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The world is a better place than you think
Key Excerpts from Article on Website of The Intelligent Optimist (Formerly Ode Magazine)
Posted: June 25th, 2013
http://www.theoptimist.com/stories/society/the-world-is-a-be...
Since the end of the Cold War, the number of armed conflicts in the world has fallen by 40 percent, according to Simon Fraser Universitys Human Security Report. And those conflicts have resulted in strikingly low numbers of fatalities. While that statement may sound odd ... the numbers are nonetheless telling. Since 1988, the number of wars killing more than 1,000 people a year has gone down by 78 percent. What explains this spectacular reduction in violence? In The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined, Harvard professor Steven Pinker cites a number of reasons. Nation-forming curbed peoples inclination to steal their neighbors land and reduced the threat of enemy invasion, allowing geopolitical stability to take root. The emergence of democracy curbed tyrannical government excesses. International trade turned countries into business partners, and peace became economically attractive. A general process of civilization brought about more and more self-control. Not every indicator shows a steadily falling line, but enough measurements do register a continuous drop in brutality. Its human to remember grisly periods like world wars and senseless outbreaks of savagery and forget how many people died violently in past centuries. Its a fact, though, that we experience considerably less violence today than our forebears did. Youre more likely to drown in a swimming pool than to die a brutal death. Thats a luxury no one knew in generations past. We do, indeed, live in historys most peaceful era.
Note: One of the most under-reported positive stories is that global violent crime has dropped dramatically in the last two decades. For FBI statistics showing violent crime in the U.S. dropped to 1/3 the rate of 1993, click here. For a treasure trove of great news articles which will inspire you to make a difference, click here.
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