Anger and Political Conflict Dynamics

Abstract

Emotions shape strategic conflict dynamics. However, the precise way in which strategic and emotional concerns interact to affect international cooperation and contention are not well understood. We propose a model of intergroup conflict under incomplete information in which agents are sensitive to psychological motivations in the form of anger. Agents become angry in response to worse-than-expected outcomes due to actions of other players. Aggression may be motivated by anger or by beliefs about preferences of members of the other group. Increasing one group’s sensitivity to anger makes that group more aggressive but reduces learning about preferences, which makes the other group less aggressive in response to bad outcomes. Thus, anger has competing effects on the likelihood of conflict. The results have important implications for understanding the complex role of anger in international relations and, more generally, the interplay between psychological and material aims in both fomenting and ameliorating conflict.

“Want of Zeal for It”: Pierre Bayle on Religious Radicalization

“…Yuna Blajer de la Garza explores the experience of political belonging, examining how citizens respond to attempts to make them feel "other" or "lesser than" in their communities (Blajer de la Garza 2023). 2 Carly Wayne and Keith Schnakenberg focus on the complex role of anger in politics and attend to the interplay between psychological and material aims in fomenting conflict (Schnakenberg and Wayne 2024). Nilay Saiya traces the phenomenon of religious terrorism to the increased regulation and suppression of religious belief and worship around the world (Saiya 2018).…”