VU University Amsterdam > Blaise Pascal Instituut > Girard Studiekring > COV&R 2007 > Abstracts Papers 

 

Peter Zvagulis

 

The Words that Kill: The Dynamics of Negative Reciprocity in Media and Collective Perception 

 

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PAPER

Devising a Set of Danger-Markers for an Early-Warning-System

 

"...the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire…" (James 3: 5-6).

 

 

Hate speech is a phenomenon that corrupts the individual and collective mind and contributes to accumulating of negative reciprocity in the collective perception. It polarizes the society and makes the peace advocates look as traitors. High-intensity hate speech is contagious. It is a spark that, disseminated by the media, has the potential to starting a wildfire of violence.

 

No matter which methods and techniques of conflict resolution are to be used in diffusing hate-speech-generated conflicts, the key to success remains a correct and timely diagnosis. Understanding the nature and dynamics of the problem allows for selection of adequate curative measures. This paper explores the perceptional aspect of collective communicative dynamics and the role of negative reciprocity in it. Although it is only one of the many layers of a hate-speech-generated conflict, I believe it is an important one because serious social conflict may not happen without fundamental change of collective opinion and true reconciliation can not be achieved without understanding the contagious mimetic forces contributing to this change. The paper reflects part of methodology used in my doctoral research also touches upon the applicability of mimetic interpretation to socio-psychological processes to European post-EU-enlargement context.

 

Cross-cultural reach

My original and main research interest was to develop a set of reliable criteria for analyzing the nature and intensity of hate speech in Latvia’s print media and possibly developing some recommendations of how to reduce its impact on public perception. I am delighted that this methodology is now being successfully used to that aim by a major Baltic research institution. I am even more trilled by the discovery that it may be applicable to contexts beyond the original intent of the research. Recently, about a month ago, at an ecumenical missiology conference in Papa, Hungary, from my discussions with colleagues involved in peacemaking, I realized how similar is the collective perceptional aspect of the problems experienced by the societies in Hungary, Romania, Slovakia and a and some other countries of the Old continent to those I was exploring in Latvia.

 

The enlargement of the European Union has created new geopolitical and economic realities. However the ethno-linguistic divisions are well alive and tend to becoming part of the new political discourse in many places across Europe. Looking at the new face of EU it seems that massive migration of the workforce to some countries adds to the number of already existing tensions. In other countries, with historically-formed large minorities, these minorities are often still perceived as ethnically belonging to the neighboring countries. EU membership seems to not have prevented new tensions nor alleviated existing resentments. Both situations provide a fertile ground for ideologies of exclusion of otherness. New socio-ethnic stereotyping tends to appear in some countries while new politicized content infiltrates old stereotypes in other countries. Regardless of what are the perceived causes of resentment, as soon as it becomes part of a public discourse, the result is hate speech.

 

It appears that for a spirit of a long term peace and cooperation to prevail on the European continent, the dynamics of collective perception in the new EU context need to be properly understood and the needs of traditional and new group identities, and individual’s needs for belonging have to be adequately addressed.

 

 

Mimetic interpretation of the dynamics of hate-speech-triggered negative collective reciprocity

My research involved cross-cultural triangulation and empirical testing of some of the assumptions. In this paper I look, from the perspective of mimetic theory, at the collective perceptional dynamics involved in hate speech. I also apply Huntington’s civilizational identifications as descriptors for group prejudice. To address the socio-psychological aspects of collective perceptional mechanics, I am also using Roger Mucchielli’s classification of propaganda techniques (Mucchielli 1972). I define hate speech as perceptional form of violence (PV). I claim that if people within one society see each other in Huntingtonian terms and if there is a presence of collective perceptional processes capable of triggering the Scapegoat Mechanism, - then there is a substantial potential for trouble and serious reason for concern.

