The Roots of Evil: The Origins of Genocide and Other Group ViolenceHow can human beings kill or brutalize multitudes of other human beings? Focusing particularly on genocide, but also on other forms of mass killing, torture, and war, Ervin Staub explores the psychological, cultural, and societal roots of group aggression. He sketches a conceptual framework for the many influences on one group's desire to harm another: cultural and social patterns predisposing to violence, historical circumstances resulting in persistent life problems, and needs and modes of adaptation arising from the interaction of these influences. Such notions as cultural stereotyping and devaluation, societal self-concept, moral exclusion, the need for connection, authority orientation, personal and group goals, "better world" ideologies, justification, and moral equilibrium find a place in his analysis, and he addresses the relevant evidence from the behavioral sciences. Within this conceptual framework, Staub then considers the behavior of perpetrators and bystanders in four historical situations: the Holocaust (his primary example), the genocide of Armenians in Turkey, the "autogenocide" in Cambodia, and the "disappearances" in Argentina. Throughout, he is concerned with the roots of caring and the psychology of heroic helpers. In his concluding chapters, he reflects on the socialization of children at home and in schools, and on the societal practices and processes that facilitate the development of caring persons, and of care and cooperation among groups. A wide audience will find The Roots of Evil thought-provoking reading. |
Contents
II | 3 |
III | 13 |
IV | 35 |
V | 51 |
VI | 67 |
VII | 79 |
VIII | 89 |
IX | 91 |
XIII | 151 |
XIV | 171 |
XV | 173 |
XVI | 188 |
XVII | 210 |
XVIII | 232 |
XIX | 247 |
XX | 249 |
Other editions - View all
The Roots of Evil: The Origins of Genocide and Other Group Violence Ervin Staub Limited preview - 1992 |
The Roots of Evil: The Origins of Genocide and Other Group Violence Ervin Staub Limited preview - 1989 |
The Roots of Evil: The Origins of Genocide and Other Group Violence Ervin Staub No preview available - 1921 |
Common terms and phrases
accept actions acts altruism American anti-Semitism anticommunism Argentina Armenians army Auschwitz authoritarian authority autogenocide become belief bystanders Cambodia camps characteristics communists conflict continuum of destruction create cultural preconditions devaluation difficult life conditions effects enemy especially euthanasia evil evolution example experience extermination feeling fulfill genocides and mass German goal theory goals harm Hilberg Hitler Holocaust hostility human Ibid ideals identity ideology important individual influence institutions intense internal Jewish Jews Khmer Rouge Le Chambon leaders mass killing military mistreatment motives murder nations Nazi doctors obedience organization Ottoman Ottoman Empire participation partly peasants perpetrators Phnom Penh Pol Pot policies political population Positive social behavior potential prisoners prosocial psychological relations responsibility result role rules self-concept Social Psychology society Staub subgroups suffering threat tion torture Turkey Turkish values victims Vietnam Vietnamese violence world view York Young Turks