Stanton, Gregory. “The Ten Stages of Genocide”.

In 1996, Gregory H. Stanton, former professor of law and genocide studies and the founding president of Genocide Watch, presented his now well-known model of genocide called “The 8 Stages of Genocide” as a briefing paper at the US State Department. He first developed this model in 1987, based on his study and analysis of some of the most famous genocides in modern history including the Holocaust and the Cambodian and Armenian genocides. The current and final version of this model was published in 2012, to which Stanton added ‘Discrimination’ and ‘Persecution’.

Stanton describes genocide as “a process” which develops and unfolds in ten “predictable but not inexorable” stages—each of which “is itself a process”. Even though the use of the term “stages” implies linearity, Stanton stresses that the processes of genocide are not linear as they occur and/or operate simultaneously. Because these processes are interdependent and overlapping, he illustrates his model by comparing it to “a nested Russian matryoshka doll” in which “Classification is at the center. Without it the processes around it could not occur”. Stanton lays out both the definition of as well as the preventive measures that can be taken at each stage.

The first four stages or processes lead to the “Othering” of the victim group.

The first stage is ‘Classification’ which is marked by the dividing and categorizing of people into ‘us’ and ‘them’. It is then followed by the second stage ‘Symbolization’ in which names (such as ethnic labels) and/or symbols (such as badges or specific garments) are used to distinguish the outcast group—against whom ‘Discrimination’, the third stage, becomes legally codified since laws curtailing or even denying their civil, political, and/or human rights are put in place. Like discrimination, ‘Dehumanization’, the fourth stage, is also motivated by “exclusionary ideologies”. Members of the victim group are compared to “animals, vermin, insects or diseases”. They could also be “equated with filth, impurity, and immorality”. Members of the dominant group, on the other hand, are indoctrinated through propaganda which is spread in different media and is even “incorporated into school textbooks”. The purpose of this stage is to legitimize and justify the extermination of victims, which is portrayed as “a “cleansing” of the society, rather than murder”.

The fifth stage is the ‘Organization’ of militias or units who are trained and armed by the state or other actors. This is followed by ‘Polarization’ (stage 6) which is marked by the domination of extremist voices, laws, and policies. The seventh stage is the ‘Preparation’ for genocide by the incitement of fear of the victim group among the members of the dominant group, in addition to the framing of the perpetration-to-follow as self-defense or counterterrorism. This then leads to the ‘Persecution’ (stage 8) of the victims through, for example, segregation, deportation, forced displacement, forced sterilization, torture, and extrajudicial killings. ‘Extermination’ (stage 9) follows through mass killing which aims to destroy the targeted group by killing all its members. Stanton also considers “mass rape” to be an act of extermination since it “is used as a means to genetically alter and destroy the victim group”. The tenth and final stage is ‘Denial’ in which investigations are blocked, evidence is concealed or destroyed, and perpetrators are granted impunity. For Stanton, ‘Denial’ does not occur in the aftermath of genocide, but is an integral process of it.

Stanton hopes that this model would help us understand how genocide happens and develops, so that its processes can be prevented and stopped. The preventative measures he suggests are mostly concerned with pedagogy and public education, which he believes could spread tolerance and awareness of diversity and thus “resist genocidal forces”. He also puts forth some policy suggestions which, he argues, should be implemented in the different stages of genocide to stop its development—some of these policies require international cooperation and others necessitate armed interventions. Stanton’s argument that promoting a single national language and identity could help combat the processes of genocide, however, is problematic, as such policy suggestions do not at all question the nation-state framework and its role in modern genocides. While Stanton’s aim to foster education about genocides is shared by many critics and thinkers who have written on the topic of perpetration, his policy suggestions are up for debate.

Author of this entry: Hagar Abdalbar

Stanton, Gregory H. “The Ten Stages of Genocide.” GenocideWatch, 1996. https://www.genocidewatch.com/tenstages.