Institutional Aggression Between Groups

Institutional Aggression Between Groups

1. Genocide

   • Acts committed with intent to destroy in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.
     • Staub claims genocide is more likely if a less powerful group within is scapegoated for the social problems experienced by others.

2. AO2/3

   • Bystanders are important in preventing genocide.
     • Staub's model of genocide emphasises the importance of bystander intervention (eg by the UN) in preventing genocide.
       • Doing nothing allows the killing to continue unabated, and may even escalate it by signalling apathy or consent.

3. Dehumanisation

   • This can lead to the dehumanisation of the target group.
     • Minority group members (eg Jews in Nazi Germany) are seen as worthless animals and so are not worthy of moral consideration due to fellow humans.
       • This leads to intergroup violence and mass killings

4. AO2/3

   • Support for explanation: Historical evidence of dehumanisation to influence mass violence against specific groups in society.
     • The actions of the Nazis against Jews during the Holocaust, where Nazi propaganda referred to Jews as the 'Jewish disease'.
       • The Rwandan genocide in 1994, the minority Tutsi were referred to as cockroaches by the majority Hutu, and their murder referred to as 'the work'.
         • Both of these examples show how killing was made easier by the dehumanising of victims.
   • IDA: Real World Application. Insights into dehumanisation can explain hostility towards foreign refugees and asylum seekers.
     • Esses et al: Found that people in high social dominance orientation (SDO) have a tendency to dehumanise outgroup members - they believe refugees deserve our hostility.

5. Obedience to Authority

   • Milgram believed that the Holocaust was primarily the result of situational pressures that forced Nazi soldiers to obey their leaders regardless of any personal moral objections.

6. AO2/3

   • Mandel rejects Milgram's claims that obedience to authority was sufficient to explain the behaviour of Nazis toward Jews during the Holocaust.
     • He argues that Milgram's account ignores other and is not supported by real-life events.