ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the roots of collective violence from the perspective of the natural science of behaviour. Strategies for modifying collective violence should take into consideration motivational factors such as verbal processes and cultural perceptions, shifting motivating antecedents, etc. Rules, models, and structural conditions are also relevant. The potential contribution of behaviour science in changing collective violence is very important. There are other serious costs associated with collective violence, including the escalating costs of police, military, and security efforts, and the sometimes dramatic effects on the quality of life of those touched by the issues. The chapter suggests that critical links in the interlocking behavioural and cultural contingencies that shape and maintain cultures of collective violence are commonly overlooked or misunderstood by policy-makers. Sometimes key determinants of behaviour, certain events that follow participation in an act of violence do not act as effective or active consequences.
