Tired of war's bloodshed, tribe resorts to its old traditions [View all]

[Jim__]

From NBC News:

The Enga people of Papua New Guinea have long been used to a culture where small-scale wars were common, short-lived and ended in peaceful relations between clans. But in 1990, the younger generation ditched their bows and arrows for shotguns and semiautomatics, and the Enga experienced 20 years of runaway violence that claimed nearly 5,000 lives.

Now, research shows that clan elders have restored peace by using their traditional tribal court system. As a result of the state-sanctioned system, relatively few wars took place in 2010 and 2011, and the death toll per war has dropped dramatically. For example, from 2006 to 2010, 74 percent of wars ended after only one to five deaths, compared with 23 percent of wars from 1991 to 1995.

The results suggest complex societies don't always evolve from simpler societies that are much more violent, as some psychologists and anthropologists contend, researchers said.

"These simple face-to-face societies have very effective means of making peace," said study leader Polly Wiessner, an anthropologist at the University of Utah. "It's when societies coalesce and are driven into larger societies, when they become no longer face-to-face, that these peace mechanisms no longer work."

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