ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the application of Terror management theory (TMT) to the legal arena. Given the influence of people's awareness of mortality on culturally valued behavior, TMT is inherently relevant to understanding legal transgressions and judgments because the law provides a codified articulation of society's morals and values. The last three decades have seen TMT applied to a wide range of social behavior, including legal judgments. TMT explain the motivation behind terrorist acts, and why individuals have the propensity to inflict destruction and death upon innocent victims, simply because they do not share common religious, cultural views. Citizens may feel that dynamics regarding the administration of local police forces or the legal system in general, may impede their ability to obtain what they perceive as a procedurally fair outcome. To date, research has typically utilized the worldview defensive mechanism of annihilation for understanding the motivation of terrorists and hate-crime offenders, as well as general aggression to worldview threats.
