War and Gender

Dates Covered: -
ISBN: 0521807166
HH Rating:

Our Take

Why do all societies arm only their young men? Were human civilizations less warlike in some distant, nomadic past? Are women born with different attitudes towards war, or indoctrinated? The neighborhood bookshelves are full of rubbishy feminist tracts on the matter. But those who are interested in more rigorous answers should turn to Joshua S. Goldstein's book, which produces a survey of literally hundreds of authors and studies on the subject. His conclusions (all societies through all of history are warlike, gender roles have a biological basis, but reinforce each other only through behavior, and all humans find it difficult to kill) are interesting in and of themselves. But the real value of this book is in the truly heroic scope of hypotheses and studies it covers. You may not agree with all of it, but you will go away far prepared to discuss war -- which turns out not to be quite dead in the 21st century after all.

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