title: Avoid recursive merge in Git
body: <p>I have a git repository with two branches: <code>master</code> and <code>live</code>. I work on <code>master</code>. Once I deem my changes ready for production, I merge them into <code>live</code>, which is checked out in the production system. I work on the project alone.</p>
  
  <p>With this setup, <code>live</code> always used to simply be a few commits behind <code>master</code>. So when I did a <code>git merge master</code> on <code>live</code>, the merge would be performed via <code>fast-forward</code>.</p>
  
  <p>As of recently, doing <code>git merge master</code> while on <code>live</code> results in a merge performed by the <code>recursive</code> strategy. I don't know if the reason for this is that I once accidentally committed a change first on <code>live</code>, and only afterwards merged it onto <code>master</code>.</p>
  
  <p><code>git diff master live</code> yields no output, ie. the two branches have the same file contents.</p>
  
  <p>What can I do to get my git repository into a "clean" state so it again uses the <code>fast-forward</code> strategy by default?</p>