Terrorism activates ethnocentrism to explain greater willingness to sacrifice civil liberties

Evidence from Germany

Bibliographic Data

ID6341883
AuthorsChristina Novak Hansen (0000-0001-7316-9593, ESCP Business School, corresponding author), P T Dinesen (0000-0003-0526-9087, University of Copenhagen)
Year2023
Volume11
Issue2
Pages402-409
Publication date2023-04-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenuePolitical Science Research and Methods (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2049-8470 • E-ISSN: 2049-8489
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/psrm.2022.5
OpenAlexW4221019060
LanguageEN
Citations received5
References cited15

Research from the United States has shown that the 9/11 terrorist attacks activated individuals’ ethnocentric predispositions to structure public opinion toward several political and social issues. Beyond this overall finding, several aspects of the activation hypothesis remain unexplored, including its geographical and substantive scope. Using the quasi-random timing of terrorist attacks during the collection of the 2016 GGSS, we demonstrate the terrorism-induced activation of ethnocentrism in Germany. Specifically, a cascade of terrorist attacks involving immigrants in the summer of 2016 activated ethnocentrism among native Germans to predict (lower) support for civil liberties relative to security concerns after its influence had been absent just a month before. Further, we show that the activation of ethnocentrism holds up in a series of robustness checks and is not explained by alternative factors, including other predispositions

Civil liberties · Economics · Ethnocentrism · Political science · Positive economics · Sacrifice · Terrorism · Theology · Culture, Economy, and Development Studies · Law · Philosophy · Psychology · Social and Intergroup Psychology · Social Psychology · Terrorism, Counterterrorism, and Political Violence

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