In a world where headlines scream of geopolitical tensions—from Ukraine to Taiwan—it's easy to overlook one of the most profound achievements of our era: the absence of hot wars between the world's top economic powers since World War II. This "Long Peace," now stretching nearly 80 years as of 2025, stands as a quiet testament to human progress.
War remains the ultimate disruptor of generational wealth and stability. It shatters economies, halts innovation, and erodes the very foundations of prosperity we've built through markets, technology, and resilience. Interestingly, surveys show "war" itself rarely appears as a top concern, with nuclear fears cited only as a secondary reason for pessimism about the next generation's prospects, behind debt and deficits or climate change. This may reflect how the specter of great power conflict feels remote or otherworldly to most Americans, its probabilities overshadowed by more tangible, everyday threats. But is this appropriate—that the biggest potential challenge to continued human progress, war, ranks so low?
This series explores the Long Peace's fragility, inviting you to weigh if pessimists might yet prevail, and whether this risk deserves more of our collective concern.
Putting the Current Stretch of Peace into Historical Context
History is riddled with conflicts among great powers—those dominant in military and economic might—making our current era stand out, though not without precedents. From 1495 to 1975, scholar Jack Levy documented 119 great power wars, occurring roughly every 34 years on average, with nine escalating to "general wars" involving most major players, like the Napoleonic Wars or the World Wars. The Correlates of War project, tracking conflicts from 1816 onward, shows a downward trend in frequency: 22 such wars in the 16th century, dropping to just five in the 19th.
Yet, extended peaces have occurred before, such as the 99-year Pax Britannica from 1815 to 1914, where British hegemony maintained relative stability amid colonial expansions. Post-1945, the Long Peace has seen no direct clashes between top economies like the US, China, Germany, Japan, or India—replaced instead by proxies like Korea or Vietnam. Global war deaths have plummeted, with the past 25-30 years marking the least violent period on record, per the Human Security Report. Statistically, this fits within historical fluctuations: Models suggest 57-68% of simulations yield similar or longer gaps without assuming a permanent decline.
Still, it's enabled explosive prosperity— global GDP multiplying 15-fold since 1950—reminding us that peace isn't inevitable but a fragile gift worth dissecting.
Hypotheses for the Extended Peace
Scholars attribute the Long Peace to a web of interlocking factors, from deterrence to societal shifts. These can be grouped by scale of influence, starting with broad systemic forces, then state-level policies, and finally societal and individual changes.
1. Systemic/Global Scale
(Broad structural forces shaping the international system):
Hegemonic stability (e.g., US dominance post-1945 and Great Britain in the 19th century): Leadership by a dominant power enforces global rules, reducing multipolar rivalries that fueled past wars.
Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD): Nuclear weapons make great power war suicidal, deterring escalation since Hiroshima.
Economic interdependence and globalization: Deep trade ties make war economically more expensive, with interdependent states substantially less likely to fight.
Spread of international institutions and norms: Bodies like the EU, IMF, human rights regimes, and the United Nations foster cooperation, embedding norms against aggression and aiding dispute resolution.
2. State/National Scale (Policies and characteristics of individual states):
Democratic peace theory: Democracies rarely war with each other due to shared norms, accountability, and institutional checks. Though rare, debatable exceptions include the War of 1812 (US vs. UK), the 1999 Kargil War (India vs. Pakistan), and the 1898 Spanish-American War, often qualified by incomplete democratic maturity.
Decolonization and end of imperialism: Ending empires post-1945 reduced territorial conflicts, redirecting focus to internal development.
Severity of preceding wars (WWI and WWII): National memories of over 100 million deaths influence policy, creating aversion to large-scale conflict.
3. Societal/Individual Scale (Cultural and human-level changes):
Respect for human life: Humanitarian advances elevate life's sanctity, shifting away from honor-based violence.
Technological and informational advances: Real-time media exposes war's horrors, while cyber tools allow non-lethal aggression, promoting reason.
Demographic and societal shifts: Aging populations, urbanization, education, and the rise of organized sports prioritize welfare and channel aggressive instincts non-lethally, cutting conflict risk significantly.
Counter-Arguments
These explanations inspire hope, but skeptics caution the Long Peace might be a fluke, fitting random war models with a 43% chance of major conflict in the next century. Economic ties failed to prevent WWI; MAD risks mishaps like the Cuban Missile Crisis; institutions falter in crises (e.g., UN in Ukraine); and factors like norms can stoke nationalism, as in the 1969 Football War between Honduras and El Salvador.
Rising multipolarity and non-state threats, from cyberwar to climate strife, could shatter it, highlighting fragility over fate. The peace also overlooks smaller wars and civil conflicts, which still draw in major powers indirectly.
What Lies Ahead
This introduction sets the stage; Essay 2 unpacks structural deterrents like MAD and institutions. Essay 3 probes societal drivers, including economics and demographics. Essay 4 tackles challenges and strategies for enduring prosperity.
Thank You To Our Sponsors:
Truflation: Learn about what prices are actually doing by going to https://truflation.com/
Use code BOBDEW10 to get 10% off purchases.
Foundation: Protect your Bitcoin using the latest off-line technology with easy-to-use Passport. Their next product, Passport Prime will protect all passwords off-line with even-better technology. https://foundation.xyz/
River Financial: If not cold storage for your Bitcoin, I’d highly recommend River for buying and holding- River is engineered to protect your Bitcoin over the long run. Use this link for discounts: https://river.com/signup?r=T7GGAF7G