First published in 1988, this historical and quantitative analysis of war defines systemic world wars as conflicts of wide scope and intensity, which leave profound historical legacies in their wake. Manus Midlarsky examines various possible explanations for the onset of such past wars as the Peloponnesian War, the Thirty Years' War, and World Wars I and II. Midlarsky develops his basic theory of systemic war, outlining the reasons for the absence of wars of this magnitude and describing the violations of certain structural conditions that are associated with the onset of world war. A timely and relevant reissue, this insightful analysis will be of particular value to those with an interest in International Relations, War and Peace Studies, Military History, and Security Studies.

First published in 1992, this edited collection argues that conflicts have a growing tendency both to intensify and to lengthen, thus increasing the likelihood of external actors being drawn into the on-going violence. Here, leading experts in comparative and international politics examine this tendency of communal conflicts to spill over into the international arena. They also look at the conditions under which these processes do not occur and are mediated successfully. The authors combine theoretical perspectives with case studies, covering examples from the origins of the First World War, to state building in Iraq, and whether it was a precursor of the Iran-Iraq War and the Gulf Crisis. They present both a global overview and a focus on the state as the single most important intermediary in the internationalization process. A comprehensive and relevant reissue, this volume will appeal to students and scholars of International Relations, Comparative Politics and Strategic Studies.

First published in 1992, this edited collection argues that conflicts have a growing tendency both to intensify and to lengthen, thus increasing the likelihood of external actors being drawn into the on-going violence. Here, leading experts in comparative and international politics examine this tendency of communal conflicts to spill over into the international arena. They also look at the conditions under which these processes do not occur and are mediated successfully. The authors combine theoretical perspectives with case studies, covering examples from the origins of the First World War, to state building in Iraq, and whether it was a precursor of the Iran-Iraq War and the Gulf Crisis. They present both a global overview and a focus on the state as the single most important intermediary in the internationalization process. A comprehensive and relevant reissue, this volume will appeal to students and scholars of International Relations, Comparative Politics and Strategic Studies.

This book studies the structural inequalities between states as they evolve and influence the political process. Through the prism of inequality, it analyzes various forms of political violence including war and revolution, the origins and dissolution of states, and the sources of cooperation between states. The ultimate genesis of democracy is shown to be a consequence of the processes detailed in the book.
Using the emergence of inequality as a theoretical wedge into the substantive material, the author develops a theoretical-probabilistic argument linking scarcity and inequality. He presents evidence for this relationship in the form of an exponentially declining probability of attaining valued commodities under conditions of scarcity. Moreover, the greater the scarcity, the more rapid the decline. This is shown to be a recipe for the emergence of inequality under conditions of scarcity and requires no assumptions beyond those of scarcity and randomness. In other words, we need make no assumption concerning human nature or structural economic relations in order to derive the existence of inequality.
But this is only half of the author's argument. Under conditions of expansion--outward movement of populations, conquest, and/or the resettlement of conquered populations--a distribution of even greater inequality emerges, namely the Pareto, or fractal, distribution of extreme inequality. The author argues that this distribution of vastly greater inequality is associated both with state formation, and, under different conditions, with the dissolution of states.

First published in 1988, this historical and quantitative analysis of war defines systemic world wars as conflicts of wide scope and intensity, which leave profound historical legacies in their wake. Manus Midlarsky examines various possible explanations for the onset of such past wars as the Peloponnesian War, the Thirty Years' War, and World Wars I and II. Midlarsky develops his basic theory of systemic war, outlining the reasons for the absence of wars of this magnitude and describing the violations of certain structural conditions that are associated with the onset of world war. A timely and relevant reissue, this insightful analysis will be of particular value to those with an interest in International Relations, War and Peace Studies, Military History, and Security Studies.

This book studies the structural inequalities between states as they evolve and influence the political process. Through the prism of inequality, it analyzes various forms of political violence including war and revolution, the origins and dissolution of states, and the sources of cooperation between states. The ultimate genesis of democracy is shown to be a consequence of the processes detailed in the book.
Using the emergence of inequality as a theoretical wedge into the substantive material, the author develops a theoretical-probabilistic argument linking scarcity and inequality. He presents evidence for this relationship in the form of an exponentially declining probability of attaining valued commodities under conditions of scarcity. Moreover, the greater the scarcity, the more rapid the decline. This is shown to be a recipe for the emergence of inequality under conditions of scarcity and requires no assumptions beyond those of scarcity and randomness. In other words, we need make no assumption concerning human nature or structural economic relations in order to derive the existence of inequality.
But this is only half of the author's argument. Under conditions of expansion--outward movement of populations, conquest, and/or the resettlement of conquered populations--a distribution of even greater inequality emerges, namely the Pareto, or fractal, distribution of extreme inequality. The author argues that this distribution of vastly greater inequality is associated both with state formation, and, under different conditions, with the dissolution of states.

