Resentment in International Relations
Paper prepared for the ECPR workshop on
Status claims, recognition, and emotions in IR:
theoretical and methodological challenges
Mainz, March 11-16, 2013
Reinhard Wolf
Goethe University
Frankfurt/M.
Germany
[email protected]
The paper will try to explore the explanatory potential of national resentment in IR. The latter
will be understood as an emotional attitude entailing negative stereotypes. In contrast to hatred or
anger, however, resentment is a weaker but also more durable form of ill will towards another
actor. Usually it is a “smoldering” sentiment elicited by the perception that another party enjoys
an undeserved status position. A resentful actor thus perceives an inacceptable mismatch between
the object's high social rank and its lower moral status. Studying resentment might help to clarify
the emotional basis of typical negative prejudices about powerful nations (e.g., anti-Americanism
in China, France, Russia, and some Arab countries). It seems also interesting from a more
theoretical point of view: as the emotional stabilizer of negative prejudices it might provide the
missing link between strongly felt short-term emotions, such as anger and vengeance, and
collective (long-term) orientations embedded in national discourses. To explore the analytical
promise of resentment for IR the paper will discuss the concept itself (based on both “classical”
discussions by Nietzsche and Scheler and on more recent developments in social psychology) as
well as the causes, consequences and possible indicators of resentment.
1
Unlike strong emotions such as hate, fear, or anger the role of resentment so far has hardly been
studied by IR scholars and other social scientists (Turner 2011, 78). This is quite unfortunate
because paying more attention to resentment might fill an important explanatory gap. Specifically, a focus on resentment could shed some light on the long-term effects of anger. While anger
is a strong feeling that quite often almost 'consumes' an individual, it can also be a very personal
and brief experience. Especially in a highly institutionalized environment (e.g. a foreign office)
which privileges instrumental rationality we should expect that angry people manage to control or
hide this emotion. And even in every day life, an angry mood usually quickly subsides. However,
this does not mean that such an acute short-term emotion does not have long-term consequences.
Although the intensity of the feeling is privately experienced, anger towards another actor might
even have observable social effects if it is transformed into a widely shared (and talked about)
feeling of resentment. In contrast to 'fleeting' anger, resentment is a long-term emotional
orientation (Bar-Tal, Halperin, and de Rivera 2007) that is often developed and memorized in
discourses that deal with the alleged moral deficiencies of its object. And by its very nature,
political resentment becomes manifest and consolidated in texts which, unlike 'inner' emotional
states, can be directly analyzed by scholars.
Uncovering the emotional dimension of resentment should advance our understanding of international conflicts in many ways. In particular, it might improve our analytical grasp of negative prejudices that impede international cooperation. Often these prejudices are largely reduced to their
cognitive dimensions. They are understood as consequences of misperceptions, 'cognitive miser'
heuristics, the fundamental attribution error, mental shortcuts, herd behavior, or of the personal
need for cognitive consistency. This approach dominates many studies on Anti-Americanism
(e.g., Katzenstein and Keohane 2006). Yet this focus on the cognitive dimension underrates the
various ways in which the emotional side of resentment can affect the persistence and
transformation of negative prejudices. For instance, via 'emotional tags' the experience of resentment predisposes an actor to negative interpretations of actions and to angry reactions against the
resented opponent. In this way, this feeling tends to reinforce negative biases. On the other hand,
prejudices caused by resentment might quickly disintegrate (or at least weaken) once the resented
actor suffers a sudden loss of status (see below).
2
Studying the dynamics and impacts of resentment should be especially useful in state systems undergoing profound shifts in the international distribution of social status, that is in material power
or prestige. Obvious examples are Germany's Anti-British resentment before and after World War
I and wide-spread Asian resentment against Western imperialism (Aydin 2007; Mishra 2012).
More recent cases include the Anti-American orientation so prevalent in contemporary Chinese
and Russian nationalism or Indian politics until the turn of the century (Gries 2004). The current
EU crisis also seems to breed southern resentment against the solvent EU members Finland, the
Netherlands, and particularly Germany, which are accused of imposing unfair and ineffective
austerity policies that disregard both European principles of solidarity and the sovereignty of
fellow member states. In all these cases a better understanding of the emotional underpinnings of
negative prejudices should provide a more realistic perspective on policy options that might
enhance or diminish the prospects for pragmatic cooperation.
