War and conflict

Abstract

Explanations of war located at the level of the international system point to anarchy, on the one hand, and global capitalism, on the other, as two structural features that create conditions conducive to conflict and war. Conflicting accounts suggest that the president was targeted either by the Tutsi Rwandan Patriot Front rebels, frustrated with the accord’s lack of progress, or by Hutu Power extremists who opposed it from the start. This chapter describes varied explanations of intrastate conflict in the global South, including state weakness, greed, resources and land, and identity. It provides a wide-ranging overview of distinct literatures and theories that have set out to understand the causes of war. The chapter shows that narrowing discussions of balance of power and arms races to strategic, military concerns ignores the deep links that such logics have with state and society building processes and with the “postcolonial anxiety” that often leads elites to mimic logics practiced by the West/North.