ABSTRACT
Perhaps the one area where the evidence of biology’s impact on politics is most conclusive and controversial is in political behaviour. Ironically, it is the one area where biological evidence has been suppressed because it conflicts with the dominant social science paradigms. Although acknowledgement of the biological foundations of behaviour need not negate the belief that environmental factors are also crucial to understanding human behaviour, the history of the debate is an acrimonious one with a tendency to coalesce into orthodox opposing camps. As a result, biological models of behaviour, even when seen as heavily moderated by environmental influences, are controversial in political science and in Western societies in general. For reasons discussed here, this intransigence against a more interactive model of behaviour becomes less tenable with each announcement of findings that link biology with behaviour.
