LEC 5 - Group Processes Flashcards
What is ideology in a group?
Who are the leaders of a group?
Who are the leaders?
- Older than followers
- Extensive long-term involvement in the group
- Criminal record for previous violent crimes
- More likely to be men than females
A different view of what leadership entails; more typical of violent groups than the pyramid. A social network approach/model. Each dot represents a person, and the color represents different roles of the network. Mapping relationships between individuals with the lines. It gives a different perspective on who counts as a leader. Number zero ties in between the two groups and could possibly be the leader.
What is leadership in groups?
Leadership
- Power
- Status
- Ideological influence
- Norm-setting (they communicate their ideologies to the rest of the group and thereby hye are more influential in constructing what the norms are)
- Prototypicality (the idea that the leader does not get chosen randomly, they somehow embody the values that the group already hold, sometimes ideologically and sometimes more practically; example: in organized crime groups they see their groups as a business, that means that the leader often, who is being looked up to, is someone who is perceived as someone who is a successful businessman)
- Represent the group to the outside world
Ideological leaders were LESS central than Operational, on several measures of centrality
What was Glowacki en Jasko’s conclusion on violence by leaders?
- On the one hand we can expect that leaders can be less violent (perhaps more aware, more experience, etc. and because they are leaders they may have less of a need to prove themselves, therefore might be less likely to engage in violent acts), but on the other hand leaders may be more violent than others (they could have become a leader through their greater tendency of violence, they have got more practice, they know what it means to engage in a violent act)
Conclusion: leaders are less likely to engage in violence than followers (in political groups)
How do leaders encourage violence?
Increase justification for collective violence
- Communicating about violence to the rest of the group
Practical route
- Directly plan/encourage violent attacks, increase the general effectiveness of the group
What was the research and conclusion of heger 2012 in relation to degree of organisation?
Conclusion: Hierarchically organized groups are more effective
Supposed mechanisms
- Functional differentiation
- Accountability
- Clear command structure
- Essentially: professionalism
Heger et al. (2012)
- Study context: ETA (Basque country)
- Timeframe: 1970-2010
- Independent variable: Degree of hierarchical organization of ETA (over time) = Leadership
- Outcome variable: Lethality (N lethal victims) in N=19.000 attacks
Q: Does change in organizational hierarchy predict change in lethality of attacks?
A: Yes, in the periods when the group was more hierarchically organized, the attacks they conducted were more lethal
What is the relation of decapitation to rate of collective violence?
When leaders are removed, we see reductions in goal-directed violence → there is evidence that violence against civilians continues
Powerful leaders ‘channel’ the violence of the group to support their goals → but… we can also look at criminal groups
Study context
- Afghanistan-Pakistan conflict
- Israel-Palestine conflict
Independent variable: ‘Decapitation’ strikes against known leaders (N=150 ‘successful)
Outcome variable: violent attacks committed by terrorist groups (N=1000)
- Differentiating Civilian targets and Military targets
How effective is leader removal in criminal groups?
Conclusion: When it comes to criminal groups, leadership removal is not very effective in reducing violence long-term
- The market/demand for product remains - so the group will continue to exist
- Leadership removal also increases violence through turf wars
Study context: Drug violence in Mexico
Years: 2006-2012
Independent variable: N=63 leadership removals
Outcome variable: Deaths registered as associated with ‘criminal rivalry’ per month/per state
What is the impact of leaders on violence?
Conclusions
Impact of leaders on violence
- Indirect more than direct
- We must consider things like:
- The type of group
- Long-term vs short-term violence
- Goal-directed vs. everyday violence
- Removing the leader does not necessarily mean the group will become less violent
What is the Mumford 2008 study?
Ideology and Leadership separated Example: Mumford et al. (2008)
- Study 52 real historical groups → “retrospective”
- Code their features and apply discriminant analysis (maximum distinction between groups)
- Discover what makes violent ideological groups unique
- NB: Separate ideology from beliefs about violence (so that they can be studied separately)
- Aspects considered
- Individual level (leader)
- Group-level
- Organizational
- Environmental
- Results regarding violence
- Violent groups are characterized by: ‘oppositional bonding’ (feature of violent groups but not necessarily violent ideological groups)
- Differentiates violent groups (ld and non-ld) from non-violent
- Disparaging other groups is associated with violence, not necessarily with ideology
- Unique features of violent ideological groups, these differentiate them from all the other types
- Violent ideological groups arise in times of social conflict and disruption
- “Ideological righteousness” (we are convinced that our ideology is right)
- “Ideological indoctrination” (a low tolerance for other views, there is no space for different opinions within the group)
Mumford et al. (2008) - conclusion
- ideological groups: violent vs. non-violent
- The ideologies of violent groups have different features than the ideologies of non-violent groups
- Violent groups’ ideology more focused on “being right” + no space for disagreement
- All violent groups (vs non-violent) can be differentiated by their tendency to “disparage others”
- Remember: weakening moral constraints
