Communication-speed limits among decision-makers caused the July 1914 crisis to escalate into global war.

Evidence

In the summer of 1914, ‘the men in power lost their bearings in the hectic rush paced by flurries of telegrams, telephone conversations, memos, and press releases; hard-boiled politicians broke down and seasoned negotiators cracked under the pressure of tense confrontations and sleepless nights, agonizing over the probable disastrous consequence of their snap judgements and hasty actions.’ Newspapers fed popular anger, swift military mobilizations were set in motion, thus contributing to the frenzy of diplomatic activity that broke down simply because enough decisions could not be made fast enough in enough locations to bring the warlike stresses under collective control. Global war was the result. — David Harvey, The Condition of Postmodernity, 1764

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s prior interest in communication technology shaping culture (from Communication as Culture) — here a concrete case of media/communication speed driving political catastrophe, and a historical pendant to the noise/information-overload thread.
• SEED: Angle: ‘when information moves faster than decision can process’ — the 1914 crisis as the original real-time-information-panic, a useful parallel for modern algorithmic trading flash crashes and social-media-driven ‘cascading’ decisions.