 

Hate speech in the linguistically divided media of Latvia has been a matter of concern of international organizations and the government of the country for a number of years (Sulmane and Kruks 2006; Fridrihsone 2000; Parlamentarais diskurss 2007). To develop a reliable methodology I had to find cross-culturally applicable common denominators. I choose three case studies where conflicts within the society have encouraged extremist leadership to manipulate the collective perception and thus have led to mass violence. By comparing the methods of Nazi propaganda, and the propaganda in former Yugoslavia and pre-genocide Rwanda, I identified common denominators and have developed a set of danger-markers (Early Warning Markers: EWM) and developed a concept for an early-warning system (Combined Cumulative Indexation: CCI) which would allow to measuring potentially dangerous processes in the collective perception at early stages. From there CCI scale of measuring has been developed. In this paper I am discussing the concept itself. By analyzing the workings of Goebbels’ theory and methodology on the collective perception from the point of view of mimetic theory, and by categorizing prejudices along the lines of Huntington’s civilizational identifications, I came to several definitions describing its mechanics and dynamics.

 

The paradigm of perceptional violence

As a paradigm hate speech consists of several layers representing its aspects of natural phenomenon and of socio-psychological construct. As a natural phenomenon it is based on instinctive emotional response to seemingly threatening social conditions. As a socio-psychological construct it becomes a key tool for introducing new content into existing stereotyped perceptional model and thus serves to induce fundamental opinion change. From the point of view of the mimetic theory hate-speech is a non-physical form of violence, which causes accumulation of violence in community. I define it as perceptional form of violence, consisting of its purely perceptional part and embodied (e.g. spoken, written, acted) part.                  

                                                 

Perceptional violence (PV), in its individual manifestation, can be described as negative emotional reaction and as hateful thinking - on its purely perceptional level. As soon as it is embodied as spoken and written word, or acted out as visual or other sensory communication – it acquires social characteristics. It works both on the Object (social environment) and on the Subject or agent (individual) him/herself. It creates new emotions in the social environment and in the individual. The latter experiences double the emotional effect: from his/her own action, and from reactions of the others. The perceptional part of the paradigm is the bridging element between the emotional unconscious and conscious articulation of an idea. It contributes to emotional contagion and, because of the internal circularity of the process in the agent, provides channels of induction of new ideas through the unconscious. With embodiment it becomes the classical communicative transaction where message reaches the object and comes back as feedback to the agent, causing him/her to alter the subsequent portion of the message.

 

The internal circularity of the perceptional violence is sustained by two very powerful emotions: fear and anger. There can be a variety of starting points leading to them. It can be desire and envy or a direct threat and power-challenging situation. Even a positive challenge that cannot be resolved in a satisfactory manner, results in frustration. Frustration threatens agent’s social identity and thus generates fear and anger.

 

Negative emotional resonance (NER)

From the perspective of mimetic theory, because of our organic and social nature as beings, we are all bound to imitate others even if we disaprove of them. It is the basic mechanism which enables our learning and cognitive capabilities. The basic mimetic transaction resulting in frustration is the mimetic desire, represented by the triangle in the scheme belove. „A” here is the Subject or agent; „C” is the Object that the Model „B” posesses or has just acquired. „A” desires „C” not because he/she really needs it but because „B” has it.

The harder the desire is to be satisfied, or cannot be satisfied at all, the more it increases in intensity and leads the Subject to identify him/herself with the Model. It leads to frustration and to Object Disapearance Phenomenon, an  emotional obsession with rivalry. The Object becomes unimportant.

 

The negative mimesis has established a strong emotional relationship between “A” and “B” on the unconscious level. Continuous and intensifying frustration translates into perceptional violence (PV). According to mimetic theory, the fighting rivals become the monstrous doubles. For the purpose of this research I call this negative mimetic relationship – Negative Emotional Resonance (NER: it covers many aspects of the negative mimesis, but not all of them).

NER causes polarization - the “if you are not with us, then you are against us” attitude. “A” and “B” have entered a rivaling relationship; their perception of the world has narrowed to a tunnel-like “A – B” axis. They are unable to see the situation from a third perspective C. Any information coming from the position C is interpreted only as being more on the “A” or “B” side. A technique breaking this vicious circle perhaps could be developed from Glen Stassen’s triade approach (Stassen and Gushee 2003, 172).

