從當今中國的情況看，和平時間長了，大家已形成一種和平的慣性思維，以為和平會一直永遠的延續下去。但是從歷史學家更長遠的視野看，戰爭並不是會不會爆發，而是一個何時爆發的問題。天下大勢，分久必合，合久必分，這是恆古不變的規律。在威權主義政體下，每個王朝的經歷就像是一場場舞台劇一樣，演員各不相同，但劇情基本雷同：新王朝初創，大家享受一段和平而又蒸蒸日上的好日子，隨後官員們腐敗，不公正的行為逐步蔓延滋長，然後是貧富差距，兩極分化，官逼民反，最後是造反起義或外敵入侵導致王朝覆滅。每個王朝就像是每一個人一樣總要經歷生老病死的過程。另一方面由於王朝的生存是仰賴暴力機器維繫的，它的死亡通常要以暴力機器的被打敗即通過戰爭的方式加以實現。所以戰爭是一種周期性現象。在中國歷史上，戰爭動亂狀態大約占據30~40%的時間。

以上是從政治的角度看待戰爭，從技術條件上看千百年來王朝更替是通過刀把子裡面出政權實現的（冷兵器時代），到了上世紀三四十年代即毛澤東率領中共造反起義的時代，它變成了槍桿子裡面出政權，到了今天如果繼續爆發類似的內戰，它就有可能演變為原子彈裡面出政權。當然核戰爭將毀滅這個國家。由此可見，科技進步已經把我們大家推送到一個極其恐怖的臨界點：再也不能讓歷史上的戰爭狀態重演，這是一個關繫到大家生死存亡的大問題。

為此中國應該儘快走出威權政體。當今世界除威權政體以外還有民主政體。民主確實是一個好東西，民主政體在不少發達國家表現很出色尤其是一些北歐國家。但是在世界的其他國家則總體表現不佳。

一國民主制度運行的好壞要受到諸多因素影響。例如，國民素質的高低、法治是否完善、政治文化是否給力、政治領袖是否優秀、基於種族宗教的衝突是否嚴重、貧富差距兩極分化是否嚴重、經濟發展水平的高低等等。所以在民主政體下獲得善治同樣很不容易，並且具有高度不確定性。

另外，政體由威權向民主轉型的階段時常會經歷動盪混亂和暴力的過程。這方面典型的案例是法國，法蘭西民族算得上是世界上最優秀的民族之一。但是在它民主轉型的早期階段，一批一批的人包括前朝皇帝夫婦都被送上了斷頭台。這也是類似中國這樣的威權政府不敢貿然進行民主改革的原因。法國人花了一二百年時間才終於學會如何駕馭民主這匹性情暴烈的野馬。期間出現了多次威權主義復辟。衝突戰爭時有發生。按照塞繆爾亨廷頓的觀點，至今為止，全世界出現了三波民主化浪潮，在每一波民主化浪潮後，都會跟進一個退潮期。退潮期中，許多民主轉型國家出現了民主崩潰政局動盪和威權復辟的現象。

有一種說法認為，民主政體由於是通過選票而非槍彈來選擇國家領導，它可以避免一國內部的戰爭。這個觀點不符合經驗事實。民主制國家出現軍事政變，爆發內戰也是常有的事。連美國這樣的民主制超級學霸大家的榜樣，在被托克維爾大加讚揚以後的19世紀60年代照樣爆發了國內戰爭。更不用說其他國家呢。由此可見，民主政體在目前情況下，並不能確保一國內部永遠不會爆發戰爭。

以上是就國內戰爭而言。還有一類是國與國之間的戰爭。這類戰爭在當今世界也是時有發生，有時戰爭還會延續多年。鑑於當前東西方大國及其幫派體系之間在意識形態上的高度敵對性和利益結構上的高度敵對性，加之永遠不會改變的人性之戰狼本能，第三次世界大戰一定會爆發，而且不僅會爆發，在那以後，還會繼續爆發第四第五第六次的世界大戰。當然，如果你把技術條件加入考慮（即核武器的全面使用），則第三次世界大戰意味着人類的末日，此後的戰爭自然會消停。

由此可見說的難聽一點，我們大家現在正處於等待第三次世界大戰爆發，而又無所事事的等死狀態。很不幸，這就是我們人類當前所處的真實位置。

當然以閒着沒事幹的方式等死，總是不對的。於是一些聰明的科學家想到要讓一部分人類趕在核戰爭爆發前移民火星。但是這個想法在邏輯上仍有問題：只要人類在政治制度上沒有突破性進步，那幫移民火星的人類即便在那裡發展起來了，也會像地球上的戰狼一樣在那個地方發動世界大戰，把火星毀滅的。至於其他星球余類推。所以人類要想走得更遠，實現長期發展，政治制度的突破性進步是躲不過必須跨過的門檻。

