Class notes
Intergroup Relations
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Summary of the Weblectures and articles. Everything is in English.
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Meeting 2Intergroup conflict: Instrumental or identity concerns?
Article 1 – Sherif (1956) – Superordinate Goals in the Reduction of Intergroup Conflict
A group of strangers brought together in some common activity acquires some kind
of organization. You need leaders, divide the duties and an esprit de corps (moral of the
group) is developed. This is exactly what the boys in the camp did.
Individuals assumed different responsibilities and duties were divided. One person proved
himself as more resourceful and skilful than the rest, and became the leader of the group. A
whole hierarchy was created with low and high positions. The boys overestimated the
performance of the most highly regarded members and underestimated the score of those
of low social standing.
How bring the two groups harmoniously together?
1. Pleasant social contacts between members for social events (watching movie), did NOT
work and still called each other by names etc.
2. Competition generates friction, working in a common endeavour (inspanning) should
promote harmony. Existence of a superordinate goal and they worked together
harmoniously. This did not immediately dispel hostility (niet direct vijandigheid verjaagd).
Gradually series of cooperative acts reduced friction and conflict, and were more friendly to
each other.
Social contact may only serve as occasions for intensifying conflict. Favourable information
about a disliked group may be ignored or reinterpreted to fit stereotyped notions about that
group. Leaders cannot act without regard for the prevailing temper in their own groups
(leiders kunnen niet handelen zonder rekening te houden met het temperament in hun
eigen groep).
Conclusion
Possibilities for achieving harmony are greatly enhanced when groups are brought together
to work together toward common ends. Then favourable information about the disliked
group is seen as w new light and leaders are in the position to take bolder steps towards
cooperation (dan zijn de leiders in staat om gedurfde stappen te zetten naar samenwerking).
Vijandigheid maakt plaats als groepen zich verenigen om overriding goals te bereiken, die
voor alle betrokkenen reëel en overtuigend zijn.
College slides
Represented an instrumental perspective; a key to this perspective on groups, is the
definition of groups in terms of mutual interdependence to reach a certain (often material)
groups goals. This does not mean that larger groups and social categories are not relevant
here, so e.g. a nation may also feel a sense of mutual interdependence; to reach certain
material goals, economy grow or defend economy.
importantly interdependence is key here!
A second important notion Sherif makes is that intergroup relations cannot be fully
understood by intragroup dynamics, which was especially by that time a new inside as most
of the theory by that time viewed the rise of intergroup conflict more of an intragroup
,(within the group) dynamic phenomenon (e.g. leaders that presented outgroups as enemies
to gain support) and Sherif was the first to study intergroup relation really at the intergroup
level. Meaning that these processes in the context of intergroup relations cannot be reduced
to dynamics within group.
Another important key concept within the theory by Sherif is the term functional relations
between groups. Meaning whether there is positive or negative interdependence between
groups. So, when there is negative interdependence; groups are negatively dependent on
each other for the goals they want to reach, they fight over certain things to reach their goal
leading to conflicts.
Whereas when is positive interdependence meaning that groups can only reach their goals
by work together, what you see is that cooperation between groups is the result.
Famous experiment that is attached to the theory by Sherif is the Robbers Cave Experiment.
Final phase of the study was brought together by means of creating a positive
interdependence, in this case they had to do certain tasks and which is not able to
accomplish by one group alone, so they really had to work together (remove a truck).
Another important point by Sherif is that contact in itself is not sufficient to improve inter-
group relations. This was an important notion because the main theory of improve
intergroup relations by the time was actually Contact Theory (in third meeting). Actually,
what Sherif showed was that contact also do harm to intergroup relations, it can make things
worse; when the functional relations are negative, bring groups into conflict only leads to
conflict (see pictures).
Evaluation (necessary vs. sufficient conditions for conflict to arise)
- It seems that intergroup conflict already emerged when the group were formed, before
introducing those instrumental goals; which is to some extent fully in line with the theory.
- Related question could be whether a common identity instead of common goals have
similar effects in reducing conflict?
- So this also coins the question whether material conflict of interest is really necessary for
intergroup harmony to develop?
Robert’s Cave experiment is the main experiment for Realistic Conflict Theory.
Minimal Group Paradigm (Tajfel)
This actually a starting point of the second important theory of intergroup relations, namely
Social Identity Theory; and the minimal group paradigm is the main theory for Social
Identity Theory.
Tajfel the inventor of the Social Identity Theory and he conducted (early 70’s) in the UK
certain experiments where participants were put into groups in the basis of an arbitrary
criterion, e.g. whether they preferred pictures, and they didn’t know whether they were
categorized in group A or group B on the basis of this criterion.
And then, participants divided small amounts of money between anonymous members of
their own group and the other group. And importantly there was no direct way to allocate
, money to yourself. And they allocation of money were made of so called Tajfel matrix, select
a certain division of a small amount of money between an anonymous member of the
ingroup and an anonymous member of the outgroup.
Results What they see is that people favoured their ingroup, although group membership
was anonymous, it was relatively meaningless, you didn’t know who was in your group or in
the outgroup and these minimal conditions already seemed enough to favouring your own
group in this paradigm.
Article 3 Ellemers & Haslam (2012) – Social identity theory
The reading in this course representing this perspective is the chapter by Ellemers & Haslam
(2012), which provides a kind of overview of the social identity perspective as it was initially
developed in the late 70’s by Tajfel and Turner.
Very key to the theory is the distinction between:
- Personal Identity (“I”; what makes you a unique person)
- Social Identity (“We”; what makes you more or less interchangeable member of a group
you belong to)
Social Identity
is defined as the part of the individual’s self-concept, which derives from his knowledge
of his membership of a social group (or groups) together with the emotional significance
attached to that membership.
Different components of social identity:
1. Self-categorization = Cognitive component, the knowledge that you belong to a certain
group (I am a member of this group).
2. Esteem = Affective or evaluative component, being happy or not so happy to be a member
of a certain group.
3. Commitment = Behavioural component, when things are going really badly with the group
do you stick with the group or leave the group.
The main motivational assumption within the Social Identity Theory is that people strive for
a positive social identity; just like people generally strive for positive personal identities, you
want to see yourself kind of positive light (self-enhancement motive), is a very universal and
strong motive which drives people’s behaviour and self-evaluations.
And this also occurs to the social self! So people want to belong to positive social
identities and this positively evaluated social groups, leading to positive social identities to
be precise, and this need for a positive social identity is served by being included in groups
that are positively different from other groups = positive intergroup distinctiveness (you
want to belong to groups that better than groups and clearly different than others).
So, this in terms serves basic human needs for meaning; it tells you who you are, what your
place in the social structure is. It serves needs for self-esteem; it provides you a positive
feeling about yourself through group membership. And it provides certainty; you know what
you and your group is about.
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