Violence and Aggressive Behaviour - Anthropological Perspective

In what follows I analyse both phenomena and attempt to elucidate reasons for human violence and aggressive tensions. The appearance of both phenomena can be ascribed to many social, political, economic and environmental factors. In addition to external factors the individual’s personality and characteristics also influence aggressive tensions and the occurrence of violence. Here we must ask ourselves why human beings are inclined toward aggressive behaviour. Freud (1953, pp. 217-221) argues that libido is the basic energy of human's psycho-sexual development. 

We have defined the concept of libido as a quantitatively variable force, which could serve as a measure of processes and transformations occurring in the field of sexual excitation. We are distinguishing between libidinal and other forms of psychological energy.  (ibid.)

A child wishes to fulfil his sexual aspirations and in this case the libido is the main drive of satisfaction. However, due to the libido drive, the child may react aggressively in unpleasant situations or in the state of an excessively aroused libido. Aggression is described by Freud as the main characteristic and consequence of the aroused libido. For boys in puberty, the arousal of libido energy is in process, which can often be expressed aggressively. Girls suppress and restrain their aroused libido. Cervone and Pervin (2008, p. 73) argue that in accordance with Freud's later theories about libido and aggression, both phenomena are basic drives and intrinsic parts of human nature. Individuals function by following the satisfactory principles and aim towards a favourable satisfaction of their drives. Society limits sexual and aggressive tendencies; therefore, its role is to effectively restrict these biological aspirations. Perko (2006, p. 116) summarizes Klein and describes aggression as aspiration to possess the mother’s internal contents and as the tendency to control or demolish the object that does not belong to the individual (ibid.). Contrary to psychological explanations of violence and aggression that describe aggressive motivations as the consequence of internal personal characteristics, inherent aspirations and psycho-sexual development of the individual in sociology (beside individualistically oriented theories) theories of social influence have emerged in the last decades of the 20^th century. According to Levold and Wedekeen (1989, p. 63) they are followed by criticism of individual guilt in violent act theories. They bring forward social conditions and social structures. For example, family violence is in accordance with such theories simply a reaction on given social conditions; abused children and violent parents are only victims of living conditions that deprived them of happy and pacifist relationships. In such cases violence against children is the expression of the parents’ incapacity and weakness.

Some sociological theories explain social violence and aggression as the consequence of social conflicts, defined by Blalock (1989, p. 7) as deliberate exchange of negative sanctions or punishments between two or more groups, individuals, corporations or quasi-groups. Reasons for conflict are depicted with the common model of conflict processes (Blalock, 1989, pp. 107-135), which in simplified form contains the following variable groups:          

1. goals, sources and dependencies;
2. rules, restrictions, exhaustion and vulnerability;
3. trust, forgiveness and sensibility;
4. motivations, limitations and actual punishment behaviour.

In accordance to the given model, the conflict can be provoked between X and Y when for example X is unable to fulfil his goals due to Y's actions, or Y feels deprived of resources due to X's activities or if, for example, X is dependent on Y. Conflicts can start also by differences between X and Y's rules, restrictions and the exhaustion of Y by X or vice versa. The probability of conflict appearance is also influenced by the vulnerability of X or Y, the trust between them, the capability to forgive and their sensibility. Of great importance are also certain group motivations and actual beliefs regarding punishment behaviour of X and Y. The model can be upgraded with ideological orientations and convictions of X and Y, which are more important factors regarding conflicts between groups than between individuals. 

If I focus on the individual as the basic cell of violence and the subject of aggressive tensions, in accordance to Freud's theory of psycho-sexual development (Freud, 1953, 1977), I can suppose that sexual as well as aggressive aspirations are inherent to human beings and stem in the individual’s libido. Responding methods and contentment of libidinal tensions may be among others consequence of adaptations on environmental challenges during the evolutionary processes. A new-born has to acquire the means for physical and psychological survival, and we can presume that an aggressive reaction is one of the primitive tactics to satisfy needs or preserve a living being’s life. If such tensions are expressed in violent form depends on many other factors such as socialisation, social norms, sex, personal characteristics, education, environmental influences, the capability to cope with stress, living conditions etc. Goleman (2006, pp. 114-115) on the other hand argues that empathy is the main restraint of human cruelty. If we suppress empathy, we are able to treat other human being as an object, which facilitates cruelty. If compassion is excluded, human beings can be placed into one of the groups of the dark triad as a narcissist, Machiavellist or psychopath. Geen (1998, p. 4) refers to Berkowitz and writes about reactions on violence or other kinds of danger and states that the immediate first reaction to a condition of negative affect is fight or flight. Which one will prevail depends on: a) the person's genetic endowment, b) prior conditioning an learning, and c) recognition of aspects of the situation that either facilitate or inhibit aggression (ibid.). In this context aggression can be understood as a defensive tactic or survival tool. This kind of tactic is not used only in the period of childhood, but also in later stages of an individual’s life. Navaro (2008, pp. 41-42) states that fighting is one of the tactics to confront danger and is instinctive to all living beings. Navaro further argues that three defensive reactions: freeze, fight and flight, are controlled by the liminal brain sphere, discovered in 1952 by Paul MacLean, who called it the mammal brain. However, we may not ascribe the three defensive reactions exclusively to mammals.