Civil war, a violent conflict between a state and one or more organized nonstate actors in the states territory. A war between factions or regions of the same country. We define a civil war as a politically organized, largescale, sustained, physically violent conflict that. On the causes of civil war uci school of social sciences.
From longman dictionary of contemporary english civil war. Civil war definition and meaning collins english dictionary. The american civil war is an enormous topic with a rich set of primary source documents, images and narratives for students to explore. A civil war is a war which is fought between different groups of people who live in the. Of or relating to citizens and their interrelations with one another or with. The civil war 186165 was a social and military conflict between the united states of america inthe north and the confederate states of american in the south.
The parade also set the stage for midnineteenthcentury americans to begin to make meaning of the war, a process that consumes the nation to the present day. United states civil war civil war in the united states between the north and the south. Improve your vocabulary with english vocabulary in use from cambridge. History, when the meaning of freedom for americans and the meaning of union for the nation changed forever. Civil war definition is a war between opposing groups of citizens of the same country. Chapter 3 analyzes what makes a country more or less prone to civil war and considers both the risk that a war will ignite and the fac. When antislavery candidate abraham lincoln was elected president 1860, the southern states seceded. Civil war legal definition of civil war legal dictionary. Books about the civil war, including fiction and nonfiction selections. Civil war meaning in the cambridge english dictionary. Civil war slang vocabulary bank the military of today has a distinctive and sometimes confusing catalog of terms, unique and all its own. As the war clouds over india and pakistan begin to drift away, we can perhaps afford the luxury of turning our attention to less lifethreatening issues. Meaning, pronunciation, translations and examples log in dictionary. The film ends with the couple driven apart by civil war, world war and dictatorship.
More than 620,000 people died as a result of the conflict, 1. We emphasize the military outcomes, with little discussion of the relations of those military events to the social, economic, and political evolution of the nation. The american civil war was the largest and most destructive. It could also lay the basis for civil wars, tension between the us and european powers and future military intervention. Civil war exists when two or more opposing parties within a country resort to arms to settle a conflict or when a substantial portion of the population takes up arms against the legitimate government of a country. A good definition of civil war is an essential starting point for analysis. S meaning, pronunciation, translations and examples log in dictionary. I do not offer new theory that helps distinguish civil war from other forms of violence. Glossary of civil war terms american battlefield trust. A brief overview of the american civil war american.
The civil war soldier had a wide variety of names for the things that they used in. Four more slave states seceded and joined the confederacy. Also called war the violent opposition between two or more people by different interests. War definition, a conflict carried on by force of arms, as between nations or between parties within a nation. While the revolution of 17761783 created the united states, the civil war of 18611865 determined what kind of nation it would be.
According to international law, war, in principle, can only take place between sovereign political entities, that is, states. Civil war definition of civil war by the free dictionary. Meaning, pronunciation, picture, example sentences, grammar, usage notes, synonyms and more. Civil war definition of civil war by merriamwebster. Theories of rebellion should therefore focus on the explanation of this phenomenon. Iraq and afghanistan are textbook examples of large scale state terrorism by the bush government. Yet while civil war is central to many nations development, it has stood at the periphery of economics research and teaching. The civil war definition and meaning collins english. Civil war is war, and all wars are acts of terrorism because they use violence or threats of violence to impose political change on others. However, there are a number of other economic theory approaches to conflict which may help us to explain the causes of conflict. The study of the causes of civil war requires a definition of civil war. Todd groce, president and ceo of the georgia historical society, talks about the origins of the civil war and the motivations of both sides to fight. Officers still packed men together in closeorder columns or firing lines and withheld defensive fire until the enemy came within murderously short range.
Each democratic state fully accepts the need and necessity of civil society for a successful working of its democratic government. We werent married in church, but we had a civil ceremony in a registry office. The gar helped lead the movement in the 1890s to fly flags over schools, to pledge allegiance, and to sing the starspangled banner. The american civil war also known by other names was a civil war in the united states from 1861 to 1865, fought between the northern united states loyal to the union and the southern united states that had seceded from the union and formed the confederacy. It had become enmeshed in the international civil war, which started in earnest with the bolshevik revolution. Definition of civilwar noun in oxford advanced learners dictionary.
The definition of civil war informs the universe of potential cases that can be compared with respect to their causes, dynamics, consequences, termination, and any other concerns, such as postwar reconstruction and rehabilitation. As war clouds gather in the hellish heat of summer, and the kashmir tragedy continues to unfold, it is worth pondering the state of affairs we find ourselves in. This unit of study will focus on the events leading to war, the perspectives of thosethe who fought in or lived. Civil war and revolution scholars at harvard harvard university. In the very process of winning the civil war, the regime was inwardly corrupted. Before this decisive semantic shift, civil war and revolution were not interchangeable but they were not at the same time mutually exclusive. The conventional definition of civil war used by political scientists stipulates that there must be sustained military combat, primarily internal.
The american civil war was fought between the northern and southern states of the united states between 1861 and 1865. Civil wars are thus distinguished from interstate conflicts in which states fight other states, violent conflicts or riots not involving states sometimes labeled intercommunal conflicts, and state repression against. It arose out of disputes over slavery and states rights. He recognizes that he doesnt have a clear answer on whether it is better to have a single definition or coding rule for civil war or if it is more beneficial to have. Of, relating to, or befitting a citizen or citizens. Summarize the meaning of the third stanza of the northern version of the song, which begins, we will welcome to our numbers. The war resolved two fundamental questions left unresolved by the revolution. American civil war, fouryear war 186165 fought between the united states and 11 southern states that seceded to form the confederate states of america.
The meaning of the civil war today 78 ohio valley history his analysis sweeps past the traditional political events that litter the pages of most secession histories. As the civil war became the province of historians, so had other great wars, not least those of antiquity. After ten years of military dictatorship, the country now has a civil government. An understanding of the factors that make civil war more or less likely is a helpful input into the formulation of policy responses, which is the subject of part iii. Making sense of the american civil war 4 embrace eleven states, a vast new nation determined to make itself independent of the united states and to make its place in the world. Rorabaugh the meaning of the civil war 55 came the symbol of the righteous triumph of the union army in the war. One study, based on eyewitness reports, estimates that, on average, musket volleys in the civil war began at 127 yards range. The need to build and strengthen the civil society has come to be common theme with all contemporary thinkers, reformers and commentators. Following the election of president abraham lincoln in 1860, decades of tensions between the north and south, primarily over slavery and states rights, exploded.
Combat began on 12 april 1861 at fort sumter in charleston, 5. Patriotism was symbolized with flags but defined by the acres of blood spilled in the civil war. For almost thirty years the civil war dictionary has been the most complete, authoritative, and handy reference book on what has been called the second american revolution. American battlefield trust postpones public events scheduled through june 10. Helicopters are mainly used for military rather than civil use. First, rather than providing a definition of civil war, econometric. War is thus a means for resolving differences between units of the highest order of political organization. The civil war is the central event in americas historical consciousness. Civil war christopher blattman and edward miguel most nations have experienced an internal armed conflict since 1960. Abstract the two volumes of understanding civil war build upon the world banks prior research on conflict and violence, particularly on the work of paul collier and anke hoeffler, whose model of civil war onset has sparked much discussion on the relationship between conflict and development in what came to be known as the greed versus grievance debate. Civil war vocabulary and commonly used civil war terms.
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