I recently read How Civil Wars Start (and How to Stop Them) by Barbara F. Walter. (h/t to G2Geek) Haven’t done a book report since high school. Hope this gets a passing grade…
It’s a hell of a lot easier to prevent a civil war than it is to stop one after it’s started… Civil wars start when one group becomes so aggrieved that they lose all hope for their future and see violence as the only solution to their problems. A prime example of this is “The Troubles” in Northern Ireland during the latter third of the last century. Native Irish people suffered discrimination at the hands of British colonizers for centuries. In 1922 Ireland was granted it’s independence... The only exception being in the North.
Northern Ireland was created as a separate nation for Protestant colonizers. Indigenous Irish Catholics in the North became a minority group and second class citizens in their own ancestral homeland. Inspired by American Civil Rights and Anti-War protesters, the Catholics attempted agitating for their rights. The Protestant controlled government sent in armed police and eventually called in the British Army. Things came to a head on January 30, 1972 when British soldiers shot 26 unarmed civilians, killing 14 of them. That day became known in the UK as Bloody Sunday. The conflict didn’t end until Good Friday in 1998.
In India, the Balkans, the Middle East, and numerous other places throughout history and the world the pattern is the same. People protest, authority steps in to stop it, radicals resort to violence, things escalate, and the result is civil war. Autocracies handle these situations with the swift use of overwhelming violence, like China in 1989...
Communist Party leader Zhao Ziyang had favored compromising with the Tiananmen Square demonstrators, but Communist Party hard-liners threw him out of power — claiming he was soft — and instead pursued a military response. — (pg. 90)
Democracies on the other hand are designed to handle them through compromise and accommodation. In practice, reconciliation is usually required after initial attempts at force fail. It is the nations in between these extremes, with either weak autocracies or weak democracies, that are most vulnerable to civil war.
Social media is increasingly employed as a platform to sow division throughout the world and undermine governments for power and profit. The algorithms that control what people see on these websites quite often inadvertently exacerbate discord. Their sorting of ethnic, social, religious, and geographical content can lead to factions which are a step on the road to conflict.
People don’t realize how vulnerable Western democracies are to violent conflict. They have grown accustomed to their longevity, their resilience, and their stability in the face of crises. But that was before social media created an avenue by which enemies of democracy can easily infiltrate society and destabilize it from within. — (pg. 124)
Social media is used to organize and fund raise, spread fear and hate, and infiltrate opposition groups. It is the radical’s newest and greatest tool. It was used to great effect in the 5 year lead up to the Capitol Insurrection, and something needs to be done to rein it in. Violent criminals thought they were true blue patriots, protecting their democracy from electoral thieves, because helping them believe that increased social media traffic and profits.
Though our institutions held strong and power was transferred without further conflict, their actions were unfortunately the straw that broke democracy’s back. On January 6th, 2021 America slipped into that middle ground between autocracy and democracy and at greater risk of civil war. Five years before the Capitol Riot our country was considered a full democracy. Since then it’s become what’s referred to as an anocracy. That’s a new word for me... I’m not sure I like it.
As America has become increasingly diverse, and the Republican party has become increasingly homogeneous, the chances for civil war have increased. By 2045 white Americans will no longer be a majority in what was once a country that was exclusively theirs. The election of an ethnically diverse black man with a foreign name in 2008 was taken as a wake up call… When their leader went down in 2020 they lost their minds
The 2020 Election was devastating for Republicans. They turned out in record numbers for an incumbent president, but still lost the White House by more than seven million votes. — (pg. 155)
Right wing extremism has been on the rise since the 1990’s and we are currently on the cusp of open insurgency. The 9/11 terrorist attacks and the wars it spawned brought us to where we are now. As sporadic violence becomes more frequent, Americans will feel increasingly unsafe. This in turn may fuel the idea that our government is ineffective, leading more and more Americans to prepare for violence. This is a cycle we must disrupt…
America’s extremists today subscribe to an idea known as accelerationism: the apocalyptic belief that modern society is irredeemable and that it’s end must be hastened, so that a new order can be brought into being. — (pg. 175)
The number of right wing extremist groups grew in response to mask mandates and Covid lock downs. They see any attempt to prevent further violence through common sense gun laws as an attack on their freedoms and an attempt to take away their precious guns. More and more of these groups openly espouse civil war and the establishment of a white ethno-state as their primary objective. With their rise, left wing groups have popped up to oppose them.
The closer America gets to reconciliation, the more desperate the radicals in our midst will become. They cannot be ignored. The rebel mindset has been ingrained in the American psyche since it’s inception. It is fueled by fear of oppression from a monolithic government unconcerned with individual interests.
Sustained campaigns of terror typically move citizens ideologically to the right, in favor of law-and-order candidates; this often brings even more conservative politicians to power. — (pg. 192)
We are already doing many of things needed to prevent a civil war. We elected a President who is open to compromise and doesn’t stoke divisiveness. Our institutions have made strides to eliminate anti-democracy extremists from law enforcement and our military. The Department of Justice is investigating and prosecuting the seditious among us who attempted to overthrow our democracy on January 6th. They have thwarted numerous plots.
We understand the need to strengthen our electoral system by expanding participation, eliminating gerrymandering, and reforming campaign finance laws to promote integrity and confidence in our elections.
In the case of the United States, the federal government should renew it’s commitment to providing for it’s most vulnerable citizens, white, Black, or brown. We need to undo fifty years of declining social services, invest in safety nets and human capital across racial and religious lines, and prioritize high-quality early education, universal healthcare, and a higher minimum wage. — (pg. 210)
One important thing we are doing is returning civics to American classrooms. We need to educate people on just what democracy is, and specifically how ours is designed to function. If our electorate recognizes the potential danger to our democracy and educates itself in an effort to strengthen it, we’ll be well on our way to avoiding another civil war.
Some here at Dailykos are in need of a refresher on our American ideals. It is un-American to suggest violating Constitutional rights or disenfranchising people. It is illiberal to wish misfortune or physical harm on political opponents. It is undemocratic to dehumanize people. It undermines our integrity to generalize large groups of people. It’s bad enough when they do it… When I see it here it really surprises me.
The United States of America was founded on the liberal ideals of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, the separation of church and state, and the right to due process and equality under the law. This country has come a long way on those ideals in last 246 years and they’ll carry us into the future, together, if we fortify them...
“Because the soul of this nation is strong... because the backbone of this nation is strong... because the people of this nation are strong... the State of the Union is strong. As I stand here tonight, I have never been more optimistic about the future of America. We just have to remember who we are. We are the United States of America and there is nothing... nothing beyond our capacity if we do it together.” — President Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr. 2/7/2023