The nature of resentment
Broadly speaking, resentment is an emotional attitude entailing a negative stereotype about
another actor's moral character. In a certain way, it can be considered as a special type of
animosity or ill will and thus as a weaker form of hatred. Sometimes, it might also be an earlier
stage in a hateful relationship. Unlike hatred, however, resentment does not (yet?) aim at the
complete dissolution of a social relationship. As will become clear below, typically the resenting
actor most of all desires to 'cut down' the object of resentment or to teach it a lesson it will not
forget. Usually, lowering the objects social position therefore is meant to clear the ground for a
more balanced relationship between the two sides. Hatred, on the other hand, is based on the conviction that its object is beyond redemption. The hated actor is felt to be so evil that no effort will
suffice to reform its immoral character. Consequently, hating other actors aims at a complete
break in the relationship, either by permanently severing all contacts or by destroying the hated
object itself (Halperin 2008).
Essentially, resentment is a negative 'emotional attitude' (Frijda 2008, 73) about another actor's
undeserved status. Broadly speaking, it is based on the perception that there is a mismatch
3
between the object's high social and its low moral status (Oldmeadow and Fiske 2012; Petersen
2002, 40p.). The resenting person or group feels that another actor enjoys more power and/or
prestige than s/he actually deserves according to established norms and values (Feather 2008;
Feather and Nairn 2005; Wilson and Davis 2011, 120p.). Thus Nietzsche in his famous treatment
of resentment in the Genealogy of Morals describes the priests' attitude towards the nobility (“the
knights”) as a kind of self-righteous envy for the latter's dominant position. The priests deem
themselves entitled to direct the affairs of their communities. But falling short in raw power they
have to put up with the warrior's rule – at least for now, for the priests embark on an indirect
assault on the nobility's power by propagating religious beliefs which undermine the legitimacy
of the ruling class. They challenge the ethos of the strong by preaching peacefulness, charity,
humbleness, mercy, and other Judea-Christian values (Nietzsche and Smith 2008; Reginster
1997; Scheler and Frings 1994).
Modern psychological studies have confirmed this conceptual link between resentment and perceived injustice: Typically, test persons report feelings of resentment towards people they deem
unworthy of success because they have achieved a lot (e.g., high marks in an important academic
test) with little effort. Moreover, resentment towards such people increased when the test persons
themselves had achieved little in-spite of having made a great effort (Feather and Nairn 2005,
100). In this case, the resented person's great success seemed even more unfair (on the link
between resentment, justice, and status see also Solomon 1990, 269).1
Since, by its very nature, status is a relative good, the undeserved status of the resented actor does
not only irritate the justice aspirations of other actors but also lowers the prestige value of their
own rank. After all, the higher status of the object of resentment also devalues the social position
of all other groups or persons belonging to the same society. Sometimes, the distance separating
them within the status hierarchy may be so great that the questionable advancement scarcely
affects the position relative to different actors. At other times, others may experience the
'undeserved' gain as a conspicuous status set-back for their own side. Of course, this will be
1 Envy, by contrast, is not necessarily related to perceptions of injustice and often not caused by moral indignation
(Feather and Sherman 2002, 954; Rawls 1971, 533). People also envy others for assets, resources, or positions
which they have attained in a fair manner. (Or, to include a special form of envy, one could be jealous of a more
successful romantic rival without accusing that person of unfair courtship.) Besides, envy usually is focused
primarily on these objects rather than on their owners. It vanishes as soon as we loose interest in that object.
4
especially the case where one actor humiliates others or when it openly subjects them to his/her
rule. In many instances then, other actors will regard the undeserved status of the resented side as
an assault on their own public image and private self-esteem (Meltzer and Musolf 2002). And
this, of course, will further intensify their ill will against the resented actor (Frank 1986; Rosen
2007).
Another key element of resentment is the awareness of momentary impotence. For the moment at
least, the resentful actor lacks the means to right the perceived injustice. Even when feeling intensely wronged s/he feels unable to engage in instantaneous retribution. Otherwise, anger over
the unfair treatment could result in a quick (and satisfying) act of revenge which often would lay
the negative emotion to rest. By contrast, due to his/her disadvantaged position an actor develops
a feeling of resentment because s/he is barred from openly challenging the detested actor. The latter may possess more raw power, more prestige and social influence, or s/he may have more
powerful allies (which, of course, also enhances his/her overall status). Whatever the particular
cause, it always boils down to the perception that another actor's social position is too high relative to his/her moral qualities and too secure to be immediately corrected (Scheler and Frings
1994, chap. 1). In many instances then (and especially in international relations), this improved
social status is doubly frustrating for the resentful side: it contravenes his/her notions of justice
and it obstructs the desired corrective action.
