War and Peace from Viewpoint of a Sociologist

Abstract

Drawing on a review of global and risk studies as well as on studies in the history of modern western sociology, the author has organized his argument into the following theses. First, the modern world is highly interdepended, i.e. has a hybrid (multisided and multileveled) nature. Therefore, a war and peace are two sides of the same coin. The second, the global whole is actually a rather complex sociobiotechnical system (the SBT-system), and the '˜behavior' of its social and other actors are usually contradictory. Third, each subsystem of it has its own basic principles of structural-functional organization, a temporal order and mode of evolution, and a specific kind of relationships with other subsystems. Fourth, hence this hybrid is inherently contradictory and unstable.A high interdependence of the subsystems objectively raises a risk of a hybrid war emergence. Fifth, that is why the war-and-peace problem should be considered as hybrid as well. Sixth, the hybrid war may have a variety of social aims ranging from economic and political domination till total destruction of a probable adversary. Seventh, despite of technocratic orientation of the westernoriented capitalism the beliefs, values and social memories are still the mighty weapons in any hybrid war. Eighth, a very essence of hybrid war is multi-sided as well. It's a mix of fear and alienation with mass protest actions and military operations. In one cases such wars mobilized people while in the others demobilizes. Ninth, these hybrid structure and processes needs more close integration of social, natural and technical sciences, i.e. modern sociology should be capable to translate any SBT-transformations sociologically. Tenth, the media and social networks are the most powerful means for the shaping individual and mass consciousness. The media and social sciences use a social memory as a '˜peaceful' weapon. Eleventh, the role of civil society organizations and movements as well as of irregular military units is still an open question.