Joakim Berndtsson

Lecture description:

What is war and how can it be studied? This seemingly straightforward question provides the starting-point for this lecture. The question takes us from 17th century political philosophy via ideas about the emergence of the nation(al) state, and on to modern day writings and research on war and armed conflict. The lecture provides a conceptual basis for thinking about war in IR, and provides examples of the changing nature of war and warfare. We discuss different ways of approaching the problem of war and organised, large-scale collective violence in theory as well as in empirical research, and we critically assess the consequences of different ways of thinking about war. As you prepare for the lecture by reading the texts below, you will realise that the question at the beginning is deceptively simple, and that there are few clear answers. At the same time, the persistent challenge of war compels us to take the question very seriously.

Lecture slides: IR1221 War in Pol Th V23.pdf

Mandatory readings:

Bousquet, Antoine 2016. “War”. In: Felix Berenskoetter (Ed.). Concepts in world politics. London: Sage, pp. 91-106.

Williams, Paul D., 2018. “War”. In: Williams, Paul D. (Ed.). Security Studies: An Introduction. 3rd ed., 2018. (e-book available through Gothenburg University Library), pp. 175-191.

Strachan, Hew and Sibylle Scheipers, 2011: “Introduction: The Changing Character of War”. In: Strachan, Hew and Sibylle Scheipers (Eds.). The Changing Character of War. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (e-book available through Gothenburg University Library).

Sugggested readings:

Clausewitz, Carl Von, transl. Peter Paret and Michael Howard, with Bernard Brodie (1976). On War. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton U.P. (Another translation of the book is available online here: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1946)

Freedman, Lawrence (2018). The future of war: a history. London: Penguin Books

Kaldor, Mary (2012). New and old wars: organized violence in a global era. 3., rev. and updated ed. Cambridge: Polity

Scheipers, Sibylle & Strachan, Hew (Eds.) (2011). The changing character of war. Oxford: Oxford University Press

Singer, Peter Warren (2010). Wired for war: the robotics revolution and conflict in the twenty-first century. New York: Penguin Books