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Creating shared goals and experiences as a pathway to peace
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Climate change, nuclear and biochemical weapons exposure, pandemics, and “disruptive technologies” threaten life on earth. According to the bulletin of the atomic scientists who developed a “doomsday clock” to predict man-made global catastrophe, we are in a “time of unprecedented danger” (Mecklin, 2023). As we collectively step onto a precipice in which humanity might cease to exist, the “fog of war” continues to stymie human creativity and ingenuity (Morris, 2003) — the only tools we have capable of mitigating this crisis. Glowacki's “The evolution of peace,” an anthropological analysis of the coevolution of peace and war, is teaming with new insights and approaches to international conflict that are seamlessly accessible to all, and simultaneously capable of ending war. These insights offer a road map for achieving a safe haven for international and interdisciplinary friendship and scholarship.
Glowacki's main thesis is that need-based sharing with interdependent out-groups provides the motivation for peace, which is a similar argument we have made in earlier work (Brown, Brown, Knickrehm, & Teske, 2005). However, Glowacki's intriguing contribution is that war begins with conflict within the group, as opposed to outside of it. He suggests that the decision to go to war is almost always made unilaterally by a single individual (or relatively small collection of individuals) who elevate their own needs (e.g., for revenge, status, freedom) above the needs of the in-group or nation. According to Glowacki, war might be in the best interest of an individual, but peace is always in the best interest of the group.
Glowacki finds remedy in polydomous ants that share resources (peacefully) with other ants from spatially distinct nests. He writes that ants “achieve peace through an entirely different pathway unavailable to most animals” (target article, sect. 8, para. 7). These ants “achieve positive-sum interdependent relationships ” with one another...