With the second high-profile killing of a U.S. citizen by federal officers on the streets of Minneapolis in late January, several observers have claimed in the past two weeks that the United States is on the brink of a civil war. Claire Finkelstein, director of the University of Pennsylvania’s Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law, recently wrote that the situation in Minnesota mirrors the hypothetical beginning of a civil war under a simulation her center conducted two years ago, the outcome of which was the outbreak of armed conflict. Individuals with views as diverse as Elon Musk and Ray Dalio have bought into the notion, with Dalio characterizing the U.S. as a “tinderbox.” This reflects some commentators’ speculation last year that in the aftermath of the assassination of Charlie Kirk, the U.S. was “on the brink.”
These observations have some merit. Many of the conditions in the United States right now do fit the recipe that analysts describe as a “tinderbox” for civil war. In her best-selling book, “How Civil Wars Start,” political scientist Barbara Walter explains that the key predictor of civil wars is when a country is moving either toward or away from democracy. In this liminal zone, where some constitutional protections exist but others are still in formation or under challenge, societies become vulnerable to violence—especially when political violence rises on both the left and right of the spectrum, people begin relying on dissimilar media ecosystems, and national leaders stoke rather than tamp down scapegoating and polarization. It is easy to point to examples of this in the United States today.
And in some ways, the actions of the people in Minneapolis could be viewed as a dress rehearsal for civil war or even an acknowledgement that the militarization of their city already borders on a siege. Trump himself has used martial language to describe the occupation of Democratic-led cities by heavily armed federal agents—particularly from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, or ICE—and even military troops last year. As political scientist Oliver Kaplan argues, many of the strategies used by the residents of these cities in response—including face-to-face appeals to armed actors, early warning and “witnessing” tactics, and mobilizing home deliveries of food, essentials and school supplies to vulnerable members of the community—mirror those used by civilians in war zones to protect themselves from armed groups and human rights violations.