Haslam, Nick. “The Many Roles of Dehumanization in Genocide.”

In this chapter in the edited volume Confronting Humanity at its Worst: Social Psychological Perspectives on Genocide, Nick Haslam tackles the relationship between dehumanization and perpetration.

It is commonly believed that dehumanization is a fundamental stage that precedes the perpetration of genocidal violence. Analysis of the biggest genocides in modern history supports this view. In the Holocaust, for example, the Nazis likened the Jews to rats and other vermin; in the lead-up to the Rwandan genocide, on the other hand, the “Tutsis were referred to as cockroaches” (Haslam 119). (For more on this, see entry on Stanton’s model “Ten Stages of Genocide”.) However, Haslam argues that dehumanization is neither a mere prerequisite that enables perpetration nor does it “simply serve as a prior preparation for it” (131). Arguing for the need of a more complex understanding of the nature and functions of dehumanization in mass violence, Haslam explains that dehumanization plays “an ongoing dynamic role in genocidal violence”, since it “is woven through the fabric of genocide and is not just a step on the path toward it” (131, 133).

Haslam also argues that while animalization is the most common form of dehumanization, there are other prevalent forms that are relatively underexamined. For example, lumping individuals together and stripping them of their individuality could be considered a form of dehumanization. Haslam explains how dehumanization by homogenization “involves perpetrators denying “identity” and “community” to victim groups, thereby erasing their individuality and the recognition that they sit within a network of caring interpersonal relations. As a result, perpetrators come to see victims as a deindividuated mass which lacks the social ties that would otherwise elicit compassion” (121).

Other forms of dehumanization include objectification wherein dehumanized groups are regarded as “disgusting or contemptible objects” or as dispensable and superfluous ones (124). Demonization of victims is also another way of dehumanizing them. Acts of perpetration against demonic victims become heroic; this “justif[ies] the perpetrator group’s aggression while supplying them with a sense of rectitude and superiority” (121 – 122). Another form of dehumanization is mechanization in which the dehumanized group is likened to “objects, automatons, or machines” and denied ““human nature,” which is constituted by attributes such as emotionality, vitality, and warmth that are seen as deep-seated and typical of our species and that distinguish us from rocks or robots” (123).

Haslam, furthermore, argues that not only victims of genocidal violence are subjected to dehumanization, but perpetrators too are also sometimes dehumanized. He explains that some perpetrators tend to perceive “themselves as emotionless killing machines, as cogs in a genocidal apparatus, as parts of a deindividuated mass of soldiers, or as wild animals” in order to “enable [themselves] to carry out genocidal atrocities” (132).

Haslam concludes by emphasizing the importance of understanding the complex and dynamic nature of dehumanization as well as the roles that it plays in the context of genocide and mass violence, suggesting that this could lead to effective prevention and intervention strategies.

Author of this entry: Hagar Abdalbar

Haslam, Nick. “The Many Roles of Dehumanization in Genocide.” In Confronting Humanity at Its Worst: Social Psychological Perspectives on Genocide, edited by Leonard S. Newman, 119–38. New York: Oxford University Press, 2020.