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129 C H A P T E R 7 Imitation and Violence: Empirical Evidence and the Mimetic Model Mark R. Anspach FROM IMITATION TO RIVALRY, OR: IF THE OTHER GUY IS SO MUCH “LIKE ME,” WHY DOESN’T HE LIKE ME? Human beings are not solipsistic; they develop their sense of self in interaction with others. This observation is a good starting point for building bridges between empirical imitation researchers and mimetic theorists. Among the contributors to this volume who draw on experimental research, Ann Cale Kruger emphasizes the yearning for communion; Vittorio Gallese speaks of a “we-centric” self that emerges from an intersubjective nexus; Andrew Meltzoff places infant development in the context of a “Like Me–Like You” framework of reciprocal recognition.1 There is a clear affinity between all these approaches and what René Girard and Jean-Michel Oughourlian refer to as “interdividual” psychology.2 The importance of this common ground should not be minimized. On the other hand, a great deal still needs to be done to connect the work of psychologists or neuroscientists on imitation and intersubjectivity to empirical data of the kind collected by Melvin Konner on the prevalence of violence in human (and nonhuman) societies.3 Here the mimetic theory may hope to make a contribution, for it claims that imitation is a crucial part of the generative mechanism responsible for the prevalence of violence among humans. 130 Mark R. Anspach This claim marks a radical break with conventional wisdom. Most discussions of conflict and rivalry are still dominated by a “common sense” approach rooted in folk psychology. This approach is object-centered; it locates the reason for rivalry in the object at stake.4 Anything people fight to possess is assumed to be intrinsically valuable—otherwise, why would they want it so much? Mimetic theory challenges the folk-psychology understanding of rivalry and desire. It replaces the object-centered approach with a “we-centric” one that locates the reason for rivalry in the intersubjective nexus. If a person sees—or merely believes—that another person wants something, he or she is liable to want it, too. The convergence of more than one desire on the same object can be explained by imitation alone, irrespective of the object’s intrinsic properties. Indeed, the folk-psychology assumption that a hotly disputed object must be valuable is itself based on imitation: it does no more than reproduce the dynamic in which the perception that other people desire an object makes that object appear desirable. If others are “like me” and they see something as desirable, nothing is more natural than for me to follow their lead. But when I try to get hold of the same thing they want, we may end up fighting. Our very likeness has set us at odds. The latter claim is counterintuitive. Common sense tells us that avoiding conflict is a matter of “overcoming our differences.” If someone else is “like me,” shouldn’t that make it easier for us to get along? Both Paul Dumouchel and Jean-Michel Ourghoulian show how this assumption can fail in the case of two individuals—for example, two friends who are so alike that they cannot help falling in love with the same woman.5 Konner cites the Robbers Cave experiment involving two groups of 11-year-old boys who, despite being of like educational, socioeconomic, and religious background, nevertheless developed a fierce rivalry.6 This experiment clearly demonstrated that rivalry can thrive in the absence of differences, but it did not seek to establish the link between imitation and rivalry posited by mimetic theory. Indeed, to my knowledge, no experimental studies have yet been undertaken with the express aim of testing claims made by mimetic theory. This lack of attention on the part of empirical researchers may largely be due to unfamiliarity with a theory whose roots are in other disciplines. It is possible, however, that some of the difficulty resides in the all-encompassing nature of the theory itself. So vast is its scope, and so sweeping are its conclusions, that even those who are acquainted with the theory may be unsure how to go about translating it into testable hypotheses. Moreover, an additional difficulty may Imitation and Violence 131 lie in the novel and sometimes counterintuitive nature of some of the theory’s claims. Researchers will only want to investigate these claims if they believe them to be plausible. But how can their plausibility be...

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