An Overview of Enduring Rivalries and Enduring Rivalries Research

Abstract

Studying enduring rivalries narrows our focus from over one thousand rivalries of all varieties to only a small fraction of them, and an even smaller fraction of possible dyadic combinations. Nevertheless, much of the history of interna-tional war and peace over the past two centuries revolves around these pairs of states. In this chapter, we present our list of enduring rivalries and discuss some of their characteristics, extending some of the data description first presented in chapter 3. The last part of the chapter is dedicated to reviewing previous research on enduring rivalries and related subjects, with an eye to identifying any consensus in this limited body of research and assessing how that empirical evidence comports with the expectations of the punctuated equilibrium model.