Fareed Zakaria wrote in a Washington Post column in July 2014 that the world is experiencing a new kind of nationalism based on fear, insecurity, and anxiety, not doubt in part linked to terrorist threats. He went on to say that we are now seeing "the pull of older, deeper forces. From Catalonia to Scotland to the Middle East, subnational identities have taken on new meaning and urgency."
Identity is defined persuasively in political psychology as the accumulation of individual and large-group historical memory. In other words, Identity- who we are and what we feel- is comprised of the memory of what has happened to us as individuals and as identity groups or nations. Social psychology explains that political and economic stresses intensify people's sense of loss of control when governments weaken or in extreme cases appear to be collapsing. Human beings under such stress turn to those social unities that make them feel most secure, from nuclear family, to clan, tribe, ethnic, or religious identity group. The late psychoanalyst and Harvard professor Erik H. Erickson introduced the idea of identity shaped in social context in Childhood and Society and Identity, Youth, and Crisis. Vamik Volkan expanded Erikson's concepts to include the impact of social and political conflict on identity. Chosen traumas are those losses in history that most dominate the consciousness of peoples who suffer from a resultant psychology of victimhood, elaborated below.
This essay advocates for the increased application of the science of political psychology, which embraces our definition of identity within policy and academic communities, as well as in conversations with the concerned lay public, so that we may be better equipped to make sense of the disorder and violence that surrounds us. Political psychology helps us predict and explain the instincts toward violence by individuals, large groups, and nations with memories of traumatic loss. More importantly, political psychology explains how to promote the peaceful resolution of conflicts. The piece will begin with case studies of victimhood and political psychology in Russia and China, followed by an explanation of an ongoing project, passed on political psychology theory, to promote reconciliation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.