By Wayne Brown


How Civil Wars Start


There is a lot to digest here. It is perhaps the first book on "Political Science" that I have found that can make a claim to being "Scientific" - based on evidence and capable of making predictions.


Analysis of hundreds of civil wars and factional violence show repeated patterns for those willing to look for them. Ironically, "democracy" seems to be a way to guarantee, rather than prevent civil war.  Rule by "headcount" is a recipe for the discontent that can boil over into civil war.


The US dipped deeper (back) into autocracy during the Trump era, following a pattern that started with Johnson's abandonment of the "South" to support civil rights (the South is now Republican). The pattern is fleshed out by many examples taken from other countries that fell off the same cliff,  such as India. 


America has not recovered from the "dip" and continues to slide into a factional power struggle, predicted by the founders as being the main threat to the Constitution, which was written when there was no real threat to the faction in charge at the time (white men of property).


The devastating effects of social media are illustrated in the horror stories in Sri Lanka and Myanmar. So far, these effects still run rampant, uncorrected, and unlamented.


There is a deep logic and consistency to all this and it's terrifying. With the American Republican party becoming the faction of white (90%) evangelicals (72%), we see systematic attacks on everyone else becoming more blatant. 


The good news is that Canada still ranks in the top 4 when it comes to having a stable liberal democracy. So far. But we see how we came close to falling apart not so long ago with the attempts to split off Quebec by encouraging people to think of themselves as English or French. Political "Entrepreneurs" still attempt to push identity politics to advance their careers at the expense of stable democracy. It is interesting to see how our uncomfortable concessions to Quebec have managed to keep the country together.


We can also see the sources of outrage in "First Nations" - even in the term itself, along with "Settlers" who are seen as usurpers of the rightful power of the original people.  It is important that First Nations retain some hope that the majority will. hear their grievances and at least put on a show of restoring justice. Hopelessness is a trigger for a violent uprising.


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