. tt CC/NUMBER 43 This Week’s Citation Classic OCTOBER 27, 1986 Boulding K E. Conflict and defense: a general theory. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1962. 349 p. [Depaitment of Economics, , Ann Arbor, Mu

Conflict and Defense is a general theory of conflict war, which could destroy us. The group includ- as a pattern common to virtually all types of social ed Anatol Rapoport, Herbert Kelman, and interaction. It considers: static and dynamic models; Stephen Richardson (the son of Lewis F. ; viability; ecologicaland epidemiological Richardson, whose remarkable works we all models ofconflict; parties to conflict; and economic, read in microfilm; they were not published industrial, intemational, ideological, and ethical con- until 19601,2). Out of this came the Journal of flicts as specialcases. It discusses the control and res- and the Center for Con- olution of conflict and concludes with an epilogue flict Resolution at the University of Michigan on the breakdown of national defense as a result of in 1956, the product ofa remarkable interdis- nuclear weapons and the long-range missile. [The ciplinary group that included Robert Angell, SocialSciences Citation Index® (SSCI®) indicates that the sociologist; David Singer, the political this book has been cited in over 360 publications.J scientist; and some others. From this livelyin- terdisciplinary intercourse came what is really a new discipline of conflict studies, what the French call “polemologie.” Conflict and Kenneth E. Boulding Defense may well be cited as a pioneer work Institute of Behavioral Science in this new field. University of Colorado The book was actually written during a year Boulder, CO 80309-0484 that I spent at the University ofthe West Indies in Jamaica (1959-1960). Anyone could detect, I think, that the book was written by an econ- omist. The basic economic and game theory August 28, 1986 models are very fundamental to it. It also, however, was much1influenced by the work of Lewis Richardson. It shows the influence of another trend of thought that came out of My interest in conflict undoubtedly goes that remarkable year at Stanford, the general back to early childhood experiences during movement, especially the application World War I in Liverpool—-when I was 7, my of ecological and epidemiological models to uncle came back from the trenches with a look social systems. An important principle that in his eyes I have never forgotten—and to a emerges is the frequent, great divergence be- conviction at about age 14 that war was a tween the images of conflict in the minds of phenomenon so outrageous that I could not the parties and the objective realities of the participate in it, which [ater led me from my conflict, as might be revealed by a study of Methodist upbringing into the Society of actual costs and benefits. Friends. I went to Oxford in 1928 with a Not long after Conflict and Defense was scholarship in chemistry, but the unemploy- published, the International Peace Research ment and poverty that I saw around me, espe- Association was founded, which represents a ciallyin Liverpool, convinced me that econom- community of several hundred scholars ic problems were most urgent, and so I be- around the world who specialize in what might came an economist, ending up in the US. be called “applied conflict studies,” particu- I went towhat was then Iowa State College larly centered on the management of conflict (now Iowa State University) at Ames in 1943 and the diminution of its social cost and the to become a labor economist. This experience increase of its benefits. There is now an convinced me that all social scientists were increasing profession of people who might be studying the same thing, the social , described as “conflict managers,” symbolized which one had to look at as a totality. Then, in the biennial National Conference on Peace- at the Center for Advanced Study in the Be- making and Conflict Resolution. havioral Sciences at Stanford (1954-1955), a My own continuing work in the field is re3- little group ofus met to consider how to direct flected in volume 5 of my4 collected papers, the social sciences towardthe study of conflict my book, Stable Peace, and lectures I gave and peace in the light of the threat of nuclear at IIASA.~

I. Richardson L F. Statistics ofdeadly qwsneLs. (wngbt Q & Lienau C C, edo.) Pittsburgh: Boxwood Press. 1960. 373 p. 2. . Atms and insecurity: a mathematical study of the causes and origins of sror. (Rashevsky N & Trucco E. edo) Pittsburgh: Boxwood Press. 1960. 307 p. 3. Booldlng K E. Collectedpapers. Volume V. International systems: peace, conflict resolution, and politics. (Singell L 0. Cd.) Boulder: Colorado Associated University Press. 1975. 457 p. 4. . Stable peace. Austin: University o( Texas Press. 1978. 143 p. 5. . National defense through stable peace. Laxenhurg, Austria: tnternational Institute for Applied . 1983. 38 p.

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