Thread by @ProfPaulPoast

🌏 is over 70% water. Why does that make violence necessary?

[THREAD]

The above question is in reference to the third of my answers for "why violence" in 👇

Specifically, this question is in reference to land or, as we like to say in International Relations, "territory".

The literature on "territorial conflict" is huge. A 2014 @JPR_journal piece by Monica Duffy Toft summarized the work to that point: "What is clear is that territory has been and will continue to be a core issue in explaining the escalation & onset of war"

journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.117…

In his 1998 book, Paul Huth went further, pointing out that clashes over disputed territorial is "one of the enduring features of international politics".
amazon.com/Standing-Your-…

@drkristawiegand went further still, writing not only that territorial disputes are the mostly likely type of dispute to lead to conflict, but they often persist because states leverage them to bargain over other issues.

amazon.com/Enduring-Terri…

Before saying more about territory, what are the other types of issues over which states can have disputes?

Besides land, there are also disputes over rivers and waterways (see @sbmitche and Paul Hensel project on the issues that "correlate with war")
journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.117…

Beyond claims over space (whether land or water), states can have disputes over "policy" (e.g. pursuit of nuclear weapons) or "regime type" (e.g. make world safe for democracy). These are are coded in the MID data
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/07…

Another issue is "identity" (or "ethnopolitical"), which is commonly an issue in internal conflicts.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00…

But research has found time and again that these other issue types are not as conflict prone as territory.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.117…

Moreover, it can be hard to disentangle these other issues from claims over territory

For example, see Toft again in @SecStudies_Jrnl.
tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.108…

So why do humans have disputes over territory and why are these disputes so prone to provoking physical violence?

One key answer is "territoriality": humans have a tendency to define and possess "territory" in order to influence others.
tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.111…

John Vasquez said it well: "Clearly, if humans were not territorial, wars over territory would not be so prevalent."
amazon.com/Steps-War-Empi…

But this answer just moves the question: what makes being "territorial" associated with using physical violence?

A straightforward answer is that holding something physical, such as land, requires physical presence.

Indeed, the physical presence on land can be established even when physical violence isn't used.

For example, consider "fait accomplis" (cc @daltman_IR)
academic.oup.com/isq/article/61…

These occur when military forces just waltz in and setup on a piece of disputes land. No shots are fired, but they now "have the high ground" so to speak.

See: "Little Green Men" from Russia into Crimea
bbc.com/news/world-eur…

Another example of using no to using physical violence (at least in the form of firing guns) to hold territory is the construction of "border walls".

(see 🙋‍♂️ & David Care in JCR)
journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.117…

In many ways, the building of a wall is the ultimate physical expression of humans being territorial.

While some think of the US-Mexico border wall, walll are a widespread and growing phenomenon (see, for example, data from @ProfVallet in @TheEconomist)
economist.com/graphic-detail…

So if holding territory requires physical presence, then taking it requires physical force. The outcome: violence.

Of course, that implies that the holding state will bolster its physical presence on the territory...and so on (see Security. Dilemma.). Hence, it's easy to see hold territorial disputes can become intractable.
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.111…

Big caveat to all of the above: the relationship is complicated by the fact that states with territorial disputes tend to be neighbors and neighbors also do a lot of "good things" with one another, like trade (see @KSchultz3580 in @AnnualReviews)
annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.114…

In other words, in international politics, neighbors can be "staunch rivals" that become "best friends" (or at least willing partners). In other words, international politics is complex.

In sum, territory makes the use of violence a "necessity" in international politics because (1) it takes physical presence to hold land, and (2) because of 1, it often requires physical force to take land.

[END]

Addendum: For more on the idea of "territoriality" and how it problematizes the link between "land disputes" (to be more precise) and violence, @Toal_CritGeo compiled an outstanding reading list 🧵!