Jack S, Levy attempts to elucidate the distribution of war and the gradual changes in the trend of war by providing a concrete foundation to understand the causality of war. He suggests that war, because of its complex nature, is never contingent on a single factor and the factors keep changing given the circumstances. Moreover, the most important contribution made by Levy has been to communicate to the readers, that the nature of warfare after the Second World War has changed from being purely Eurocentric and today it is in fact circumscribed within the boundaries of countries (civil war). Furthermore, he says that those conflicts that have transcended national borders (e.g. the Arab Spring) have redistributed power and people which has consequently created a severe lack of pacifism in the regions affected.
The existence of nuclear deterrence has made many suggest that perhaps nuclear weapons have acted as deterrents in the face a potential Third World War (referring to the Cuban Missile Crisis). However, why is it that States and politicians make necessary the acquisition of nuclear weapons to maintain stability? This thought provides a very interesting segue into how we choose to define 'peace' and what is needed to create peace; Levy suggests 'peace its the absence of war'. However, the only criticism of many IR theories rests in the fact that because war and peace are so subjective, making them all the more abstract, there has never been any rational or logical explanation which suggest that peace can be achieved.
The difficulty in trying to achieve world peace is rooted in the repeated trend of politicians looking for solutions through war. This idea is in line with the Realist school of thought which suggests that the causes of war are embedded in the covert intervention endorsed by First world States. Furthermore, the Realist scholars say it is the States that, as the principal actors in world politics, are responsible for creating systems conducive to warfare.
Adding empirical analysis to try to understand war is beneficial - sometimes empiricism is necessary. It is left to us to decide whether we would like to treat was as a zero-sum constant or a variable. If we ascribe war to human nature, it becomes problematic because this explanation is dependent on a very vague generalization which considers man to be 'all evil'.
After reading all the articles on war, one is left wondering whether studying war is really effective or beneficial because at the end of the day politicians knowingly plunge themselves into the same mistakes over and over again. Call it pessimistic, but is it really possible to achieve world peace or resolve war absolutely?
Good reflection. But even if we can't end war (at least not yet), there is tremendous value in studying its causes. Perhaps one day we'll be able to figure out the silver bullet that ends war once and for all.
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