As a result of this perceived impotence these antagonistic attitudes can persist for a very long
time (Meltzer and Musolf 2002). As the desired redress must be postponed, the resentful side
remains conscious that there still is an 'account' waiting to be settled. Unless s/he forgets the
original act of injustice or somehow is no longer confronted with the other actor's undeserved
status, the resentful actor will keep waiting for a good opportunity to finally correct the perceived
wrong (e.g., by 'cutting down' the resented party in order to put it back into its deserved place; see
Feather and Nairn 2005; Feather and Sherman 2002, 958). Consequently, resentment develops the
typical quality of a simmering, smoldering feeling which distinguishes this emotion from 'hot
feelings' such as anger, rage, and vengeance (Frijda 2008, 73; Solomon 1990, 265).2
2 This temporal endurance is indeed a crucial element. Meltzer/Musolf reserve the French term “ressentiment” to
this persisting feeling. For reasons of convenience I stick with the English term, as it is widely understood as a
long-term emotion.
5
And oftentimes resentment grows considerably over time. Frequently, the frustration experienced
about the impotence to rectify the original injustice gets linked more closely to the object, so that
the negative feelings are increasingly associated with the resented actor itself (which, after all, is
the 'cause' of this frustration). As a result, the bias against the latter may get even more negative.
In many cases the frustrated actors (e.g., Nietzsche's priests) will also try to win allies by
persuading third parties of the moral shortcomings of the resented actor. Or they need to make
sure that parts of their own in-group do not forget about the account which still needs to be
settled. This, too, should make the resenting party look for additional evidence and arguments for
tarnishing its object's image. To the extent the resenting side itself comes to believe in these
additional arguments the latter will naturally reinforce the perception of undeserved status. In
extreme cases, persons or like-minded groups thus can become altogether obsessed with
resentment.
The Causes of International Resentment
Many social developments can cause resentment. According to the conception outlined above,
however, all these causes come down to an actor's perception of a growing discrepancy between
another actor's social and its moral status. For reasons of transparency these possible changes will
be differentiated along two dimensions: (a) changes of social status vs. changes of moral status
and (b) interactional vs. structural changes, that is changes in the direct relationship between
resenting and resented actors vs. changes which concern other members of society just as much
as the resentful party. Obviously, these kinds of changes can also be found in combination and
sometimes even reinforce each other in real cases.
Perhaps the most obvious type, particular in IR, is a shift in social status in a dyadic relationship
which is not matched by a parallel change in moral status (Type 1: social/interactional). Usually,
in this case, the (soon to be) resented actor enhances his/her standing at the expense of the (soon
to be) resentful actor by some kind of domineering behavior. The latter may be the establishment
of direct rule through conquest or certain forms of compellence (think of Greek resentment to-
6
wards Germany or some debtor countries resentment of the IMF Higgott 2000), more symbolic
acts of national humiliation (e.g., occupation of the Ruhr by French forces in 1923), or repeated
acts of milder forms of unrequited acts of disrespect which also expose the lower rank of the
'victim' (for instance, recurrent acts of U.S. disrespect for Russia's sphere of influence or for the
Russian veto in the U.N. Security Council). In such cases, by demonstrating its dominance the
resented party directly proves that it can advance its rank at the expense of the other party.
Usually the latter at first experiences anger which over time (that is, when the new status
difference gets consolidated) is transformed into resentment (unless, of course, the weaker side
eventually comes to see this status shift as deserved).
Type 2 (moral/interactional) relates to cases where the mismatch evolves because the moral status
of a close interaction partner declines while his/her social status remains unchanged. Thus, in
terms of power and prestige the dyadic relationship remains constant whereas there is a shift in at
least one of the actors' moral status (of course, possibly only in the eyes of the resenting party).
For instance, a weaker state may have accepted the leadership of a stronger (or a balanced
partnership with an equal one) for some time, until its erstwhile moral superiority becomes
questionable in the eyes of the client state. In that case, legitimate leadership would also come to
be seen as undeserved dominance and thereby stimulate resentment. An example might be
growing resentment against colonial rule by European powers or German resentment against the
George W. Bush Administration's insistence on U.S. leadership among the Western democracies.
Naturally, the legitimizing distance in moral status could also shrink as a result of improved
moral status of the resenting party. (Often, of course, both these perceptional shifts go hand in
hand.)