行文至此我要引述一段我在另一篇文章中所寫的文字，以便再重申一下問題的嚴重性：

“本人阿剛嚴重不才，但是會模仿外星人的“筆跡”，給人類撰寫一篇墓志銘。具體如下：
人類墓志銘
我們來到這裡時，這裡已經成為一片核廢墟。除少量沒有靈魂的機器人還活着（其實它們正處於無電的休眠狀態），而所有有靈魂的活人都已死亡。我們沒有做過任何缺德的事：他們（自稱人類）不是被我們殺害的，而是自我毀滅。
事情是這樣的，他們人類拿到了一手好牌，卻因為這麼多好牌，而令自己粉身碎骨。這已經是我們遇見的第九顆行星了，情況都是一樣一樣的：他們人類在還沒有能力處理好相同地域內不同人群之間的關係以及在還沒有能力處理好不同地域人群之間關係的情況下，過早地擁抱了先進的科學技術。科學技術可以改善高級動物的生活條件和幸福水平，這是科技進步的原動力。但是科學技術本身是一把雙刃劍，只要稍一轉彎轉到軍事領域，如原子彈氫彈這樣的大規模殺傷性武器便水到渠成地生產出來了。在政治智慧（政治學理論）還處於非常落後的狀態下，在政治制度政治心智尚遠未發育成熟的情況下，大國之間會情不自禁瘋狂的捲入核軍備競賽並最終走向核毀滅。一旦進入這個軌道，大家會沿着路徑依賴完全失控地滑向災難。

人類想要發展文明，這本沒有錯。但是錯就錯在他們把發展文明的先後順序搞顛倒了。他們應該首先發展政治文明，待政治文明發展到相當先進的水平以後再來發展科技文明。但現在為時已晚，一切已皆成往事，這根本不是人類智慧所能認知的問題。所以我們尊敬的人類朋友們，一路走好，請安息吧！”

所以解決政治制度問題具有高度緊迫性，我們是在跟戰狼賽跑。你不能馬後炮，那等於放空炮，必須趕在核戰爭爆發前就解決這個問題。

那麼這個問題能不能快速予以解決？有什麼好辦法嗎？今天天色已晚，聊天就聊到這裡。我要使勁地好好休息一段時間啦，大家都洗洗睡吧。欲知後事如何，且聽下回分解。

Bringing the world out of the shadow of war as soon as possible and forever with institutional innovation (I) Zhu Gang

Looking at the situation in China today, we have been at peace for a long time, and we have formed a kind of peace inertia, thinking that peace will continue forever. But from the longer-term perspective of historians, war is not a question of whether it will break out, but a question of when it will break out. It is an unchanging law that the world will be divided for a long time and united for a long time. Under the authoritarian system of government, the experience of each dynasty is like a stage play, the actors are different, but the plot is basically the same: the creation of a new dynasty, everyone enjoys a period of peace and prosperity, and then the corruption of officials, the gradual spread of unjust behavior to grow, and then the gap between the rich and the poor, polarization, officials forced the people to rebel, and finally, the rebel uprising or invasion of foreign invaders leading to the collapse of the dynasty. Every dynasty is like every human being who has to go through the process of birth, old age, sickness and death. On the other hand, since the survival of a dynasty depends on the maintenance of a violent machine, its death is usually realized by the defeat of the violent machine, i.e., by means of war. So war is a cyclical phenomenon. In the history of China, the state of war and turmoil occupied about 30-40% of the time.

The above is the political perspective of war, from the technical conditions of the thousands of years of dynastic change is realized through the sword inside the power (cold weapon era), to the 1930s and 40s of the last century that is, Mao Zedong led the Chinese Communist Party rebel uprising era, it becomes the barrel of a gun inside the power, to the present day, if continue to break out in similar civil wars, it may evolve into the atomic bomb inside the power. Of course nuclear war will destroy this country. From this we can see that technological progress has pushed us all to an extremely terrifying tipping point: the state of war in history can no longer be allowed to recur, and this is a major issue that has a bearing on the survival of all of us.

For this reason, China should get out of the authoritarian regime as soon as possible. In today's world, apart from authoritarian regimes, there are also democracies. Democracy is indeed a good thing, and it has performed very well in many developed countries, especially in some northern European countries. However, in the rest of the world, it has generally performed poorly.