 

It does not matter which initial situation causes the NER between “A” and “B”, the result is frustration which translates into fear and anger. If the axis “A – B” is sustained as dominant theme for a longer period of time the two generated emotions: fear F and anger “A” produce the purely perceptional part of PV – hate H.

The formula of the perceptional part of PV therefore is F + A = H. The embodied part E of PV ensures the internal circularity of the proces e.g. continued replication of the same process. This means that the full cycle is F + A = H +E = H2 (F2+A2). This process is a low-intensity hate-speech process. If this process is suplemented by wider dissimenation D of the hate message through mass media, then the replication process becomes an accumulating multiplication that could be described as F + A = H +E = H2 (F2+A2)+ D = H32.

 

The frustration generating multiple H3 in the comunity, increases the social tension but still can be managed if the D is sporadic, the cause of frustration is removed, and the PV process does not last too long and does not reach collective circularity. However the situation gets much more complicated if D is continuous and takes a consistent form of hate propaganda and manipulation of collective perception by an extremist elite.

 

Then the community gallops towards a no-return point: to collective circularity of PV. Under this scenario the PV soon infiltrates and corrupts the power structures. The normal political rules no longer apply; political shortcuts appear instead of the regulated political processes. Power structures break down and massive physical violenace errupts. The process in a short version can be described as H32 + P = H4x  or as F + A = H +E = H2 (F2+A2)+ D = H32 + P = H4x in its full version. Because NER  works both on individual and on social level the increasingly accelerating multiplication happens simultaneously between the individual members of the society and between groups. The rapid exponential multiplication of H4x in some ways seems reminiscent of the chain reaction of nuclear fission.

Circularity of perceptional violence and the Scapegoat Mechanism

The process of accumulation of perceptional violence and its reaching of collective circularity may be described in the terms of classical mimetic theory as the Scapegoat Mechanism. The circularity may be defined as a self-sustaining process between the perceptional and embodied components of PV. This definition applies both to internal and external circularity.

 

When the frequency and intensity of NER increases to an elevated level, the tension caused by frustrations becomes unbearable and threatens the very social fabric of the society. The normal social communication increasingly is replaced by NER. With the society in crisis, the identity of individuals as members of that society becomes less and less secure. They start looking for opportunities providing them with new identity. Joining any group that has energy and purpose promises this new identity. The easiest cause is a group defense against common enemy. The accumulated perceptional violence, reaching a critical mass, enters into circularity and triggers the Scapegoat Mechanism. The Scapegoat Mechanism is the instinctive defensive social reaction of the group projecting violence outwards from the group.

 

When the the multiplication and intensification of NER processes increase the level of collective frustration, NER becomes the dominant theme of collective perception. Search for channeling the PV outwards beggins. If the accumulation of collective PV is allowed to continue, it finally reaches circularity and disrupts the pre-PV collective identity. From the point of view of collective perception processes this is the crisis situation. It is a no-return point: the collective PV has become circular. The search for chanelling the collective PV outwards have finalized. The imagined enemy or the Scapegoat is identified. The society unites against the Scapegoat  which is perceived as the cause of all problems and collective discomfort. Usually this is the stage where, in extreme cases,  physical mass violence is present.

 

The common cause gives the society a new identity, defined against the Scapegoat (the Other). This alleviates the tension inside the group because there is only one dominant NER: the one between the group and the Scapegoat. Inside the group there is unity and unanimity. It lasts for a while and then the initial collective NER process starts again. This application of the classical Mimetic theory to collective PV processes gives us an opportunity to understand the mechanics behind the socio-psychological phenomena described by Roger Mucchieli.  

 

The problem with the Scapegoat Mechanism is that it does not remove the cause of the collective frustration, and that this way of alleviating collective tension and suffering triggers violent collective instincts that tend too easely become a form of mental adiction. The danger of this process lays mainly in three of its aspects all relating to its capability to affect the collective and individual unconsious:

 

1.     experienced circularity of PV establishes a violent pattern of social regulation,

2.     the new negative content injected into the old stereotypes is irreversible,

3.     the collective PV can be rechanneled against almost any target and therefore is subject to manipulation.

