Such substitute institutions and hypotheses must meet varying criteria. In
general, they must be technically feasible, politically acceptable, and potentially
credible to the members of the societies that adopt them. Specifically, they must
be characterized as follows:
ECONOMIC. An acceptable economic surrogate for the war system will require
the expenditure of resources for completely nonproductive purposes at a level
comparable to that of the military expenditures otherwise demanded by the size
and complexity of each society. Such a substitute system of apparent "waste"
must be of a nature that will permit it to remain independent of the normal
supply-demand economy; it must be subject to arbitrary political control.
POLITICAL. A viable political substitute fir war must posit a generalized
external menace to each society of a nature and degree sufficient to require the
organization and acceptance of political authority.
SOCIOLOGICAL. First, in the permanent absence of war, new institutions must
be developed that will effectively control the socially destructive segments of
societies. Second, for purposes of adapting the physical and psychological
dynamics of human behavior to the needs of social organization, a credible
substitute for war must generate an omnipresent and readily understood fear of
personal destruction. This fear must be of a nature and degree sufficient to
ensure adherence to societal values to the full extent that they are acknowledged
to transcend the value of individual human life.
ECOLOGICAL. A substitute for war in its function as the uniquely human
system of population control must ensure the survival, if not necessarily the
improvement, of the species, in terms of its relations to environmental supply.
CULTURAL AND SCIENTIFIC. A surrogate for the function of war as the
determinant of cultural values must establish a basis of sociomoral conflict of
equally compelling force and scope. A substitute motivational basis for the
quest for scientific knowledge must be similarly informed by a comparable
sense of internal necessity.
SUBSTITUTES FOR THE FUNCTIONS OF WAR: MODELS
The following substitute institutions, among others, have been proposed for
consideration as replacements for the nonmilitary functions of war. That they
may not have been originally set forth for that purpose does not preclude or
invalidate their possible application here.
general, they must be technically feasible, politically acceptable, and potentially
credible to the members of the societies that adopt them. Specifically, they must
be characterized as follows:
ECONOMIC. An acceptable economic surrogate for the war system will require
the expenditure of resources for completely nonproductive purposes at a level
comparable to that of the military expenditures otherwise demanded by the size
and complexity of each society. Such a substitute system of apparent "waste"
must be of a nature that will permit it to remain independent of the normal
supply-demand economy; it must be subject to arbitrary political control.
POLITICAL. A viable political substitute fir war must posit a generalized
external menace to each society of a nature and degree sufficient to require the
organization and acceptance of political authority.
SOCIOLOGICAL. First, in the permanent absence of war, new institutions must
be developed that will effectively control the socially destructive segments of
societies. Second, for purposes of adapting the physical and psychological
dynamics of human behavior to the needs of social organization, a credible
substitute for war must generate an omnipresent and readily understood fear of
personal destruction. This fear must be of a nature and degree sufficient to
ensure adherence to societal values to the full extent that they are acknowledged
to transcend the value of individual human life.
ECOLOGICAL. A substitute for war in its function as the uniquely human
system of population control must ensure the survival, if not necessarily the
improvement, of the species, in terms of its relations to environmental supply.
CULTURAL AND SCIENTIFIC. A surrogate for the function of war as the
determinant of cultural values must establish a basis of sociomoral conflict of
equally compelling force and scope. A substitute motivational basis for the
quest for scientific knowledge must be similarly informed by a comparable
sense of internal necessity.
SUBSTITUTES FOR THE FUNCTIONS OF WAR: MODELS
The following substitute institutions, among others, have been proposed for
consideration as replacements for the nonmilitary functions of war. That they
may not have been originally set forth for that purpose does not preclude or
invalidate their possible application here.
