Why We Fight: The Roots of War and the Paths to Peace

by Christopher Blattman

Overview

“Why We Fight  reflects Blattman’s expertise in economics, political science, and history… Blattman is a great storyteller, with important insights for us all.” —Richard H. Thaler, winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences and coauthor of Nudge

“Engaging and profound, this deeply searching book explains the true origins of warfare, and it illustrates the ways that, despite some contrary appearances, human beings are capable of great goodness.”—Nicholas A. Christakis author of Blueprint: The Evolutionary Origins of a Good Society

Why did Russia attack Ukraine? Will China invade Taiwan and launch WWIII? Why has the number of civil wars reached their highest level in decades? Why are so many cities in the Americas plagued with violence? And finally, what can any of us do about it?

It feels like we’re surrounded by violence. Each conflict seems unique and insoluble. With a reason for every war and a war for every reason, what hope is there for peace? Fortunately, it’s simpler than that. Why We Fight boils down decades of economics, political science, psychology, and real-world interventions, giving us some counterintuitive answers to the question of war. 

The first is that most of the time we don’t fight. Around the world, there are millions of hostile rivalries, yet only a fraction erupt into violence. Most enemies loathe one another in peace. The reason is simple: war is too costly to fight. It’s the worst way to settle our differences.
In those rare instances when fighting ensues, that means we have to ask ourselves: What kept rivals from the normal, grudging compromise? The answer is always the same: It’s because a society or its leaders ignored those costs of war, or were willing to pay them.

Why We Fight shows that there are just five ways this happens. From warring states to street gangs, ethnic groups and religious sects to political factions, Christopher Blattman shows that there are five reasons why violent conflict occasionally wins over compromise.
Through Blattman’s time studying Medellín, Chicago, Liberia, Northern Ireland, and more, we learn the'common'logics driving vainglorious monarchs, dictators, mobs, pilots, football hooligans, ancient peoples, and fanatics. Why We Fight shows that war isn’t a series of errors, accidents, and emotions gone awry. There are underlying strategic, ideological, and institutional forces that are too often overlooked.
So how to get to peace?

Blattman shows that societies are surprisingly good at interrupting and ending violence when they want to—even gangs do it. The best peacemakers tackle the five reasons, shifting incentives away from violence and getting rivals back to dealmaking. And they do so through tinkering, not transformation.

Realistic and optimistic, this is a book that lends new meaning to the adage “Give peace a chance.”

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781984881571
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	04/19/2022
Pages:	400
Sales rank:	246,181
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.20(h) x 1.70(d)

About the Author

Christopher Blattman is the Ramalee E. Pearson Professor of Global Conflict Studies at the University of Chicago, where he coleads the Development Economics Center and directs the Obama Foundation Scholars program. His work on violence, crime, and poverty has been widely covered by The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Forbes, Slate, Vox, and NPR.

Table of Contents

Maps ix

Introduction 1

Part I The Roots of War

1 Why We Don't Fight 21

2 Unchecked Interests 32

3 Intangible Incentives 49

4 Uncertainty 81

5 Commitment Problems 109

6 Misperceptions 133

Part II The Paths to Peace

7 Interdependence 171

8 Checks and Balances 189

9 Rules and Enforcement 203

10 Interventions 219

11 Wayward Paths to War and Peace 256

Conclusion: The Peacemeal Engineer 273

Acknowledgments 301

Notes 307

Bibliography 345

Index 371

Editorial Reviews

02/21/2022

Game theory shows why violent conflicts start and how to forestall them, according to this penetrating treatise. Noting that the high costs of violence almost always make peaceful agreement a better solution to antagonisms than violence, University of Chicago economist Blattman analyzes forces that often counteract that logic, including the self-interest of leaders, ideological passions, miscalculation of an opponent’s strength or motives, and mistrust. On the flip side, he contends, considerations of costs and benefits suggest ways to avoid violence through constraints on leaders’ power, credible enforcement of rules by the police and other authorities, and interventions that can be as simple as getting people to talk. Blattman explores these dynamics in conflicts ranging from turf battles among Chicago’s gangs to WWI and the American Revolution. (He compares White Flower, a Liberian warlord with a financial stake in perpetuating civil war, to George Washington, whose land speculations prospered thanks to the rebellion he led, but whose power was constrained by the Continental Congress and state legislatures.) Blattman uses lucid, easy-to-follow diagrams to explain the game theory underlying his ideas, and from it derives pithy, often counterintuitive insights (“The more destructive our weapons, the easier it should be to find peace”). This stimulating discussion of violence illuminates a fraught subject with sober reason. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

2022-01-11
A bracing look at the many reasons nations go to war.

