s, both cultural and military, within and between groups and nations that "are conducive to war."
An important part of this whole discussion is Brown's view of the role of human psychology as a factor in the whole calculus of interpersonal, intergroup and intragroup, and international relations. What that comes down to, as Brown makes clear, is the importance of the "emotional and cognitive states of mind of key decision makers" where the potential or actual conditions of war exist. This points in the direction of a view that what could be called the behavioral psychology of war informs nation-state behavior that is masked by what Brown refers to as "structural" reasons for war such as territorial ambition, response to attack, or protection of property (or culture). He cites Freud's psychoanalysis of civilization in terms of "the pleasure principle, mediated through the death instinct (suicidal impulses to eliminate all pain) and Eros (life-affirming impulses), leads to interpersonal and intergroup aggression; accordingly, for 'civilization' to prevail, this instinct, driven dynamic had to be repressed." In describing causes of war, or more exactly reasons that wars have been waged at various points in history, The Causes and Prevention of War finds certain analogues between the psychology of human/group aggression and the psychology of nation-state aggression.
The psychology of human/group aggression as an origin of international war does not originate with Brown, and he points out competing theories of the source of violence--alienation, frustration, response to threats of violence or humiliation, sociopathology, beliefs or perceptions about felt injustice. Such feelings and beliefs are more likely to be directed outward rather than inward. Thus by and large, violence is directed internationally and not within a society. Brown cites the double standard of the "global culture of violence," in which "people the world over feel...