WAR IGCSE Global Perspectives

War is a reciprocated, armed conflict between two or more non-congruous entities, aimed at reorganising a subjectively designed, geo-politically desired result. An armed conflict which has been formally instituted by a declaration of war or the expiry of an ultimatum.

War is not necessarily considered to be the same as occupation, murder, or genocide because of the reciprocal nature of the violent struggle, and the organized nature of the units involved.

Civil war A civil war is a war between factions of citizens of one country, or else a dispute between two nations that were created out of one formerly-united country.

Ethnic Cleansing “Ethnic cleansing” is a literal translation of the Serbo-Croat ETNIČKO ČIŠĆENJE. It is used to describe warlike conduct against civilians who are targeted solely because of their nationality, race or religion, and made the objects of persecution and terrorization, mass murder, rape, torture or plunder.

Ethnocide This recently coined term, associated with a re- evaluation of the concept of ethnicity, refers to the total destruction of an ethnic group or its civilization. In a wider sense, the concept also applies to conflicts currently taking place on several continents, where the ultimate objective is not the complete elimination of ethnic groups, but the creation of monoethnic states, involving the expulsion of minority ethnic groups from a particular territory.

Genocide The systematic destruction of a human group by the extermination of all members of the group and destruction of their cultural heritage. Although this crime against humanity and contravention of human rights has been repeated several times throughout human history, only in 1948 was the term defined and brought into use in international law though the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, approved by the General Assembly of the UN.