CSS Forums - Avoiding wars in an anarchic world

Respected fellow members,

I have started practicing writing the essays. I am planning to start by writing up to 500 words and then will keep up the momentum to write the long essays, too.

This is my first attempt to write a short argumentative essay. I kindly request you to please evaluate and comment so that it can help me in improving the writing skills.

[B]Title:[/B] Is it possible to avoid wars in an anarchic world, described by the classical Realist thinkers?

[B]Essay: [/B]
The current system of the world is composed of nations and states. In this system, each state is a leviathan, and hence no supreme authority lies over the states. Next, the states are composed of individual human beings whose nature is competitive and unchangeable. Further, the notions of power, self-defense, and jealousy as described by Thucydides, Machiavelli, and Thomas Hobbes are rooted in the laws of history. Wars have become inevitable in the anarchic world described by the classical Realist thinkers.

Firstly and most importantly, the human nature is ridden with the conflicts. Historically, the individual human has always looked for the means to increase the power to control the large swathes of land. As stated by Thucydides, the earliest of the classical thinkers, “the human nature is unchangeable”. This static state of mind will lead to the wars in future, too.

Another important reason is the fear and jealousy caused by the increase in the relative strengths of competing states. Though the states may be gaining the powers for absolute gains, the adversaries will threat from it. The ancient world history depicts many such cases. For example, the war between Greek City-States (Athens vs. Spartan) is one of such scenarios. Although there were many reasons for this great war; however, in the view of Thucydides it was “the rising power of Athens feared Spartan”. Clearly, today we are facing a threat to the unipolar system led by the U.S by many emerging powers, such as Russia, China, Germany, and Brazil. Hence, the continuous threat of shifting the balance of power to an existing state by an emerging state will keep the chances of war alive.

Finally, the norms of the human society within the boundaries of a state are totally different from the norms of international politics. It is said that the customs and normal behaviors envisaged within the social organizations of human beings are necessary for their domestic security. Whereas, these norms have nothing to do while conducting relations internationally. In the words of Machiavelli, “Politics have no relations to morals”. As well as any promised made “are the necessity of the past” and “the world broken is the necessity of the present”. Therefore, the notion of norms, a pivotal factor to keep the peace perpetuating, could give rise to the escalation of wars.

To sum up, a supreme authority is always required to keep the law and order, and this particular agency is missing in the current nation-state systems. Furthermore, the concept of human nature, jealousy, laws of philosophy, power, the balance of power, and norms illustrated by the classical Realist thinkers in tandem with the multiple perennial conflicts in the 21st century implies that it has become difficult to avoid wars.