‘New Wars’ Discourse in Germany

The past few years have seen the development in Germany of a discourse on the phenomenon of ‘new wars’. This debate on the nature and cause of new wars is linked to changes in German military policy in the 1990s as well as to growing criticism of globalization. In particular, this review discusses as examples two books that have found wide audiences. In contrast to much of current Anglo-Saxon mainstream research on internal conflicts, emphasis in Germany is placed on the effects of globalization as a major factor in the causation of new wars. Globalization speeds up the decay of states and provides rebels with opportunities they previously did not have. In addition, new wars are characterized by asymmetry in warfare. Therefore, with the growing availability of small arms and light weapons, these wars have grown in number. The authors of the books under review have preferred to adopt a holistic approach to examining collective violence, which allows for the integration into their analysis, in addition to warfare, of a good number of contemporary phenomena, including terrorism and globalization. However, there are methodological shortcomings. In particular, general propositions are often made on the basis of reports from selected cases, without recourse to quantitative evidence.