Collective Psychology as a Correlate of Violence in the International Arena: The Influence of the Victim-Offender Cycle among Groups

Abstract

Relentless civil wars, long-standing interstate conflicts, and ongoing human rights abuses by sovereign powers have devastating effects on civilian populations. Theories seeking to describe and explain the etiology of violence in the international arena promulgate political, economic, and socio-cultural schools of thought while assuming away the specter of psychology. However, the field of psychology has rigorously documented a victim-offender cycle of violence, in which individual survivors of abuse are statistically more likely than members of control groups to subsequently perpetrate violence. I hypothesize that the scope of this phenomenon extends to groups as well as across generations. A quantitative analysis was performed using scales of conflict intensity, with measures aggregated cumulatively by generation. The findings reveal a correlation between exposure to political crises and subsequent manifestation of high-level political conflict. Thresholds of cumulative duration and intensity of exposure to violence are demonstrated to anticipate subsequent political violence. Moreover, both the intensity and cumulative duration of exposure to violence anticipate the subsequent severity of violence. These outcomes are shown to occur inter-generationally. This study supports the hypothesis that the victim-offender cycle is patterned and predictable among groups within the international arena. Exploring the influence of psychology in international relations is thus necessary for understanding and addressing vulnerabilities and fostering resilience in the prevention of violence in the international arena.