Long-term Factors Underlying Peace in Contemporary Western Civilization

Abstract

The absence of war within Western Civilization since World War II may not be the result of nuclear deterrence. It may be that nuclear weapons have not been used because of structural factors that are responsible for the peace. Measured in several ways, the present period looks as though it may be the most peaceful one in the past quarter millennium, probably the most peaceful in modern Western history. The factors behind this peace may have to do with the combination of long-term fluctuations that produces alternate crises and `ages', and with a particular way of seeing that is as characteristic of the present period as what we now perceive as `Victorian' was for the period between the Congress of Vienna and World War I. If that should be the case, we may expect short-term pressures for arms reduction, but long-term factors that would increase tension and danger several decades hence.