The K-Factor

"The K-Factor" by Harry Harrison is a science fiction story from the early 1960s that looks at a science called "Societics," which tries to understand and control what makes people go to war. The main characters, Neel Sidorak and Adao Costa, try to figure out what their research really means as they see their society is close to fighting. Neel has to check out the planet Himmel because things are getting bad there, and a "k-factor" shows a war might happen. With Adao, he finds out things are more complicated than he thought, and his own coworkers are part of a sneaky plan. Neel has to decide if it's okay to use violence to make peace. He struggles with how to use Societics to stop war without killing anyone, which leads to a big ending where things don't go as planned. The book wonders about power, doing what's right, and what happens when you mess with how societies work.