No subgroup in Europe is strong enough. They’ll be forced to close cooperation with the United States. In addition, for the European nuclear weapons states self deterrence applies.

Now, the difference is that the said internal tensions and the resentment they generate are usually kept under the lid by the superstructure of the orderly society, the power of the law and the authority of the government.

Consequently, the said “social hierarchies that are manifestly unfair and continuously generating resentment” are usually less likely to result in internal conflicts, _unless_ the authority and/or the legitimacy of the government and the law, as well as the stability of the society, are somehow broken or dissipated by some external causes. Or, unless the people who view themselves as victims are pretty damn desperate or self-confident. Or stupid.

Disintegration usually has to start from the top; succesful revolutions organized purely from the grass-roots level are rare in history.

However, there’s really no similar deterrent constraining the use of violence in the international relations, which is probably why the article deliberately stresses “anarchic international order” and “chaos”. Basically, because we do not have and cannot have an effective world government, and because the international law is not effectively enforced by anyone, conflicts are far more likely.

So, sadly, I guess I have to broadly agree with the article.

Cheers,

J. J.

There are a couple of things to say here:

1. For the earthquake model, you have to assume that there are some kinds of disputes between states where war is the *favourite* way of changing the status quo - either there are no alternatives, or the state actors would never choose them. Other disputes will tend to unwind peacefully, even if they require sudden changes (such as a treaty).

The obvious example here is territorial changes. Thanks to territorial nationalism, it’s often political suicide for a country’s government to hand over territory peacefully to its neighbour, even if most inhabitants of the disputed territory itself want such a transfer. International arbitration is possible, but also irrelevant if the de jure sovereign has a solid claim. So the status quo is preserved, and tensions build up until it snaps on one side or the other and war breaks out.

An earthquake theorist might suggest that we should be far more willing to redraw the map peacefully on local state-identity grounds, perhaps even population transfers to move conflicting populations apart from each other, lest we store up enough tension to launch another round of wars and ethnic cleansing, aiming to achieve the same results but with far more violence and misery.

2. Why stop at the state level? Within states, there may be social hierarchies that are manifestly unfair, continuously generating resentment. Do these inevitably boil over into revolution or civil war?

Probably not, because some countries are still going to be too pacifistic (e.g. Germany). But it would be possible to imagine a “pioneer group” of European countries that have closer cooperation in defence policy and in foreign policy coordination aimed at stopping Russian expeansion. This group might include Europe’s nuclear weapon states, former Soviet republics and former Warsaw pact countries.