War

War is organized violence between groups of people. This may be the only observable factor common to the class of events called ‘war’. As organized collective violence, war is embedded in very diverse socio-political conditions, ranging from the ritualized vendettas of tribal society to the revolutionary guerrillas of modern times. The medieval war of knights has very little in common with the industrialized world war, or even with the violent merchant rivalries in post-Renaissance Europe. In the feudal world, war was an integral part of political life; it was an expression of the chivalrous ethos, and was firmly imprinted on the ideological horizon. Warfare in the early modern epoch was ritualized to resemble the military parade, until the total war of the Napoleonic campaigns endangered the existence of states. Yet war was still regarded as a normal way of resolving diplomatic tension right up to the outbreak of the First World War in 1914. Even today, of course, war remains a chameleon, ranging from post-colonial border clashes to the potential of a global nuclear holocaust.