Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-2lccl Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-28T17:01:05.984Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Impediments to peace

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 January 2024

Raymond Hames*
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE, USA rhames@unl.edu https://sgis.unl.edu/raymond-hames
*
*Corresponding author.

Abstract

While effective institutional practices are critical for the evolution of peace certain factors deter their effectiveness. In-group and out-group dynamics may make peace difficult between culturally distinct groups. Critical ecological conditions often lead to intractable conflict over resources. And within group conflicts of interest most prominently between generations may inhibit effective peace making.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Allen, M. W., Bettinger, R. L., Codding, B. F., Jones, T. L., & Schwitalla, A. W. (2016). Resource scarcity drives lethal aggression among prehistoric hunter–gatherers in central California. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 113(43), 1212012125. doi:10.1073/pnas.1607996113CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Brown, P., & Podolefsky, A. (1976). Population density, agricultural intensity, land tenure, and group size in the New Guinea highlands. Ethnology, 15(3), 211238.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dow, G. K., Mitchell, L., & Reed, C. G. (2017). The economics of early warfare over land. Journal of Development Economics, 127, 297305.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Efferson, C., Lalive, R., & Fehr, E. (2008). The coevolution of cultural groups and ingroup favoritism. Science (New York, N.Y.), 321(5897), 18441849. doi:10.1126/science.1155805CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ember, C., & Ember, M. (1992). Resource unpredictability, mistrust, and war. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 36(2), 242262.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ember, C. R., & Ember, M. (1994). War, socialization, and interpersonal violence: A cross-cultural study. The Journal of Conflict Resolution, 38(4), 620646.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ember, C. R., & Ember, M. (2014). Violence in the ethnographic record: Results of cross-cultural research on war and aggression. In Martin, D. & Frayer, D. (Eds.), Troubled times: Violence and warfare in the past (pp. 120). Routledge.Google Scholar
Ember, M. (1982). Statistical evidence for an ecological explanation of warfare. American Anthropologist, 84, 645649.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hewstone, M., Rubin, M., & Willis, H. (2002). Intergroup bias. Annual Review of Psychology, 53(1), 575604. doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.53.100901.135109CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kelly, R. L. (2013). From the peaceful to the warlike: Ethnographic and archaeological insights into hunter–gatherer warfare and homicide. In Fry, D. P. (Ed.), War, peace, and human nature: The convergence of evolutionary and cultural views (pp. 151167). Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kurzban, R., Tooby, J., & Cosmides, L. (2001). Can race be erased? Coalitional computation and social categorization. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 98(26), 1538715392. doi:10.1073/pnas.251541498CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McDonald, M. M., Navarrete, C. D., & Van Vugt, M. (2012). Evolution and the psychology of intergroup conflict: The male warrior hypothesis. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 367(1589), 670679.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Otterbein, K. F. (1973). The anthropology of war. In Honigmann, J. J. (Ed.), Handbook of social and cultural anthropology (pp. 923958). Rand McNally.Google Scholar
van der Dennen, J. M. G. (1995). The origin of war: The evolution of a male-coalitional reproductive strategy (Vols. 1 and 2). Origin Press.Google Scholar
Walker, R. S., & Bailey, D. H. (2013). Body counts in lowland south American violence. Evolution and Human Behavior, 34(1), 2934.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wrangham, R. W., Wilson, M. L., & Muller, M. N. (2006). Comparative rates of violence in chimpanzees and humans. Primates, 47(1), 1426.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed