Journal of Global Peace and Conflict

Preventing War … The Simpler Way
Ted Trainer

Abstract
The literature on the causes and prevention of international conflict in general and war in particular is strongly inclined to focus on ways of dealing with conflict once it has arisen. Much less attention is given to defusing tension before it arises and leads to violence, and even less to analysing the factors that generate tension in the first place. The following argument is that most of the discussion of armed conflict does not focus on the fundamental causal factors, which lie deep in the institutional structures and cultural commitments of our society. The taken for granted obsession with the pursuit of ever-increasing wealth, affluent living standards and GDP has driven this society far beyond the limits to growth and is inevitably generating problems of resource depletion, ecological destruction, Third World deprivation, deteriorating social cohesion and quality of life, and resource wars. The following discussion deals with the causal connections between the quest for growth and affluence and armed conflict. The implication is that warfare conflict cannot be prevented unless and until there is huge and radical transition to some form of Simpler Way.

Full Text: PDF     DOI: 10.15640/jgpc.v11-12a2