[secfirstmd]

Kind of an old story. Studied this year's ago in reference to terrorism. The concept of "ingroup love and outgroup hate" is a large part of terrorism radicalisation.

Also in many ways it's a big chunk of regular military training (though not as extreme) - from boot camp onwards it's "We hate platoon two, we hate battalion three, we hate non-infantry units etc and we are gonna beat them at XYZ."

I have often thought that when people give theories (many I agree with) on the reasons behind the long term drop in crime (better policing, abortion, removing lead paint from houses, change in availability of goods etc) one that they miss out is the change in social nature. My sense is that social connections are now weaker, with more individualism and less scope for in/out group love/hate thus less reason for group related violence - stabbing outside a bar, murder in retribution for attack on your ingroup etc.

[lifeisstillgood]

That's a fascinating thought. Perhaps a slightly more optimistic view is not we are all individuals, but we start to see more and more people as in our tribe?

Perhaps we are more starting to see ourselves as humans?

[secfirstmd]

Yes I also think this is a part of it. As the world becomes more internationalist and multi-cultural, it makes it harder to dehumanise please who we now have the chance to communicate with in an instant, read about, travel to their country etc

[theoh]

One of Hofstede's observations is that developed countries tend to be more individualistic, treating others as individuals rather than in-group or out-group. There are other correlated features on his individualism-collectivism dimension, such as the nature and purpose of education. The paper "Dimensionalizing Cultures" covers this in depth.

[lotsofmangos]

I don't think that tribalism is going away, but it is becoming less geographical. You used to be able to identify groups by location, but that is getting a lot more fractured by global communication networks.

This is also interesting from a defense perspective as it means that area-weapons get less effective when the people you are trying to attack are no longer conveniently located in one spot. Things like nukes, for instance, are completely ineffective if your target is scattered throughout another population. I suspect that one of the main outrages of war in the 21st century will be from saturating an area with close-quarter drones with instructions to target a section of a population, rather than the bombing of whole cities.

[rhizome]

(though not as extreme)

This reads as a non-sequitur to me. How is dehumanizing the enemy, which is an explicit aspect of military training, not a form of institutionalized outgroup hate?

[secfirstmd]

I think you misread my comment. That is exactly what it is. I meant not as extreme in comparison to terrorism where it's perfectly acceptable to kill civilians etc.

[rhizome]

It's just as extreme, and within the terms of the ethic being taught civilians are still fair game in military engagements. Even recent history has plenty of proof of this.