Selected Readings

Selected Reading

Psychology of Terrorism
Edited by Bruce Bongar, Lisa M. Brown, Larry E. Beutler, James N. Breckenridge & Philip G. Zimbardo


Selected Reading

Articles by and about Philip Zimbardo


Selected Reading
  • Fighting Words: How Arab and American Journalists can Break Through to Better Coverage [pdf]

    By Lisa Schnellinger and Mohannad Khatib
    Produced by the International Center for Journalists [2006]

    "Arabs are violent, religious extremists unwilling to consider any point of view that conflicts with their fundamentalist convictions."
    "Americans are hedonistic imperialists who have no values and insist on imposing their materialistic culture all over the world."

    No doubt many people in the United States and in Arab countries - including many of their leaders - believe these stereotypes. They help widen a dangerous schism between the two worlds that seems unbridgeable. But where do these stereotypes come from? How much responsibility do media in each region have for promoting them?

    In late 2005, two dozen Arab and American journalists gathered in Wisconsin to talk about how they cover each other's worlds, and how they can do it better. Over three days, they discussed such topics as using loaded words like "terrorist" and "jihad," showing provocative images, covering sensitive issues of religion, and handling pressure from governments and advertisers.

    This manual is an outgrowth of that conference. Written by an American and an Arab who participated in the discussions, it is designed to help journalists in both worlds think about how they can help minimize the misunderstandings between cultures that perpetuate conflict. The conference and the manual were made possible by the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Johnson Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, Thomas S. Ewing and the Saudi Committee for the Development of International Trade.

Selected Reading
  • Multiculturalism and Intergroup Relations: Psychological Implications for Democracy in Global Context

    By Fathali M. Moghaddam, PhD [2007]

    How can we best manage cultural diversity and avoid intergroup conflict and terrorism in this fast-changing world? In Multiculturalism and Intergroup Relations: Psychological Implications for Democracy in Global Context, author Fathali M. Moghaddam applies current psychological theories on intergroup relations to a variety of cultures and conflicts across the globe. While focusing primarily on the effect of globalization and how it facilitates cultural homogenization, Moghaddam examines what psychological research and theory can teach us about democracy and policies for managing diversity. Moghaddam skillfully crafts an argument for implementing contextualized democracy, that is, the use of local cultural symbols and meaning systems as a way of strengthening democratic trends and bringing into place a democratic state.

    The book also explores the large-scale migration of refugees fleeing international conflict as well as the effects of 9/11 and the violent conflicts that have erupted in its wake. In addition to the global perspective, the author considers local issues for societies, namely the United States, United Kingdom, France, and Germany, which are facing newly emerging racial, religious, and linguistic diversities within their own borders. This book will appeal to anyone interested in diversity, intergroup relations, and democracy in national and international contexts.

Selected Reading
  • Trapped in the War on Terror

    By Ian Lustick
    Professor, Bess W. Heyman Chair, University of Pennsylvania [2006]

    The first principle of terrorism is to understand that the weak win by exploiting the strength of the powerful. When 9/11 terrorists with box cutters hijacked American airliners, they transformed America's preeminent transportation system into a devastating weapon of attack. They also set a trap with the promise of revenge and security as the bait. The hijackers' biggest victory was to goad our government into taking the bait by unleashing the War on Terror. The worry, witch-hunt, and waste that have ensued are, according to Ian S. Lustick, destroying American confidence, undermining our economy, warping our political life, and isolating us from our international allies.

    The media have given constant attention to possible terrorist-initiated catastrophes and to the failures and weaknesses of the government's response. Trapped in the War on Terror, however, questions the very rationale for the War on Terror. By analyzing the virtual absence of evidence of a terrorist threat inside the United States along with the motives and strategic purposes of al-Qaeda, Lustick shows how disconnected the War on Terror is from the real but remote threat terrorism poses. He explains how the generalized War on Terror began as part of the justification for invading Iraq, but then took on a life of its own. A whirlwind of fear, failure, and recrimination, this "war" drags every interest group and politician, he argues, into selfish competition for its spoils.

    Facing the threat of nuclear incineration during the Cold War, America overcame panic about nonexistent communist sleeper cells poised to destroy the country, a panic fueled by the destructive hysteria of McCarthyism. Through careful analysis of the Soviet threat, the nation managed to sustain a productive national life and achieve victory, despite the terrifying daily possibility of catastrophe. This book is inspired by that success. It points the way forward, not toward victory in the War on Terror but to victory over it. The first and most difficult step toward that victory is to know the enemy. In large measure, as Trapped in the War on Terror shows, that means understanding how al-Qaeda is making us our own worst enemy.

Selected Reading
  • Unconquerable Nation: Knowing Our Enemy, Strengthening Ourselves

    By Brian Michael Jenkins [2006]

    Brian Michael Jenkins presents a clear-sighted and sobering analysis of where we are today in the struggle against terrorism. Jenkins, an internationally renowned authority on terrorism, distills the jihadists' operational code and suggests how they might assess their situation very differently from how we might do so. He distills the jihadists' operational code and outlines a ferociously pragmatic but principled approach that goes beyond attacking terrorist networks and operational capabilities to defeating their entire missionary enterprise by deterring recruitment and encouraging defections.

    Jenkins believes that homeland security should move beyond gates and guards and become the impetus for rebuilding America's decaying infrastructure. Americans need to adopt a realistic approach to risk and get a lot smarter about security. We need to build upon the nation's traditions of determination and self-reliance. Above all, we need to preserve our commitment to American values. Preserving these values is no mere matter of morality, he argues; it is a strategic imperative.

    Jenkins brings to his prose the driving rhythm, no-nonsense language, passion, and energy of a warrior, and he brings to his analysis the steady, informed perspective of a historian. Unconquerable Nation is a rallying cry from a man who has dedicated his life to defending America, who has been dismayed by the propagation of homegrown terror, yet who refuses to surrender his faith in what he believes are America’s finest, unconquerable values.

    How America deals with the terrorist threat is one of the major challenges of this century. Jenkins points the way forward.

Selected Reading
  • Why Not Kill Them All? The Logic and Prevention of Mass Political Murder

    By Daniel Chirot and Clark McCauley [2006]

    Genocide, mass murder, massacres. The words themselves are chilling, evoking images of the slaughter of countless innocents. What dark impulses lurk in our minds that even today can justify the eradication of thousands and even millions of unarmed human beings caught in the crossfire of political, cultural, or ethnic hostilities? This question lies at the heart of Why Not Kill Them All? Cowritten by historical sociologist Daniel Chirot and psychologist Clark McCauley, the book goes beyond exploring the motives that have provided the psychological underpinnings for genocidal killings. It offers a historical and comparative context that adds up to a causal taxonomy of genocidal events.

    Rather than suggesting that such horrors are the product of abnormal or criminal minds, the authors emphasize the normality of these horrors: killing by category has occurred on every continent and in every century. But genocide is much less common than the imbalance of power that makes it possible. Throughout history human societies have developed techniques aimed at limiting intergroup violence. Incorporating ethnographic, historical, and current political evidence, this book examines the mechanisms of constraint that human societies have employed to temper partisan passions and reduce carnage.

    Might an understanding of these mechanisms lead the world of the twenty-first century away from mass murder? Why Not Kill Them All? makes clear that there are no simple solutions, but that progress is most likely to be made through a combination of international pressures, new institutions and laws, and education. If genocide is to become a grisly relic of the past, we must fully comprehend the complex history of violent conflict and the struggle between hatred and tolerance that is waged in the human heart.

http://www.cipert.org/