State Power and Violence

The theme of my latest Harari lecture was the remarkable decrease in violence the world has seen in the last several decades. People today are more likely to die by suicide or in car accidents than from interpersonal or state violence. Several hundred years ago, about 400 of every 100,000 people would die by violence at the hands of others every year. Even in Detroit, the US murder capital, the figure today is about 50/100,000 and in Western Europe, Japan, and Australia it is only 1/100,000. The global average is 9/100,000 but most of those deaths are concentrated in a few violent regions.

The huge decline has occurred in two categories: interpersonal violence and interstate violence (wars). The decline in interpersonal violence has come about as a result of increased state power. Large and well-equipped police forces suppress both violence and many of its provocations.

Harari attributes the decrease in interstate violence largely to the historically unusually peaceful fall of the great European empires. Most empires throughout history have ended in spasms of chaotic war and violence as the empire fought to preserve itself and others fought for the scraps. Thae Soviet Empire was particularly notable in this respect. As Harari put it, the Soviet elite simply concluded that Communism didn't work and decided to dismantle it.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Anti-Libertarian: re-post

The most pointed critique of social security and liberalism in general is the libertarian critique. The problem with libertarians, for a liberal, is that we have too much in common. We both believe in individual rights, tolerance of individual differences, and dislike government prescription of religion. The basic difference, it seems to me, is the different answers we give to Cain's (with thanks to the Captain - my original version had the corpse asking the question!) famous question: "Am I my brother's keeper?" That's not really my basic bitch against the libertarians though. My real complaint is the same as my complaint against most religion - its premise is a fraud. For those who can't stand to wait for the punchline, I believe that trying to implement libertarian principles leads to tyranny or social disintegration. Demonstrating that takes some historical (and pre-historical) context. For all but the last 15,000 or so of the 100,000 years the human spec
Read more

Uneasy Lies The Head

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown ........... Shakespeare Henry IV, Part II. So it is with us and our slightly distant primate cousins , so it seems. A 9-year study of wild baboons in Kenya by Princeton University and the Institute of Primate Research may turn conventional assumptions of alphas males upside down. The study found that alpha males have high testosterone levels, which allows them to dominate other baboons, get access to more food, and attract better mates. This is expected. Surprisingly, though, the alpha males also have high levels of stress hormone glucocorticoid, which scientists measured from their feces samples. In fact, the stress of alpha baboons was on par with low-ranking baboons. The convention wisdom is that access to food and females provides life security and thus less stress for dominant males. Conversely, weak males who are constantly threatened by starvation and physical violence from stronger males are thought to be more stressed. The st
Read more

We Call it Soccer

The US played its best, and maybe only good game of World Cup, but lost thanks to brilliant goalkeeping by the Swedish keeper and the bizarre method soccer uses to settle ties when three US stars could not put the ball on frame from the 12 yard spot.  At the end it came down to a blocked shot that spun in by maybe a couple of centimeters. Well, that's football - too much like life.   Which brings me to a modest proposal.  Replace the thirty minute overtimes with as many 7-player 15 minute periods as needed to settle it.  Scoring should be much easier with fewer players.
Read more