“There has never been a protracted war from which a country has benefitted.” So wrote Sun Tzu, whose The Art of War is a classic text. Blattman, a professor of global conflict studies at the University of Chicago, concurs—but he also notes that while there are countless reasons for individuals to fight individuals and countries to fight countries, war is rarer than it might be. The reason, as he brightly puts it, is simple: “Even the bitterest enemies prefer to loathe one another in peace.” Of course, war has always occurred, and Blattman identifies five principal reasons. One is “unchecked interests,” meaning that the goals of the ruling class are out of alignment: They gain power and wealth while ordinary people lose their property and lives. The author argues persuasively that these unchecked interests account for much of the world’s organized violence, but another is just as opportunistic: the “commitment problem.” If a rival nation seems to be growing in power, then why not crush it now, before it gets too strong to defeat with any certainty? (Think Vietnam.) Blattman attributes much warfare to what might be considered venal causes rather than the usual explanations of conflict as emanating from the quest for resources or ethnic divisions, though they certainly figure. More to the point, as he writes, “there is seldom one reason for a war.” Against modern theories of intervention, the author observes that aims such as regime change are often unrealized, but there are useful nonmilitary weapons that can be deployed in place of actual arms—targeted sanctions, for instance, and decentralizing authority, the latter of which is difficult for bureaucratized world police officers such as the U.S. government and the United Nations.

Valuable for readers interested in understanding matters of war and peace.

Kirkus Reviews

"As what could end up as Europe’s bloodiest war since 1945 grinds on, this is an apposite time for a book explaining why and when human beings fight… Blattman identifies five “logical ways” why, despite all the reasons to compromise, people opt to fight. All five map quite neatly onto the war in Ukraine. [A] valuable guide, supported by engaging anecdotes, to what makes people turn to violence—and why, mercifully, they are usually too sensible to do so.”—The Economist

“Blattman deftly translates knotty ideas from game theory and social choice theory for a lay audience, weaving in colorful anecdotes from his own life and travels.”—Foreign Affairs

"Noting that the high costs of violence almost always make peaceful agreement a better solution to antagonisms than violence, University of Chicago economist Blattman analyzes forces that often counteract that logic, including the self-interest of leaders, ideological passions, miscalculation of an opponent’s strength or motives, and mistrust… This stimulating discussion of violence illuminates a fraught subject with sober reason."—Publishers Weekly

“Blattman shows us things we don’t normally see and takes us to places we might be terrified to go. A captivating and intelligent book.”—Tim Harford, author of The Data Detective and The Undercover Economist
 
“Engaging and profound, this deeply searching book explains the true origins of warfare, and it illustrates the ways that, despite some contrary appearances, human beings are capable of great goodness.”—Nicholas A. Christakis author of Blueprint: The Evolutionary Origins of a Good Society
 
“A surprisingly and refreshingly optimistic book, one that deserves a place both on living room and diplomats’ shelves.”—Anne-Marie Slaughter, CEO, New America
 
“An important, radical book that leaves you hopeful that peace is not a dream and conflict is not inevitable.”—David Miliband, president and CEO, International Rescue Committee
 
“The most important book on this most important topic.”—Tyler Cowen, author of Average Is Over and Marginal Revolution
 
“Economists imagine that people in poor countries wake up every day worrying that they are poor. Maybe, but more fundamentally they are insecure and subject to violence. Foregrounding this most basic human problem is essential for understanding the world we live in today.”—James A. Robinson, coauthor of Why Nations Fail
 
“Blattman is the go-to social scientist on war. His insights are essential reading.”—William Easterly, author of The White Man’s Burden and The Tyranny of Experts
 
“Why We Fight not only reflects Blattman’s expertise in economics, political science, and history, it also introduces us to an intriguing range of characters and locations. We meet a warlord from Liberia called White Flower, and in the same chapter learn why George Washington became America’s wealthiest president. Blattman is a great storyteller, with important insights for us all.” —Richard H. Thaler, winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences and coauthor of Nudge
 
“As we move into the third decade of the twenty-first century, humanity is still mired in wars and deadly conflicts. Avoiding the useless dichotomies that ei­ther claim violence is an inseparable part of human nature or declare that humanity has all but con­quered its proclivity to war, Christopher Blattman explains how human communities make use of many different strategies to resolve conflicts, and why these efforts sometimes stumble.”—Daron Acemoglu, coauthor of Why Nations Fail

From the Publisher