 

Situations inviting manipulation

In crisis situation, the manipulation of a collective PV by extremist elite may be intuitive or conscious. The difference with conscious manipulation is that it might start at an earlier stage of accumulation of collective PV and it may relay on what René Girard would call subversive knowledge. The top-down causation however should not be overstated because, for the NER to appear in the first place, there have to be some objective circumstances causing the accumulation of frustration. There have to be economic or other material conditions causing intensification of rivalry. Social psychologists would add that, for the risk of violence to increase in any group, there has to be a sufficient momentum of individuals, who are emotionally in motion and pre-disposed to violence.

 

In all three case studies, before the hate propaganda would emerge, there were two pre-conditions already in place:

 

  1. economic crisis leading to high unemployment rate among young men,
  2. resentment about past political events perceived as unfavorably affecting the well-being of the ethnic group (Mucchielli 1972, 74).

 

This situation leads to accumulation of violent emotions and potential development of disruptive violent processes in the society. In all three case studies it was accelerated by the loss of social identity by the unemployed. The society in crisis was engaged in a desperate collective search for scapegoat. It also was looking for a strong leader to guide them in this search which was expected to end with deliverance from the crisis, and give the society new identity through ethnic unity. 

 

The mechanics of manipulation of the collective PV

Manipulation works by inserting new political content into the old shell of traditional stereotypes. Because of the double character (perceptional and embodied) of PV and because its perceptional part works both on unconscious and conscious levels – this becomes the Trojan horse for infiltrating new content via the unconscious. This mechanism is the most powerful tool for inducing fundamental changes of collective perception (Mucchielli 1972, 19, 23).

 

Roger Mucchielli in his socio-psychological analysis of the mechanics of the political propaganda techniques emphasizes that the common denominator for all techniques is that they are aimed at infiltrating new content by bypassing the conscious cognitive process. The instinctive defense of the Self, according to Mucchielli, becomes the defining criterion in this process (Mucchielli 1972, 6). Since the defense does not allow direct conscious access to the content determining perception, the method par excellence of targeting the old content becomes the manipulation of the unconscious with engineered communication constructs, camouflaged under a familiar, emotion-generating irrational form. The mechanism of defense itself becomes the gate of infiltration. 

 

According to Mucchielli, the starting point of any perceptional technique has to be polarization, asking the audience to choose pro or contra. This helps to develop an ideological construct in an almost empty space, provided it is based on existing perceptional constructs and takes into account the context of the moment. Fear and prejudice are used to lower the unconscious and conscious defenses. The new content is presented against a “friendly background” that gives impression of a decision freely taken by the manipulated group and by individuals. According to Mucchielli, propaganda targets perception because it is the source of motivation (Mucchielli 1972, 23).

 

Manipulation of stereotypes

The Trojan horse used by hate propaganda to change the collective perception, in all three cases studies, was stereotype. Propaganda abused the double-character of the stereotype and infiltrated new content through the unconscious.

Once the elements of the new content disrupted the coherence of the old perception, the manipulators responded to the instinctive need of integration of information by offering a harmonizing ideology, designed for the new content. When this process was completed, the stereotype had a new homogeneous content. The old content was lost forever and could not be recovered even when the indoctrination ceased.

 

To infiltrate its new content, the hostile propaganda in the three case studies, described the enemy communities in terms very close to Huntington’s definition of groups belonging to different civilizations. The conflicting communities collectively perceived the conflict with their neighbors as a fault line conflict.

 

The lasting effect of the manipulation

Another particularity of the circularity of perceptional violence, observable in all three case studies, seems to be its lasting effect after the discontinuation of hate propaganda. It appears that its grip is so powerful that even the conscious and cynical organizers of such campaigns were influenced by their own manipulation techniques. Very few of the organizers have repented and only one of the hate propagandists has done so (BBC News 15 May 2000). From the descriptions of the three case studies it appears that the perception of the people who had participated in communal violence was altered so significantly that even afterwards they continued to see the events from the perspective of the hate ideology that reigned during the terror (Purvis 1993). This aspect of hate propaganda makes the dismantling of its after-effects and achieving genuine reconciliation a very difficult task.

