What drives people into waging wars?

Why do wars still exist? Why has this scourge of humanity not been annihilated yet like pestilence? Is there something rooted in our human genes which drives us into raising arms against our fellow human beings? Are there family traits of belligerence? Often this question prompts a simplifying and pessimistic response: There have always been wars and that´s just the way it is and will be for ever as long as humankind exists. In the first third of the exceptionally war-like 20^th century this problem of belligerence was discussed more often and more passionately than today, and from divergent standpoints – especially in the years between the world wars. At that time humanity was still under shock from the death toll and devastations of the first world war. And already disturbing developments seemed to indicate that a second war was looming with renewed destruction. The discussion about psychic inclinations towards peace within the human species was started back then. In this situation Albert Einstein, the globally well-known physicist, published an open letter to a pioneer of the research into the subconscious mind in which he posed the question: What inner forces keep driving people towards belligerent propaganda?

Because he hoped to get an answer to this very question, on 30 August 1932 – a few months before Adolf Hitler was appointed Reich Chancellor in Germany and later empowered to practical autocracy by far-reaching edicts – in these fateful days, Albert Einstein, a self-confessed pacifist, published an open letter to one of the founders of the psychology of the subconscious mind, Sigmund Freud, an outstanding researcher of his time. Einstein had been encouraged to pen this letter by the League of Nations. He stated that he was puzzled by his observation that in civilised countries “the bulk of the people” kept allegiance to a belligerent minority who “abused them … for their lusts”¹. This behaviour, Einstein remarked, was obviously self-destructive since the people of all nations had to be interested in preserving peace for their own sake. And especially concerning for him: how could war propaganda take hold so quickly of whole populations that it amounted to a kind of belligerent mass psychosis. Einstein gives a partial answer himself, unfortunately it remains valid to this day: “An obvious answer to this question would seem to be that the minority, the ruling class at present, has the schools and press, usually the Church as well, under its thumb. This enables it to organise and sway the emotions of the masses, and makes its tool of them.” And he adds another, eminently psychological question: “Is it possible to control man’s mental evolution so as to make him proof against the psychosis of hate and destructiveness?” This is the question about the inner, psychic conditions of peacefulness, in the individual as well as in humankind.

Freud’s answers reflect the
contemporary narrative on human nature

Freud published his answers to Einstein’s text both promptly and elaborately. However, his answer is as discouraging as it is creepy. Einstein’s rather clear questions are, at best, only partially answered (as Freud himself admits at the end), insisting that there was no hope whatsoever. Basically, Freud uses the opportunity to lay out his theory on humans being possessed by their basic instincts, yet again. The main axiom of this theory claims that the instincts, the sexual ones in particular, cause all kinds of irritations and full-blown neurotic ailments in the people as a reaction to the harsh moral obligations in society (around 1900!) Later Freud, referring to the horrors of the first world war, would invent another supposedly basic instinct, complementary to eros. This one he called “Thanatos”, the urge towards death. In all living beings, there is a constant quarrel between the forces of life (eros, sexuality) and those of death (aggression, war) according to Freud. This “Thanatos” instinct, he argues, could be used to make people kill their fellow human beings.
  These thoughts are not really informed by psychological insights but are meant to back-up the mainstream militaristic zeitgeist with pseudo-scientific arguments.

Misled, but not by instincts but
by deeply rooted misinformation

Fortunately, further development of research into our subconscious emotional life focussed on the social environment which shapes our world-view decisively even before language skills are acquired, rather than mere instinct economy. As comprehensive psychological research by the Vienna school of Alfred Adler and personal depth psychology was able to show, subconscious emotional orientations are mainly shaped by early perceptions in young children. As cultural beings, we humans are mainly influenced by our cultural experiences and social environment, rather than instincts. The way we are treated since our early childhood will pave the way for our orientation in the world, depending on our immediate social environment – and the conclusions which we as children draw from our experiences, consciously or subconsciously. An authoritarian environment will favour anxiousness and the desire to over-adapt, which later can switch to agressiveness and revolt. In an understanding and encouraging environment on the other hand, other character traits will develop: empathy, a desire to understand other people’s motives, co-operation, consideration.
  It is therefore easy to comprehend how big a role school plays in the character development of the young human being. We are more and more convinced: education is not simply facts being memorised, it is guidance in relatedness, knowledge and wisdom being acquired in interaction with the world. If this competent human guidance is missing, the culture which holds society together will crumble. Because human culture in the humanistic sense needs conscious transfer to the next generation. This requires empathic, mature and sensible personalities. Parents who insist on their children contributing to the needs of the family routine according to their ages, teacher who are not just coaches but partners on the journey towards human companionship, by their knowledge and decent behaviour. Media too, but those which focus on the interests of all instead of just lobbying. A society which loses track of the obligation to maintain their culture, will lose this culture altogether.

Theorising based on
an out-dated image of man

In another main segment of his answer Freud yet again indulges in antiquated cliches. He refers to Einstein’s remark that both history and the current events in Europe were proof that the question of rigth versus migth was far from being solved. Sooner or later, one would always have to conclude that might makes right and not vice versa. But again, he breaks this down from the adequate political-legal perspective to a questionable bio-psychological level by suggesting to equate the right versus might dualism with that of right versus violence. This viewpoint does, however, blend out entirely more than one century of development away from the authoritarian-absolutistic coercive state towards the democratic state of the citizenry. Freud’s “line of proof” turns out to be as fallacious as his basic assumption: it starts with concepts which cannot be maintained in the light of more modern theories on the evolution of the human species and their psyche. This may not be Freud’s fault alone, but it certainly shows a limitation of his thought. He argues: Just as the question of violence is settled by the law of superior bodily strength in the hordes of higher animals – according to what we refer to now as the “pecking order” – the same was true for human societies. He invokes the primordial horde, in which all individuals obey the one with the biggest muscles. The whole cultural history of mankind did nothing to change any of that primordial principle, he asserts. Progress in civilisation would increase the technical capabilities but these were only utilised to develop more sophisticated weapon systems with the only result to replace muscle strength with the access to these superior technologies. A certain system of checks and balances may have enabled the suppressed masses to withstand the ruling warrior elite, forcing them to adhere to some control mechanisms of counter-weight and moderation. The weak stance of religion in our cultures was proof that ideals didn’t play any role in that, Freud argues. Religion could not extend the principle of love towards your fellow human being to include hostile states, and the same was true for the league of nations which lacked the might to enforce all those rights they postulate.