Type 3 (social/structural) relates to cases where a state can enhance its social status within the international system without (in the perception of the resenting actor) improving its moral status. In
such a case, the resenting nation is not necessarily directly subjected to domineering behavior but
nevertheless disapproves of the 'undeserved' social status gain of the 'parvenu'. An obvious case
in point seems French (and perhaps to a lesser extent British) post-World War II resentment
towards the American 'upstart' with its 'shallow culture' that allegedly made the U.S. unfit for a
superpower role (or, at least, did not qualify her more than France herself; Revel and Cammell
7
2003).
Finally, type 4 (moral/structural) usually involves cases where a nation (due to its improved moral status) feels entitles to a higher social status, yet is not accepted by its aspired peer group. In
the terminology of Social Identity Theory, this is the international version of obstructed social
mobility where an actor assumes s/he possesses enough credentials for gaining access to the higher status group but is not awarded the higher social rank (Oldmeadow and Fiske 2012; Tajfel and
Turner 1979). Naturally, in the latter's eyes, this unwarranted rejection lowers the legitimacy of
the status hierarchy and disqualifies the members of the higher status group for their dominant
position. This in turn, further reduces the distance in moral status which until recently even the
rejected party had taken for granted. As a result, the latter comes to see the unreformed social
status hierarchy as even more anachronistic.3 Good illustrations of this type are Germany's
resentment over its failure to achieve world power status before World War I or China's more
recent ill will over the fact that it still is being denied political parity with the U.S. in the Far East
(Gries 2004). Alternatively, a moral/structural type of mismatch evolves if a state succeeds in
retaining its social status despite the fact that its moral status supposedly has declined (e.g., due to
that state's violation of accepted international norms).
The effects of resentment
Just like negative prejudices caused by other factors, resentment can poison a relationship in
many ways. Typically unfavorable biases undermine trust, reduce confidence in the other side's
competence, tend to increase fear, and make dissociation more attractive. Because these effects
have already received a lot of scholarly attention (for an overview see Hilton and von Hippel
1996) I will focus here on the emotional 'extra effects' of resentment. In other words, I shall try to
outline what IR scholars (and perhaps also political practitioners) might gain from diagnosing a
negative bias as a case of resentment. Among other things, we might want to know, whether it
really makes an analytical or practical difference if we take the emotional dimension of
resentment into account. I believe it does, as resentment should specifically affect the resentful
3 Note that this cause of resentment can also result from a resenting actor's increase in material power, provided (a)
that it believes that this advancement justifies its admittance to the higher status group and (b) that group is still
powerful enough to blockade that adjustment.
8
parties cognitions, emotions, discourses, and non-verbal behavior. Normally, stereotypes caused
by resentment can be expected to be more stable or intense than prejudices that are merely due to
cognitive factors. Yet, in some cases resentments might also dissipate sooner than these other
negative biases.
First of all, negative views with an emotional component have cognitive effects which tend to
make these views more stable than other kinds of prejudices. To be sure, the latter may also become so firmly entrenched in a person's belief system that they cannot be revised without calling
into question other central ideas. Hence, the need for 'cognitive consistency' (Festinger 1957)
may already suffice to shield some prejudices from dis-confirming evidence. Yet 'emotional
beliefs' (Mercer 2010) tend to be even more stable (Haidt 2013, chaps. 2-4). For one thing, their
revision just does not 'feel right' (Kahneman 2012, 82, 103). While in many situations such 'gut
feeling', certainly, is not a good reason to cling to a particular view, it may frequently suffice to
achieve just that, especially when people are confronted with contradictory, ambiguous, or
incomplete evidence. After all, actors often face inconsistent reports about other actors, evidence
may be subject to rather different interpretations, or they need to predict another actor's future
intentions or behavior. Under these circumstances, they always tend to hold on to those
convictions they simply 'like better'. In the case of resentment, of course, they do not like the
object at all. However, they like the view that its social position is undeserved, particularly if this
elevated position has been attained at their own expense. Revising the negative view of the
resented actor would thus also call into question one's self-perception as the morally superior side
which, after all, has not pushed for an undeserved social status. Despising the upstart makes it so
much easier to cope with one's own status dissatisfaction. Not without reason, philosophers such
as Nietzsche and Scheler have already stressed that resentful persons take an unfairly distorted
look at their despised objects.
