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Origins and Age of Deterrence: Comparative Research on Old World and New World Systems

University of Colorado

Is deterrence a recent or ancient phenomenon? Long-range analysis from political science, supported by key advances in archaeology and epigraphy, now permit social scientists to measure and compare systematically the ancient origins of deterrence as a strategy of defense. The data reported in this article, based directly on primary sources, demonstrate that deterrence is at least thousands of years old and was invented independently in the Old World (Eastern Hemisphere) and the New World (Western Hemisphere), by"pleogenesis" and with neolithic technologies, as opposed to being only decades old and the product of Cold War nuclear weapons strategy. The millenarian age of deterrence implies that it is a deeply rooted behavioral pattern manifested since the earliest pre-state polity systems (chiefdoms), similar to government, warfare, and other fundamental behavioral patterns, and not one that is ephemeral or easily modified.

Cross-Cultural Research, Vol. 33, No. 3, 239-264 (1999)
DOI: 10.1177/106939719903300302


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