IELTS Reading: Sociology

War is an armed conflict between the armed forces of states, or between governmental forces and armed groups that are organized under a certain command structure and have the capacity to sustain military operations, or between such organized groups. It is generally characterized by widespread violence, destruction, and mortality, using regular or irregular military forces. War aims typically involve the pursuit of political, economic, or territorial objectives. Warfare refers to the common activities and characteristics of types of war, or of wars in general. Total war is warfare that is not restricted to purely legitimate military targets, and can result in massive civilian or other non-combatant suffering and casualties.

War has changed in numerous ways over the course of history. Since 1945, great power wars, territorial conquests and war declarations have declined in frequency. However, war in general has not necessarily declined. Civil wars have increased in absolute terms since 1945. Wars have been increasingly regulated by international humanitarian law. Battle deaths and casualties have declined, in part due to advances in military medicine. == Etymology == The English word war derives from the 11th-century Old English words wyrre and werre, from Old French werre (guerre as in modern French), in turn from the Frankish *werra, ultimately deriving from the Proto-Germanic *werzō 'mixture, confusion'. The word is related to the Old Saxon werran, Old High German werran, and the modern German verwirren, meaning 'to confuse, to perplex, to bring into confusion'.

Anthropologists disagree about whether warfare was common throughout human prehistory, or whether it was a more recent development, following the invention of agriculture or organized states. It is difficult to determine whether warfare occurred during the Paleolithic due to the sparsity of known remains. Some sources claim that most Middle and Upper Paleolithic societies were possibly fundamentally egalitarian and may have rarely or never engaged in organized violence between groups (i.e. war). Evidence of violent conflict appears to increase during the Mesolithic period, from around 10,000 years ago onwards. American cultural anthropologist and ethnologist Raymond Case Kelly claimed that before 400,000 years ago, humans clashed like groups of chimpanzees; however, later they preferred "positive and peaceful social relations between neighboring groups, such as joint hunting, trading, and courtship". In his book Warless Societies and the Origin of War he explores the origins of modern wars and states that high surplus product encourages conflict, so "raiding often begins in the richest environments". In his 1996 book War Before Civilization, Lawrence H. Keeley, a professor at the University of Illinois, says approximately 90–95% of known societies throughout history engaged in at least occasional warfare, and many fought constantly. Keeley describes several styles of primitive combat such as small raids, large raids, and massacres. All of these forms of warfare were used by primitive societies, a finding supported by other researchers. Keeley explains that early war raids were not well organized, as the participants did not have any formal training. Scarcity of resources meant defensive works were not a cost-effective way to protect the society against enemy raids. William Rubinstein wrote "Pre-literate societies, even those organized in a relatively advanced way, were renowned for their studied cruelty.'" Since the rise of the state some 5,000 years ago, military activity has continued over much of the globe. In Europe the oldest known battlefield is thought to date to 1250 BC. The Bronze Age has been described as a key period in the intensification of warfare, with the emergence of dedicated warriors and the development of metal weapons like swords. Two other commonly named periods of increase are the Axial Age and Modern Times. The invention of gunpowder, and its eventual use in warfare, together with the acceleration of technological advances, have fomented major changes to war itself.

In Coercion, Capital, and European States, AD 990–1992, Charles Tilly, professor of history, sociology, and social science at the University of Michigan and Columbia University, and described as "the founding father of 21st-century sociology," argued that "war made the state, and the state made war", saying that wars have led to creation of states which in their turn perpetuate war. Tilly's theory of state formation is considered dominant in the state formation literature.

Since 1945, great power wars, territorial conquests and war declarations have declined in frequency. Wars have been increasingly regulated by international humanitarian law. Battle deaths and casualties have declined, in part due to advances in military medicine and despite advances in weapons. In Western Europe, since the late 18th century, more than 150 conflicts and about 600 battles have taken place, but no battle has taken place since 1945. However, war in some aspects has not necessarily declined. Civil wars have increased in absolute terms since 1945. A distinctive feature of war since 1945 is that combat has largely been a matter of civil wars and insurgencies. The major exceptions were the Korean War, the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, the Iran–Iraq War, the Gulf War, the Eritrean–Ethiopian War, and the Russo-Ukrainian War.

Asymmetric warfare is the methods used in conflicts between belligerents of drastically different levels of military capability or size. Biological warfare, or germ warfare, is the use of biological infectious agents or toxins such as bacteria, viruses, and fungi against people, plants, or animals. This can be conducted through sophisticated technologies, like cluster munitions, or with rudimentary techniques like catapulting an infected corpse behind enemy lines, and can include weaponized or non-weaponized pathogens. Chemical warfare involves the use of weaponized chemicals in combat. Poison gas as a chemical weapon was principally used during World War I, and resulted in over a million estimated casualties, including more than 100,000 civilians. Cold warfare is an intense international rivalry without direct military conflict, but with a sustained threat of it, including high levels of military preparations, expenditures, and development, and may involve active conflicts by indirect means, such as economic warfare, political warfare, covert operations, espionage, cyberwarfare, or proxy wars. Conventional warfare is a form of warfare between states in which nuclear, biological, chemical or radiological weapons are not used or see limited deployment. Cyberwarfare involves the actions by a nation-state or international organization to attack and attempt to damage another nation's information systems. Insurgency is a rebellion against authority, where irregular forces take up arms to change an existing political order. An insurgency can be fought via counterinsurgency, and may also be opposed by measures to protect the population, and by political and economic actions of various kinds aimed at undermining the insurgents' claims against the incumbent regime. Information warfare is the application of destructive force on a large scale against information assets and systems, against the computers and networks that support the four critical infrastructures (the power grid, communications, financial, and transportation). Nuclear warfare is warfare in which nuclear weapons are the primary, or a major, method of achieving capitulation. Radiological warfare is any form of warfare involving deliberate radiation poisoning or contamination of an area with radiological sources. Total war is warfare by any means possible, disregarding the laws of war, placing no limits on legitimate military targets, using weapons and tactics resulting in significant civilian casualties, or demanding a war effort requiring significant sacrifices by the friendly civilian population. Unconventional warfare can be defined as "military and quasi-military operations other than conventional warfare" and may use covert forces or actions such as subversion, diversion, sabotage, espionage, biowarfare, sanctions, propaganda or guerrilla warfare.