War, Peace, and International Relations. An Introduction to Strategic History

Questions

1. Can the human race make progress towards a more peaceful world? Has it done
   so since 1800?


2. What are the requirements for international order?


3. What were the strengths and weaknesses of the successive ‘new world orders’
   attempted since 1800?


4. What is peace? How best is it achieved and maintained?

Further reading

C. J. Bartlett Peace, War and the European Powers, 1814–1914(Basingstoke: Macmillan,
1996).
M. E. Brown, S. M. Lynn-Jones and S. E. Miller (eds) Debating the Democratic Peace
(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996)
M. E. Brown, O. R. Cote, Jr, S. Lynn-Jones and S. E. Miller (eds) Theories of War and Peace
(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1998)
I. Clark The Hierarchy of States: Reform and Resistance in the International Order(Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1989).
F. H. Hinsley Power and the Pursuit of Peace: Theory and Practice in the History of Relations
between States(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1963).
M. Howard The Invention of Peace and the Reinvention of War(London: Profile Books,
2001).
G. J. Ikenberry After Victory: Institutions, Strategic Restraint, and the Rebuilding of Order after
Major Wars(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001).

278 War, peace and international relations

Key points

1. There are two main and opposing views of strategic history. One holds that the
   human race is slowly making progress towards a warless world; the other
   believes that the strategic future will resemble the strategic past, though not in
   detail.


2. Great wars have been waged for the purpose of restoring or creating a favoured
   international order.


3. After every great war in modern times, except for the Cold War, an effort was
   made to institutionalize a new world order.


4. The repeated efforts to construct a new and improved world order were not
   wholly without value, but they all foundered on the rocks of the sovereign
   self-regard of states.


5. Peace has two principal meanings: war is not under way at present; and war is
   all but unthinkable and impossible.


6. A peaceful world order cannot be created by institutional engineering. It has
   to be the product of some shared cultural values and of common understanding
   of historical experience.