Nor are genocides and mass killings ever “rational” expressions of self-interest. The three genocides, at least, were highly destructive to the perpetrators. The fabric of society was impaired, many people essential to its functioning were killed, and desperately needed resources were used in the service of killing.c
a On October 12, 1987, NBC news presented a program on the killing of children in our modern age. According to this program, “Once children just died in the crossfire, now they are targets.” While always among victims of genocide, in the last twenty years children have increasingly become direct targets, killed in order to terrorize communities into political passivity.
b Part of the overall conception I present and many of the specific concepts, ideas, and considerations also apply to individual violence within groups. One major difference is that the cultural and psychological influences that arise from the differentiation between “us” and “them,” ingroup and outgroup, need not be involved in individual violence. Another is that personal (rather than societal) characteristics and circumstances (or the characteristics of and conditions in families) become of primary importance.
c The frequently self-destructive nature of genocides makes it unlikely that its function is to reduce population surplus, as one author has suggested.14 Certainly genocide does not seem to do this in an effective manner and does not appear to gain evolutionary advantage for the perpetrators.
2 The origins of genocide and mass killing: core concepts
I believe that tragically human beings have the capacity to come to experience killing other people as nothing extraordinary. Some perpetrators may feel sick and disgusted when killing large numbers of people, as they might feel in slaughtering animals, but even they will proceed to kill for a “good” reason, for a “higher” cause. How do they come to this? In essence, difficult life conditions and certain cultural characteristics may generate psychological processes and motives that lead a group to turn against another group. The perpetrators change, as individuals and as a group, as they progress along a continuum of destruction that ends in genocide. The behavior of bystanders can inhibit or facilitate this evolution.a
A conception of the origins of genocide and mass killing
Difficult life conditions
Human beings often face hard times as individuals or as members of a group. Sometimes a whole society or substantial and potentially influential segments of society face serious problems that have a powerful impact and result in powerful motivations.
Economic conditions at the extreme can result in starvation or threat to life. Less extreme economic problems can result in prolonged deprivation, deterioration of material well-being, or at least the frustration of expectations for improved well-being. Hostility and violence threaten and endanger life, whether political violence between internal groups or war with an external enemy. Political violence threatens the security even of people who are uninvolved. Widespread criminal violence also threatens life and security. War threatens the life of at least some individuals and affects many aspects of the life of a society. Rapid changes in culture and society – for example, rapid technological change and the attendant changes in work and social customs – also have the psychological impact of difficult life conditions. They overturn set patterns of life and lead to disorganization.
The meaning assigned to life problems, the intensity of their impact, and the way groups of people try to deal with them are greatly affected by the characteristics of cultures and social organizations. By themselves, difficult life conditions will not lead to genocide. They carry the potential, the motive force; culture and social organization determine whether the potential is realized by giving rise to devaluation and hostility toward a subgroup (or a nation; see Chapter 16).
Difficulties of life vary in nature, magnitude, persistence, and the accompanying disorganization and chaos in society. As a result, the impact also varies: the threat may be to life, to security, to well-being, to self-concept, or to world view. In all four cases I discuss, political violence, civil war, or external war was involved. Political violence may create a new political system that changes traditional ways of life and values; this has the impact of difficult life conditions. The new system can further cultural and social characteristics that contribute to genocide. In all four cases I will examine, changes in political systems preceded genocides and mass killings by less than a decade.
One important cultural characteristic is the rigidity or the adaptability of a society. Monolithic societies, with a limited set of acceptable values and ways of life, may be more disturbed by change. For example, the disruptive changes in technology, ways of life, and values under the shah probably contributed to the intensity of Islamic fundamentalism in Iran. Rigidity and flexibility partly depend on societal self-concept, the way a group and its members define themselves. Greater rigidity makes the difficulties of life more stressful.
Psychological consequences: needs and goals
Difficult life conditions give rise to powerful needs and goals demanding satisfaction. People need to cope with the psychological effects of difficult life conditions, the more so when they cannot change the conditions or alleviate the physical effects. Hard times make people feel threatened and frustrated.b Threats to the physical self are important, but so are threats to the psychological self. All human beings strive for a coherent and positive self-concept, a self-definition that provides continuity and guides one’s life. Difficult conditions threaten the self-concept as people cannot care for themselves and their families or control the circumstances of their lives.
Powerful self-protective motives then arise: the motive to defend the physical self (one’s life and safety) and the motive to defend the psychological self (one’s self-concept, values, and ways of life). There is a need both to protect self-esteem and to protect values and traditions. There is also a need to elevate a diminished self.
Disruption in customary ways of life, the resulting chaos, and changing mores can profoundly threaten people’s assumptions about the world and their comprehension of reality. Because understanding the world is essential, people will be powerfully motivated to seek
