Predicting genocide and mass killing
The model I have outlined may help us identify societies likely to commit mass killing or genocide.f I shall briefly consider, as a demonstration, the potential of the United States for genocide.
U.S. culture includes a sense of superiority, even a belief in the right to dominate others (or at least to bring to them the “right” values and ways of life), and there is also an underlying insecurity about worth, moral goodness, and recently even about competence, a dangerous combination. The individualism of American culture is a double-edged sword.13 On the one hand, it makes people likely to speak out and avoid blindly following leaders. On the other hand, people standing alone may intensely feel the need for connection and support in difficult times. This makes them vulnerable to such movements as survivalist groups, the Ku Klux Klan, or extreme fundamentalism.
Devaluation and discrimination still exist in the United States but have been diminishing. There is some cultural awareness that negative images often are not representations of reality but expressions of prejudice. This is an important and difficult advance. Efforts to expose and eliminate stereotypes and negative images have to some degree been institutionalized in laws. In all this there has been continuous progress for decades, with only occasional backlash. But the joblessness and poverty of previously devalued groups, the result of many forces, provide a renewed basis for devaluation.
Respect for and obedience to authority are moderate, which creates less potential for mass killing. Society is pluralistic, both culturally and procedurally. Self-censorship by the media (see Chapter 17) makes it somewhat difficult for certain views to gain an audience and somewhat limits pluralism. Still, extremely varied groups have been accepted in the open forum of society. It seems progressively less likely that certain groups will have neither access to the pluralistic process nor the opportunity to define their rights. This is not a simple, linear process: the poor, homosexuals (especially in the era of AIDS), and Hispanics are emerging targets of devaluation. However, devaluation in the United States generates contrary processes; this demonstrates a relatively healthy pluralistic system.
Pluralism, freedom, and respect for the individual limit the potential influence of destructive ideologies within the United States. Valuing freedom and pluralism, as well as capitalism, and a past history of antagonism toward the Soviet Union created an intense anticommunism. This, in combination with an elevated self-concept and with the role of a great power, has led to an “ideology of antagonism” toward the Soviet Union. All these characteristics have also led to a disregard for the human rights and well-being of people in certain nations, which is related to a recurrent policy of support for violent, repressive, but capitalist, governments, coupled with hostility to governments inclined toward communism.
Finally, the United States has a history of aggressiveness, both on the individual level and between racial groups. Aggression against blacks and Indians arose from deep-seated devaluation, exclusion, and economic motives. Substantial inequalities between groups provide a potential for political and intergroup violence. An increase in economic problems could intensify feelings of injustice, and the resulting anger would increase the potential for violence.
In sum, despite some predisposing elements, the total cultural pattern for genocide or mass killings does not seem to exist in the United States. (Much more detailed and formal analyses are possible, using the conception I have outlined.) But for a full picture we must also consider the nature of life conditions and their contribution to a genocidal potential. The United States has experienced moderately difficult life conditions and undergone social upheaval in the last twenty-five years, with effects that have further contributed to social disorganization. There was the civil rights movement, a struggle for cultural and societal change, with sit-ins and demonstrations and resulting in police brutality and violence. There were the assassinations of leaders. There was the Vietnam War, with the loss of life, the protests, the emergence of a youth movement, profound political conflict, and after-effects such as posttraumatic stress in veterans, economic problems, and threats to and changes in societal self-concept, world views, and culture. There has been rapid technological change.
There have been profound changes in social mores and practices: the acceptability and frequency of divorce and abortion, changes in sexual practices, and widespread drug use. Even though some of these changes, like the movement to create equality for women, are inherently positive, they have contributed to the existence of one-parent families, which in turn have led to problems in the socialization of children.
Although there has been increased concern with social justice, there has been an increase in poverty, homelessness, and unemployment among the youth, especially black youth, with bleak prospects for the uneducated poor. Movements like the Moral Majority and white supremacist groups have come to serve the needs that have been created by all this upheaval, in turn contributing to divisions in society.
Pluralism, values and institutions that stress procedural justice, the positive social currents that I have described, and positive political currents such as improved relations with the Soviet Union make me confident that we will pass through this period without extreme destructiveness. But to decrease the violent potential in the United States we must strive to fulfill constructively the basic needs that have arisen from these upheavals and that are strengthened by the nature of our societal self-concept. This requires crosscutting relations (see Chapter 17) to create positive connections among subgroups of society, efforts to create a sense of community, and different segments of society working together to fulfill the basic needs and provide decent and dignified conditions of life for all citizens. It requires societal ideals that stress joining (rather than exclusion), an expansion of the boundaries of “us.”
My analysis also suggests ways to prevent group violence. In the short
