[extropy-chat] Human Security Report: Sharp decline in number of wars, deaths from war, genocide

[Neil H.]

There's a little press about the recently-published Human Security Report,
produced by the Human Security Centre at the University of British Columbia.
The report is available here:

http://www.humansecurityreport.info/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=28&Itemid=63

A few news/opinion pieces about it:
http://csmonitor.com/2005/1018/p08s02-comv.html
http://csmonitor.com/2005/1018/p01s01-wogi.html?s=u2
http://www.cbc.ca/storyview/MSN/world/national/2005/10/18/global-wars051018.html

A few highlights from the report:
* The number of armed conflicts around the world has declined by more than
40% since the early 1990s
* The average number of deaths per conflict fell 98% between 1950 and 2002
(from 38,000 deaths to 600 deaths)
* The number of genocides and politicides fell by 80% between 1988 and 2001
* There were 25 ongoing armed secessionist conflicts in 2004, the lowest
number since 1976.
* International terrorism is the only form of political violence which has
increased, although for the time being it kills only a tiny number of people
compared to wars.

It's an interesting read, and almost counter-intuitive in the context of
mainstream media. There's also some pretty interesting graphs.

-- Neil
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