Социальная функция войны. Наблюдения и заметки

Социологическое обозрение. 2025. Т. 24. № 2. С. 233–251.

Translator: Bankovskaya S.

This article advances the idea that war is a political institution in progress—an institution whose function is undetermined, whose structure has not yet been fixed. The attempt to conceptualize war as a biological category is flawed not so much by its failure to analyze the concrete and biological aspects of war, but by its failure to explore competition and conflict as distinct aspects of the "struggle for existence." Competition can be viewed as an individualizing or analytical process; conflict as an integrating process. Wars necessitated the organization of a society that, at least for the purposes of collective action, became immeasurably superior to the primitive horde. 

Not only does the state trace its origins to war, but its primary function remains the preparation for and conduct of war. Where there are no common interests or "basic understandings" that make compromise possible, wars seem inevitable. Ideological wars become struggles for territory, because political control and sovereignty over territory are necessary to maintain the different ways of life represented by the parties to these conflicts. The function of war is to (1) expand the zone of peace, (2) establish within this zone a political authority capable of enforcing it, and (3) establish an ideology that rationalizes the new political and social order and a cult that idealizes it.

Keywords: конкуренция, война, competition, конфликт, социальный порядок, мир, social order, conflict, peace, warfare

Publication based on the results of: National philosophy and culture: spiritual and moral values (2025)