Daniel Little
Ethnic cleansing, Srebrenica, July 1995 Milan Obaidi is a prolific Danish social psychologist who has worked extensively on right-wing extremism. His scientific publications provide greater detail on his emerging views of the psychology of extremism. A useful document for the ongoing discussion of the mechanisms of right-wing extremism here is a well-documented 2020 summary of …
Continue reading "Racist extremism and inter-group violence"
Our current political scene presents an unresolved and important question: why have the ideologies of hate, fear, nationalism, antagonism, and violence had such appeal to a segment of young men across many countries in the past thirty years? How does it happen that many fairly typical twelve-year-old boys somehow become captivated by the extremist right-wing …
Continue reading "Social psychologists on the appeal of antagonism and hate"
March on Selma, 1965 Human beings have attitudes, behaviors, habits, stereotypes, and values. And somehow these mental attributes are developed or acquired in the course of normal human social life. But how, when, and with what results does this process work? And how persistent are a set of attitudes and values once established in the …
Continue reading "How are an individual’s political values formed?"
The United States is a multicultural democracy. This is simply an empirical fact; the country is a democracy (imperfect by many important measures); and it is multiracial, multi-ethnic, and multi-national. So what is involved in helping bring about a transition to an "inclusive" multicultural democracy -- a social and political order embodying fundamental equality across …
Continue reading "Group identities and inclusive multicultural democracy"
The United States has a long history of racism against African-Americans, at multiple levels. At the level of individuals, we have a history of negative attitudes, stereotypes, fears, and antagonisms that are built into the social consciousness of white men and women about African-Americans. Racist attitudes about "genetic inferiority", crime, and other negative stereotypes have …
Continue reading "New thinking about generational change about race"
Many countries are facing a resurgence of racism and ethnic hostility in the current political environment, catalyzed in complicated ways by the refugee crisis in Europe, the Brexit vote in the UK, and the rise of trumpism in the United States. Animosity against black and brown people, immigrants, and Muslims is rising in many countries, …
What is needed for a community of diverse people and groups to maintain its resilience in the face of hateful language, incidents, and provocations? This question is particularly important for universities, which commonly seek to create a climate of welcome and respect for the various groups of students who make them up, and which are …
Stephen Esquith has spent much of his career observing, teaching, and engaging in "conflict societies", and trying to develop an understanding of how best to move from high-violence to low-violence societies. In particular he has spent a great deal of time in Mali in west Africa. He has come to emphasize the importance of "political …
Continue reading "The role of political education in social progress"
Rawls believes that a just society must be a pluralistic society, and that means that it must be neutral across (reasonable) comprehensive conceptions of the good. Citizens must be enabled to pursue their own comprehensive conceptions without interference from the state. Does this imply that a comprehensive conception based on the idea of ethnic or …
Continue reading "Confronting race through Rawls’s political philosophy"
MLK, Rousseau, Rawls (Gemini) A prior post asked whether liberal political philosophy can be "anti-racist". Charles Mills addresses a related question in much more radical terms. He offers a fundamental critique of European/American liberal philosophy grounded in his view that the "social contract" tradition rests upon a comprehensive "racial contract" that embodies racial hierarchy and …
Continue reading "Racial assumptions in western political philosophy"
Understanding Society 