Freud’s answer narrows the vision

Freud’s answer is therefore disappointingly conventional, trivial in that it is informed by an un-questioned zeitgeist model and at the same time disappointingly circular in its reasoning. At the end, Freud’s “psychological explanation” on how it is that the masses always go to war happily boils down to : because it has always been like this. The fact that wars exist is meant to explain why Europeans have cheered their leaders who sent them into the murderous world war. Supposedly, wars (domestically and if possible also abroad) have always been fuelled by the very existence of rules and government so that all elites become belligerent inevitably. Strange as this line of thought appears, it is based on Freud’s rather grim axiom that laws have always been established by blunt violence amongst human beings. Human community and their culture are nothing but a by-product of power and violence being imposed on the weaker individuals. Were that the case, the whole human history would indeed be nothing but a contrast bath of dismal terror and counter-terror. Is it conceivable how under such circumstances of perpetual war things like agriculture, manufacturing, trade, education, architecture, road building, philosophy, mathematics, technology, welfare and the idea of democracy as a desirable state of affairs should ever have developed? All under the ever-swinging whip of sleepless tyrants? Sleepless, because they had to live in constant fear of the next coup d’etat?
  Such basic principles discard with a single stroke the possibility of states being founded as treaties of responsible citizens (Rousseau), as well as the separation of powers as the principle of functioning democracies (Montesquieu), rule of for and by the people (European enlightenment based on natural law and human rights), also Kant (the state is only conceivable as the rule of law inasfar as its laws are founded on natural law and human rights being guaranteed. As a state, the community has to live and fulfil the axioms of human dignity in-order to maintain itself.)
  Seen through Freud’s one-dimensional lens all efforts world-wide to establish institutions like the league of nations, or the UN, as instruments to grant equal rights to all states – according to the principle “one state, one vote” regardless of their power and size – are swept aside as pointless. This simple but fundamental principle is guaranteed to every individual citizen, everyone is entitled to them because he or she is human, no matter if influential or socially lower class. Rights and jurisdiction cannot differ from person to otherwise, unless they are corrupt.

The “primordial horde”
had to create culture

Nobody knows whether Freud’s «primordial horde» ever existed. As for every situation when we don’t know something but would like to know – we imagine things. Was the cradle of humanity a «primordial horde»? Did it function in the way Freud liked to imagine, according to his personal views on humanity? What we do know, however, is the following: human beings are, to put it in Adolf Portmann’s terms, a “social prematurity”. Without his caring social network, the newborn infant is doomed and will die. While a new-born lamb will get up on his feet in record time, immediately feed at the udder of what he had identified to be his mother, soon afterwards jump around with joy, all of this takes much longer in newborn human babies. In order to survive it needs care (just as animal babies) but also culture (this is the difference in the human species): warmth, clothing, hygiene, special preferably cooked meals. Much time will pass before it is able to walk, let alone talk. As a social prematurity it needs the social womb, as Portmann puts it, an atmosphere of calm and considerate care. All it needs comes from the outside. Therefore, giving birth to children, nurture them and bring them up, requires a minimum of culture. This is the root from which human civilisation developed, not from war but from the need of protection and care. A people or horde, for that matter, which was constantly fighting enemies both inside and outside, wouldn´t have time for elementary cultural achievements. The same fate waits for a people which can no longer figure out how to pass on their culture to their offspring. Helpfulness, curiosity, the ability to listen and learn how to contribute to common goals – all this is way beyond instincts in humans but cultural achievements which need to be learned from somebody. This somebody, the closest person, used to be naturally the mother, in a wider circle the family and finally the cultural community. All these role models don´t emphasise war as their main objective, but peacefulness. Humanity did not survive because some hordes won their wars – quite the opposite: so far humanity managed to survive despite all the wars. By relatedness. By companionship. By diligence, the readiness to make sacrifices, too, and specialisation in the work process. All this requires consent, understanding, preferably in peaceful circumstances. Without we would long ago have ceased to exist, or even more likely, would never have appeared on the stage but be eradicated as some error of evolution, corrected by nature.

We “learn” our character
including our ability to be peaceful

Therefore, it remains true, everything a human being does or knows had to be learned. He is neither a slave of his impulses nor his (mainly lost) instincts. As his main gift he got his cerebrum, in which, with time, his world view, his image of man, of friend and foe, will develop. This explains how education – education of soul and spirit, of the heart, the emotions, the sense of responsibility, education towards contribution within a meaningful context – is essential for his survival as an individual but also for the human community as such. If children see phantasy figures as their only role models, if they admire violence and coolness (never showing compassion and thereby losing it), then they and their environment miss out on the great gift that evolution handed to us on our way: social learning, learning in the co-operation of daily life, which require functioning family structures and a good school. This is not primarily a cognitive process, but an emotional one. We can learn war, but also peacefulness. The sooner we start with the peace work in small groups, the more stable the result will be. From neglect, however, only one thing will be born: chaos.  •

¹ Quotes from Einstein, Albert/Freud, Sigmund. Why war? Warbler Classics 2023