Abstract The study of stigma in IR has been oriented around two role-types: “normals” and “deviants.” This duality allows stigma scholars to conceptualize a relationship in which the former successfully stigmatizes the latter. But in a protracted international conflict, a competition emerges over which side can stigmatize the other more. Investigating this process requires adding a third role-tyle, “victims.” Under these conditions, a competition emerges over which group has been victimized more than the other. Using a social psychology definition, victimhood as a collective identity is defined as having been made, first, by violence, and second, by comparing their suffering to others. This competitive victimhood becomes a competitive stigmatization, as each side seeks to cast the other as deviant for how they have victimized the other side. A competitive stigmatization emerges within international conflicts under a set of baseline conditions. One, the actors seek the same goal. Two, the parties use violence against each other as part of their tactical toolkit. This includes moments of extreme violence that take on an element of horror, a form of violation so depraved that it provokes an emotional reaction in outside actors. Three, stemming from the first two conditions, the parties in the conflict engage in competing claims to victimhood vis-à-vis each other. The framework is applied to Israeli and Palestinian efforts to stigmatize each other over the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and Israel’s immediate military response.
Brent E. Sasley (Thu,) studied this question.