 

The enduring effect of consistent hate propaganda appears to be due to sequence of its dynamics of infiltration. The new content, infiltrated in the unconscious, overwrites the old content of the stereotype. The circularity of the collective PV seems to imprint them also as a new scheme (Parkes 1963, 104 -119; Wrong 2001). The de-ideologization efforts, such as was the denazification program in Germany, mostly have limited results. Being educational by nature, they are intellectual in their content and aimed at the conscious part of perception. The intellectual constructs, going against the core beliefs anchored in the unconscious, tend to be rejected. Even if the person seems convinced on the rational level, when it comes to crisis situation – he/she will react emotionally and therefore act according to the unconscious core blueprint (Parkes 1963, 10).

 

The perceptional polarized blueprint can be filled with other polarizing hate content. Any harmonizing ideology might be accepted if it will be wrapped in an emotion-generating form. Theoretically, even if the affected person is removed from the ethnic or other situation where the coded core unconscious applies directly, he/she would be inclined to apply the same unconscious model to other situations by analogy. The lasting effect of propaganda on collective perception underlines the importance of timely and effective counter-measures, before the circularity of collective PV has been reached. This requires tools for an early detection of the dangerous phenomena.

 

Identifying EWM

Based on the three case studies, the core identifying markers of a process leading to the circularity of perceptional violence and non-physical embodied violence in the society are the presence in and dissemination by the media of:

 

  1. A polarizing hostile attitude (ideology at later stages), based on negative historically rooted stereotypes; dividing one society in they versus us.
  2. The old content of an existing stereotype replaced with a new content, linked to current political agenda.
  3. Core of code-words and their derivatives that can be used in hate propaganda of varied sophistication (at later stages a set of core code-words).
  4. Dehumanization propaganda technique.
  5. Demonization propaganda technique.
  6. Siege mentality propaganda technique.
  7. Accusation in mirror propaganda technique.
  8. Authorization of hate propaganda technique.
  9. Self-victimization propaganda technique.
  10. Conditioning by association propaganda technique.
  11. Rationalization of the irrational and emotional content propaganda technique.
  12. A glorious vision of nation’s future as a liberating mission which may only be achieved through violence.
  13. The face of the national hero identical with the face of an extremist leader and his friends.

 

The presence of these EWM may be identified by media monitoring. Content analysis in the light of the above criteria would allow to identify the markers, evaluate their frequency, and to measure their intensity. The impact of the disseminated hate message on collective perception may be measured by using derivatives from the set of markers above, enhanced by Huntington’s criteria of exclusionist perception. This can be done through opinion polls. A set of additional markers, measuring the stability of the regulating political processes would allow to asses the combined impact of the two previous cumulative scores. This can be done through series of in-depth interviews with experts.

 

 

Conclusion

 

Hate-speech is one of the key elements inviting manipulation of the collective perception and potentially leading to destabilization of social order and to physical mass violence.

 

By analyzing the perceptional mechanics of the paradigm with the help of mimetic theory, and by applying Huntington’s civilizational identifications as descriptors of group prejudice it appears to be possible to detect dangerous phenomena and processes in the collective perception at relatively early stages. Cross-cultural triangulation makes it possible to discern the generic elements and to develop cross-culturally applicable EWM and methodology of measuring their cumulative intensity. Adding to this the analysis of socio-psychological dynamics of propaganda techniques, based on Mucchielli’s identifications, allows for developing additional EWM for detecting manipulative processes in the collective perception and estimating the combined impact of all EWM. For the measurements to be accurate a contextualization of this method, with involvement of the local experts, has to be done in each particular case. 

 

Timely detection of collective PV processes may provide peacemakers with a helpful tool in assessing the situation and devising adequate curative strategies and tactics. EWM has been developed by analyzing three case studies, which are clearly defined in terms of internationally recognized legal opinion. It makes the measurements a convincing part of the argumentation for peacemaking initiatives and facilitates the advocacy for preventive measures.

 

 

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