The functioning of democracy in a country is affected by many factors. For example, the quality of the people, the rule of law, the strength of the political culture, the excellence of the political leaders, the severity of conflicts based on ethnicity and religion, the seriousness of the polarization between the rich and the poor, the level of economic development, and so on. Therefore, good governance in a democracy is also difficult and highly uncertain.

In addition, the transition from authoritarianism to democracy is often characterized by turbulence, chaos and violence. A typical case in point is France, where the French nation is considered one of the best in the world. However, in the early stage of its democratic transition, a group of people, including the former emperor and his wife, were sent to the guillotine. This is also the reason why authoritarian governments like China dare not make democratic reforms hastily. It took the French a century or two to finally learn how to ride the wild horse of democracy. During that time there were many authoritarian restorations. There were wars of conflict. According to Samuel Huntington, there have been three waves of democratization around the world so far, and after each wave of democratization, an ebb period followed. The ebbing period has been characterized by the collapse of democracy, political instability and the restoration of authoritarianism in many countries in transition.

There is an argument that a democracy, because it chooses its national leaders by votes rather than by bullets, avoids internal wars within a country. This argument is not consistent with empirical facts. It is not uncommon for democracies to have military coups and outbreaks of civil war. Even the United States, which is a superb example of democracy for everyone, had a civil war in the 1860s, even after being praised by Tocqueville. Not to mention other countries. It is thus clear that democracies, under the present circumstances, do not ensure that wars will never break out within a country.

These are domestic wars. There is another category of wars between countries. Such wars also occur from time to time in today's world, and sometimes they last for many years. Given the current high level of ideological hostility and interest structure hostility between the great powers of the East and West and their gang systems, coupled with the never-changing human instinct of the wolf of war, World War III will surely break out, and not only will it break out, but it will continue to break out for a fourth, fifth, and sixth time after that. Of course, if you add the technical conditions into consideration (i.e., the full-scale use of nuclear weapons), then the third world war means the end of mankind, and wars thereafter will naturally subside.

It follows that, to put it bluntly, we are all now in a state of waiting for the outbreak of World War III while waiting to die with nothing to do. Unfortunately, this is the true position in which we human beings currently find ourselves.

Of course waiting to die with nothing to do is always wrong. So some clever scientists thought of having a portion of the human race immigrate to Mars in time for the outbreak of nuclear war. But this idea is still logically problematic: as long as human beings do not have a breakthrough progress in the political system, that group of immigrants to Mars, even if the development of human beings there, will also be like the war wolves on the Earth in that place to start a world war, the destruction of the planet Mars. As for other planets Yu analogous. Therefore, if human beings want to go farther and realize long-term development, the breakthrough progress of the political system is a threshold that must be crossed.

At this point I would like to quote a paragraph I wrote in another article in order to reiterate the seriousness of the issue:

“I, AGong, am seriously untalented, but I will imitate the “handwriting” of the aliens and write an epitaph for mankind. The details are as follows:

Epitaph for Humanity

When we arrived here, it was a nuclear wasteland. With the exception of a few soulless robots that are still alive (they are actually in a dormant state without power), all living people with souls are dead. We have done nothing unethical: they (the self-proclaimed humans) were not killed by us, but self-destructed.

The thing is, they humans were dealt a good hand, but they pulverized themselves because of so many good cards. This is the ninth planet we've met, and the situation is the same and the same: they humans embraced advanced science and technology too soon, before they were able to deal with the relationships between different groups of people within the same geographic area, as well as before they were able to deal with the relationships between groups of people in different geographic areas. Science and technology can improve the living conditions and happiness level of advanced animals, which is the driving force of scientific and technological progress. But science and technology itself is a double-edged sword. With a slight turn to the military field, weapons of mass destruction such as the atomic and hydrogen bombs are produced. In the political wisdom (political theory) is still in a very backward state, in the political system of the political mind is still far from mature, the great powers can not help but frantically involved in the nuclear arms race and ultimately to nuclear destruction. Once on this track, everyone will follow the path of dependence and slide completely out of control towards disaster.

Human beings want to develop civilization, which is not wrong. But the mistake is that they have reversed the order of development of civilization. They should have developed political civilization first, and then developed scientific and technological civilization after political civilization had reached a fairly advanced level. But now it is too late, and everything has already gone, and this is not a problem that human wisdom can recognize at all. So our honorable human friends, go well and rest in peace!”

That's why solving the problem of the political system has a high degree of urgency; we are racing against the war wolves. You can't be a horse's ass, that's the same as shooting blanks, you have to solve this problem before the outbreak of a nuclear war.

So can this problem be solved quickly? What's the best way? It's getting late today, so I'll stop here. I'm going to take a well-deserved break, so let's all go to bed. We'll see what happens next.