This book is a compilation of the most recent theoretically and empirically oriented research on international warfare. Some of the chapters are updated from the earlier "Handbook of War Studies"; most are new contributions representing new understandings of the vast changes in international relations that have occurred during the past decade.
The new themes addressed in the volume are democratic peace theory (Bruce Russett and Harvey Starr); ethnic or identity conflict and interstate conflict (Manus Midlarsky); terrorism (Martha Crenshaw); ancient warfare and enduring rivalries (Claudio Cioffi-Revilla); origins of dyadic conflicts (Gary Goertz and Paul Diehl); conflict escalation and interstate crisis (Jonathan Wilkenfeld and Michael Brecher); and escalation processes (John Vasquez). Also new to the "Handbook" is the analysis of game theory, here represented by the work of James Morrow and a necessary corrective supplied by Jack Levy.
Important theoretical perspectives continued from the earlier "Handbook" are power transition and the power cycle (updated respectively by Jacek Kugler and Douglas Lemke, and Charles Doran) and concentration and deconcentration of global reach capabilities (Karen Rasler and William Thompson). Finally, Daniel Geller extensively reviews the major strains of empirical research on international warfare.
This book is the single most comprehensive treatment of systematic research by political scientists on the causes of large-scale political violence. Overall, it tells us how far the discipline has progressed in developing a scientifically based understanding of the causes of war.
Manus I. Midlarsky is Moses and Annuta Back Professor of International Peace and Conflict Resolution, Rutgers University-New Brunswick.

Political extremism is one of the most pernicious, destructive, and nihilistic forms of human expression. During the twentieth century, in excess of 100 million people had their lives taken from them as the result of extremist violence. In this wide-ranging book Manus I. Midlarsky suggests that ephemeral gains, together with mortality salience, form basic explanations for the origins of political extremism and constitute a theoretical framework that also explains later mass violence. Midlarsky applies his framework to multiple forms of political extremism, including the rise of Italian, Hungarian and Romanian fascism, Nazism, radical Islamism, and Soviet, Chinese and Cambodian communism. Other applications include a rampaging military (Japan, Pakistan, Indonesia) and extreme nationalism in Serbia, Croatia, the Ottoman Empire and Rwanda. Polish anti-Semitism after World War II and the rise of separatist violence in Sri Lanka are also examined.

The Killing Trap offers a comparative analysis of the genocides, politicides and ethnic cleansings of the twentieth century, which are estimated to have cost upwards of forty million lives. The book seeks to understand both the occurrence and magnitude of genocide, based on the conviction that such comparative analysis may contribute towards prevention of genocide in the future. Manus Midlarsky compares socio-economic circumstances and international contexts and includes in his analysis the Jews of Europe, Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, Tutsi in Rwanda, black Africans in Darfur, Cambodians, Bosnians, and the victims of conflict in Ireland. The occurrence of genocide is explained by means of a framework that gives equal emphasis to the non-occurrence of genocide, a critical element not found in other comparisons, and victims are given a prominence equal to that of perpetrators in understanding the magnitude of genocide.

This widely used and acclaimed text reader brings together some of the best work on the onset of war, the expansion of war, the conditions of peace, and the termination and impact of war. Editorial commentary on the major findings and the statistical analysis used in each study teaches students how to read the article so that they can become literate in social science methods. A learning package in the appendix provides a programmed text to teach students how to interpret tables, read basic statistics, and conduct elementary data analysis. Correlates of War data on European countries is provided, and a methodological table of contents allows instructors to assign articles from the easiest (simple percentages) to the most advanced (time series and formal modeling).

