The world is entering its most fragile period for international consensus since the end of the Second World War. According to the Global Peace Index 2025 (GPI), global peacefulness has declined in 13 of the past 15 years. There are now more active conflicts than at any time since the Cold War. International aid is shrinking, geopolitical competition is rising, and global goodwill is fragmenting.
We call this period the Great Fragmentation: a world where trust – between countries, communities and institutions – is breaking down. Our mechanisms for cooperation are weakening at the very moment when collective challenges such as climate change, economic inequality, mass displacement and rapid technological disruption require unprecedented collaboration.
When these pressures converge, violence becomes more likely, whether in conflicts abroad or in violent incidents at home.
One of the GPI’s 23 indicators is the ease of access to small arms and light weapons. The proliferation is staggering: more than one billion firearms are in circulation globally, of which around 85 per cent are held by civilians. Access to weapons does not automatically lead to violence, but it heightens the potential for it. Where Positive Peace – the attitudes, structures and institutions that sustain peaceful societies – is strong, the risks are mitigated. Where it is weak, weapons become a flashpoint.
Highly peaceful countries such as Iceland, Portugal, Singapore and New Zealand feature low homicide rates, low terrorism impact and relatively tight access to firearms. But the relationship is not universal. Switzerland and Finland, for example, combine high levels of civilian firearm ownership with high peacefulness, because they also maintain strong governance, low corruption, rigorous training and robust licensing systems. Their foundations for peace counterbalance the risks that guns introduce.
This nuance is crucial.
Weapons amplify the environment in which they exist. In cohesive societies with strong institutions, risk is contained simply by the social cohesion of society. In fragmented societies, the same weapons can turn local tensions into mass-casualty events.
Across Ukraine, the Middle East, and parts of Africa, Asia and Latin America, peace agreements are becoming harder to achieve. Conflicts are increasingly complex, fragmented and shaped by transnational networks, including arms trafficking, cyber operations and the spread of extremist ideologies online. Traditional diplomacy is struggling to manage conflicts that no longer have clear fronts, clear actors or predictable trajectories.