate with each other in competition with other groups.
A third related term is aggression, which can be characterized as assertive, intrusive or attacking behavior, often directed toward causing physical injury. Aggression can also be defined as the mobilization of energy in order to satisfy needs and/or desires. In this sense some measure of aggressive behavior may be necessary or inevitable in order to insure individual or group survival, access to food or sexual partners, as well as other things considered desirable. Aggression thus can be both a cause and effect of conflict and would almost certainly be involved in predatory competition. Aggression can take a variety of forms, ranging from subtle, covert or nonviolent expression to overt and violent attack.
Obviously, too, violence and aggression are often linked. In fact, violence can be seen as a destructive form of aggression in which physical damage is inflicted upon persons, other living things or property. However, violence can also occur without aggression, as in the outcome of certain natural forces such as earthquakes, storms or volcanic eruptions. Both conflict and competition can also be violent, although not inevitably so. Like the other terms already discussed, violence too can take a variety of forms and can occur at various levels from that of an individual to that of an army. We can distinguish, for example, between violence that is sanctioned by society or the state and that which is unsanctioned or criminal violence.
This brings us, finally, to war and warfare. Although distinctions have sometimes been made between these two terms, in this course they will be treated as synonymous and used more or less interchangeably. Rather than offer a single definition here, I present on the following pages a number of definitions. I suggest that you examine these definitions and try to see how they are similar to and different from each other. You may note, for example, that violence, groups of people and some form of organization are common components of many of the definitions.
How is warfare related to the other concepts discussed above? Well, warfare most certainly is a form of aggressive conflict. It is equally clear that not all aggression or conflict involves war. In fact, the relationship between warfare and aggression is complex and reciprocal and not a simple matter of cause and effect; there is, for example, more evidence that war produces aggression than that aggression, in itself, causes war. As we will see, the more complex war becomes, the less impact individual aggression has. As indicated by the definitions on the following pages, war is an organized form of violence, usually but not always on a large scale. War can also be seen as an extreme form of predatory competition.
In general, then, war may be viewed as a subset or an aspect of human behaviors and actions including conflict, competition, aggression and violence. In all instances, war represents a extreme form of these behaviors. Conversely, war as a phenomenon incorporates all of the above concepts, and many others as well. It should thus be apparent that war, a unique but all-too-human institution, is an extremely complex phenomenon which has had manifold causes, expressions and consequences throughout the world and through time.
CLASSIFICATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF WARS
War is by no means a unitary phenomenon. As should be apparent from the foregoing quotations, it is extremely complex and diverse, encompassing a variety of contexts and experiences. For example, war can be perceived variously and not necessarily exclusively as a heroic enterprise, a means of extending political or economic control, an act of piety or a punishment meted out by a deity, a means of livelihood, a normal phase in the relations of states, an abnormal phase of international relations, a symptom of social pathology or criminal behavior on a large scale.
Likewise, wars can be classified according to a number of variables, including sponsorship, motives, results, units involved, where fought, extent, length and differences in economic or political potential or cultural development. And although there may be a common thread as in the definitions of war discussed previously, war can take many forms as well. Without exhausting by any means the possibilities, conflicts can be termed tribal wars, feudal wars, revolutions, civil wars, dynastic wars, class wars, wars of conquest, national wars, international wars, holy wars, cold wars and guerrilla wars. For this reason, if no other, and although I have violated the admonition I am about to make frequently in the following pages, we should nonetheless be wary of making generalizations about war in the expectation that they would or could apply to all possible manifestations of warlike behavior. Conversely, most of the following general discussion will apply more appropriately to some societies and situations than others.