Why is the relationship between inequality and democracy so compelling to the contemporary social scientist? This 1997 volume addresses questions that were raised as early as the time of Aristotle and through Marx to the present. Theoretical lacunae are explored, as are major current policy concerns. The book focuses on the sources of democracy, the relationship between economic development and thresholds of democracy, and finally on responses to democratization. Of course, definitions of democracy have varied over an extraordinarily wide range, as have conceptions of inequality, and the reader will find such variations reflected in the contributions to this volume. Descriptions of democracy vary from an emphasis on equality of participation for all citizens in decision making, to more complex indices emphasizing competitiveness and civil liberties. The contributors to this volume provide the kind of multidimensional analysis which is essential to a comprehensive treatment of the relationship between inequality, democracy, and economic development.

"Midlarsky has done it again, another state-of-the art handbook on the most recent developments in the study of war. This volume is entirely new with a focus on internal war. It is a 'must-read' for scholars and students of conflict. Even the most knowledgeable will learn a great deal from the book."
---John A. Vasquez, Thomas B. Mackie Scholar in International Relations, University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

""Handbook of War Studies III" is a tour de force. This is a compelling and comprehensive work of scholarship. Midlarsky, as with previous volumes, has assembled an 'all star' team from the interdisciplinary field of conflict processes. In response to trends in place over the last few decades, this third volume rightly focuses on the intrastate dimension of international conflict. The volume includes lucid presentations on rational choice and political psychology as alternative visions, along with convincing treatments of civil war, ethnic conflict, genocide, and related issues. This book will be required reading for anyone with an interest in conflict processes."
---Patrick James, Director, Center for International Studies, University of Southern California

"This third volume of the Handbook is a very welcome addition with its focus on intrastate conflict. Scholarship on internal conflict has proliferated over the past decade, and therefore it is time to take stock of the work that has been done and to point out directions for future research. In this volume a team of leading scholars do just that as they provide trenchant assessments of what has been accomplished and what are the remaining big questions that require further research. This volume will be indispensable to students and scholars alike."
---Paul Huth, Editor, "Journal of Conflict Resolution, " and Professor of Government and Politics, University of Maryland, College Park

"Handbook of War Studies III" is a follow-up to "Handbook of War Studies I" (1993) and" II" (2000). This new volume collects original work from leading international relations scholars on domestic strife, ethnic conflict, genocide, and other timely topics. Special attention is given to civil war, which has become one of the dominant forms---if not the dominant form---of conflict in the world today. Contributors: Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, New York University, and Hoover Institution, Stanford University
Nils Petter Gleditsch, International Peace Research Institute, Oslo (PRIO), and Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Trondheim
Havard Hegre, University of Oslo, and International Peace Research Institute, Oslo (PRIO)
Erin K. Jenne, Central European University, Budapest
Mark Irving Lichbach, University of Maryland
Roy Licklider, Rutgers University, New Brunswick
T. David Mason, University of North Texas
Rose McDermott, Cornell University
Stephen Saideman, McGill University
Havard Strand, International Peace Research Institute, Oslo (PRIO)
Monica Duffy Toft, Harvard University Manus I. Midlarsky is the Moses and Annuta Back Professor of International Peace and Conflict Resolution at Rutgers University, New Brunswick. He is the founding past president of the Conflict Processes Section of the American Political Science Association and a past vice president of the International Studies Association. Cover photograph (c) Matthew Rambo / iStockphoto.com

The Killing Trap offers a comparative analysis of the genocides, politicides and ethnic cleansings of the twentieth century, which are estimated to have cost upwards of forty million lives. The book seeks to understand both the occurrence and magnitude of genocide, based on the conviction that such comparative analysis may contribute towards prevention of genocide in the future. Manus Midlarsky compares socio-economic circumstances and international contexts and includes in his analysis the Jews of Europe, Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, Tutsi in Rwanda, black Africans in Darfur, Cambodians, Bosnians, and the victims of conflict in Ireland. The occurrence of genocide is explained by means of a framework that gives equal emphasis to the non-occurrence of genocide, a critical element not found in other comparisons, and victims are given a prominence equal to that of perpetrators in understanding the magnitude of genocide.

The relationship between inequality and democracy is a compelling one for the contemporary social scientist. This book addresses questions raised as early as the time of Aristotle, and continue through Marx to the present day. Theories of inequality in relation to democracy are explored, and the book focuses on the sources of democracy, the relationship between economic development and thresholds of democracy, and finally responses to democratization. As the gap between rich and poor widens within and between nations, the subject of this book becomes increasingly important worldwide.