ukraine soldierREUTERS/Gleb GaranichUkrainian soldiers stand guard at a position near the eastern Ukrainian city of Konstantinovka July 10, 2014.

With the world caught in a series of potential proxy wars from Ukraine to the Middle East and tensions ratcheting in East Asia and elsewhere, many have compared the present to 1914, when a trigger event in Sarajevo activated military alliances and led to a devastating global war.

Especially on the 100-year anniversary of the start of World War I, the similarities come to mind easily, but is history really repeating?

Richard Evans, the Regius Professor of History at Cambridge, identified key difference between now and then in a January article in the New Statesman. These include balancing tendencies of the multipolar world we live in now as well as the emergence of "institutions of collective security" like the United Nations, which makes a big difference even if they may seem ineffective.

Above all, he believes people have learned from history, as he said in an interview with the New Republic:


As for WWI not preventing WWII, many see the latter as an extension of the former, and anyway WWII had a greater effect. Writes Evans:


Harvard Professor Joseph S. Nye, Jr. similarly commented on changing attitudes toward war in a January article:


Another difference is that the ideology of war is much weaker nowadays. In 1914, war really was thought to be inevitable, a fatalistic view reinforced by the Social Darwinist argument that war should be welcomed, because it would "clear the air" like a good summer storm.

Notably, his comments focused on China, not Russia, which has emerged as a major threat to peace. But in an April column on Russia's Ukrainian intervention, Nye noted how measured the international community's reaction has been and how slow diplomatic and economic responses appear to be the best and most likely results.

These differences don't mean the world isn't in a scary place right now, but our ceaseless asking if this is 1914 again may our best hope for why it isn't.