Is war necessary? In Peace and War prominent anthropologists and other social scientists explore the cultural and social factors leading to war. They analyze the covert causes of war from a cross-cultural perspective: ideologies that dispose people to war; underlying patterns of social relationships that help institutionalize war; and the cultural systems of military establishments. Overt causes of war--environmental factors like the control of scarce resources, advantageous territories, and technologies, or promoting the wel-fare of people "like" oneself--are also...