TY - BOOK N2 - "The proliferation of 'new wars' since the end of the Cold War has forced scholars to re-open the debate about 'what is war?' For most commentators, 'new war' is 'mindless' mass action. It has become a behavioural problem. Like a disease, the risk of infection must be contained." "This book takes a different approach. Anthropologists, who have lived with and through the wars they describe here, reflect a paradoxical assumption that to understand war we must deny it a special status. Rather than quarantine war and leave it to security specialists they grasp its character as but one among many aspects of social reality, organised by social agents, made through social action. All war is long-term struggle organised for political ends, and neither the means nor the ends can be understood without reference to a specific social context."--BOOK JACKET. AB - "The proliferation of 'new wars' since the end of the Cold War has forced scholars to re-open the debate about 'what is war?' For most commentators, 'new war' is 'mindless' mass action. It has become a behavioural problem. Like a disease, the risk of infection must be contained." "This book takes a different approach. Anthropologists, who have lived with and through the wars they describe here, reflect a paradoxical assumption that to understand war we must deny it a special status. Rather than quarantine war and leave it to security specialists they grasp its character as but one among many aspects of social reality, organised by social agents, made through social action. All war is long-term struggle organised for political ends, and neither the means nor the ends can be understood without reference to a specific social context."--BOOK JACKET. T1 - No peace, no war :an anthropology of contemporary armed conflicts / DA - 2005. CY - Athens : CY - Oxford : AU - Richards, Paul, AU - Helander, Bernhard. CN - GN497 CN - GN497 PB - Ohio University Press ; PB - J. Currey, PP - Athens : PP - Oxford : PY - 2005. N1 - "In memoriam Bernhard Helander." ID - 340383 KW - War. KW - Ethnic conflict. KW - Political violence. SN - 9780821415764 (Ohio Univ. Press: pbk.) SN - 082141576X (Ohio Univ. Press: pbk.) SN - 0821415751 (Ohio Univ. Press) SN - 9780821415757 (Ohio Univ. Press) SN - 0852559364 (J. Currey) SN - 9780852559369 (J. Currey) SN - 0852559356 (J. Currey : pbk.) SN - 9780852559352 (J. Currey : pbk.) TI - No peace, no war :an anthropology of contemporary armed conflicts / ER -