War or Peace

The current illusion of peace, in twenty-first century Europe, has been dispelled. What was the nature of that illusion?
The illusion was of inevitable progress, towards peace, at least in modern Europe. There is no inevitable progress, in the human condition. New considerations have to be met, to facilitate peace. Peace does not come of its own accord, thru business as usual. Peace must be provided for, like any other purpose. A great many people have so dedicated their lives to the peaceful settlement of disputes, thru the establishment of inter-national law.
Thru-out history, it has been evident that wars are started by lawless autocrats. Stopping war has meant stopping dictatorship. There has to be a better, less ruinous way than thru defeating dictators wars, by playing their game, and sharing their degradation. The relationship of unrestrained power to war-mongering is clear enough. Yet, it has been challenged whether democracies prevent wars. On the face of it, they don't.
This issue reveals a further illusion, that there is a clear-cut distinction between countries which are dictatorships and countries which are democracies. It turns out that so-called democracies have serious defects, that could be remedied, to promote peace. Explaining some of these peace-promoting remedies will be the limited objective of this treatise.
I believe such democratic reforms are necessary, tho not sufficient, ways to peace. That is because the technical conditions for peace are necessary but not sufficient to bring about a change of heart in humanity. As one of the last survivors of world war one said, We must learn to love one another. To this end, we have the studies of Pitirim Sorokin, as well as his diagnosis of the human condition, in Social and Cultural Dynamics, and allied works.