| Endemic Warfare |
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Endemic warfare is the state of continual, low-threshold War fare in a Tribal Warrior society. Endemic warfare is often highly ritualized to minimise fatalities, and plays an important function in assisting the formation of a social structure among the tribes' men by proving themselves in battle. Typical activities associated with endemic warfare are Cattle Raid s and Abduction of women. It is unclear why some tribal societies (such as the African tribes Nuer or Germanic Tribes , the Yuezhi or the Māori ) evolve traditions of endemic warfare while in others (such as the Kalahari Bushmen ), warfare is practically absent. Endemic warfare is not equivalent to "primitive warfare" in general, but is reserved for perpetual low-threshold conflicts. Primitive societies are well capable of escalation to all-out wars of annihilation between tribes. Thus, in the Amazonas , there was perpetual animosity between the neighboring tribes of the Jivaro . A fundamental difference between wars enacted within the same tribe and against neighboring tribes is such that "wars between different tribes are in principle wars of extermination" (Karsten, p. 277). SEE ALSO
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