Moreover, just like other emotions, resentment presumably also affects the acquisition and processing of additional information (Redlawsk 2006). Humans recall previous pieces of information
more easily when they resonate with their current emotional state. Normally, social data are
'stored' in our memory according to the emotions they were associated with ('what fires together
wires together';). They come with 'affective tags' (Groenendyk 2011, 458; Haidt 2013, 66–7;
9
McDermott 2004; Rosen 2007). Consequently, when confronted with a resented actor humans
will tend to remember its negative acts rather than its widely appreciated behavior. Apparently,
these 'affective tags' also work in the presence of dis-confirming information: when exposed to
evidence that challenges their political views, test persons tended to recall memories with the
kind of 'affective tags' which helped to bolster their existing attitudes (Groenendyk 2011, 458).
Accordingly, favorable information can be expected to be balanced by increased retrieval of
episodes during which people felt bad about the resented party. Therefore, resentful persons
should be even less guided by curiosity or rational (i.e. strategically instrumental) learning than
people with typical cognitive biases. These tendencies then further reinforce and protect the
resentful prejudices.
On the other hand, sometimes resentments may also dissipate more quickly than other kinds of
biases. In particular, they can collapse all of a sudden when the social status of the resented actor
experiences an abrupt decline. In that eventuality, the psychic need for disparaging the latter's
moral status can vanish over night. Therefore, the negative perception of its character may readily
vaporize without any new evidence that could actually have dis-confirmed these images. In this
perspective, it is not so surprising that, in the wake of 9/11, the outburst of sympathy towards the
U.S. was particularly strong in France and Russia, that is in the very two European countries
which presumably had harbored the most intense resentment against the 'invincible' 'hyper
power'. After all, the collapse of the WTC towers had just visibly shown that the United States
hardly was the invulnerable ruler of the world. And perhaps it was no coincidence that of all
French papers it was precisely the left-leaning Le Monde which expressed the profoundest sympathy with the famous title “Nous sommes tous Américains”.4
Second, resentment can promote the association of other unfavorable emotions with its object.
Thus, it has been established that resentment 'colours” feelings towards other persons or groups
in specific ways. Indeed, it is consistently related to unpleasant impressions of these actors. Resented people are described as lacking in 'warmth', that is as being less trustworthy, less friendly,
less moral, and less sincere than others (Oldmeadow and Fiske 2012). Moreover, sentiments
4 Russian president Putin apparently was the first European politician to call U.S. president Bush. In a similar vein,
during the Cuban missile crisis French president de Gaulle had been the European chief executive who had most
strongly articulated his solidarity with the United States.
10
make actors more susceptible to the experience of corresponding 'hot' emotions (Frijda 2008, 73).
Resentment thus primes actors to experience (or re-experience) anger vis-à-vis the resented actor.
As the latter is strongly associated with unfair behavior or hurtful experiences, resenting persons
are inclined to ascribe it illegitimate motives. Hence, they will be more inclined to feel unfairly
treated and thus get more readily angered (Miller 2001). Sometimes, the association of the
resented actor with angry experiences may be so intimate that even the mere thought of this actor
can stimulate an angry feeling. In the long run, resentment can also bring about outright hatred. If
the processes reinforcing the negative bias proceeds long enough or even, as described above,
intensifies over time the negative stereotypes could become so strong that the moral character of
the resented comes to be seen as completely evil and thus unreformable.
Third, resentment possibly has a number of specific effects on discourses, as resenting actors tend
to feel a particular need to propagate and justify their negative views about the object. Thus, effectively tarnishing the object's moral status may immediately help to lower its social status
which, of course, is the essential aim of resentful actors. Also, such articulations might win allies
which, at some later time, might support forceful attempts to cut down the object of resentment.
In addition, the verbal expression of these negative stereotypes also serves the subjective need to
experience one's ill feelings as perfectly appropriate and justified (rather than coming to see these
feelings as the manifestation of an envious or spiteful character). Consequently, communities
give meaning to consecutive experiences of disrespect by telling themselves narratives which link
the loss of status to the negative traits of the resented actor (Fattah and Fierke 2009). Finally,
elaborate articulations of the objects shortcomings might also become necessary to
(preemptively?) 'disprove' anyone who might try to challenge these (self-serving) prejudices.
Overall then, there are several reasons why resentful actors can be expected to make a special
effort to express and justify their unfavorable views.
Naturally, such public articulations can also spread the resentful feeling itself. According to Intergroup Emotions Theory, people tend to experience the kind of emotions they deem prototypical
for the groups they identify with (Mackie, Smith, and Ray 2008; Rydell et al. 2008; Sasley 2011).
To the extent that the resentment discourse accentuates their collective identity and persuasively
propagates the notion that a typical member of the in-group harbors negative feelings about the
11
resented actor, even large anonymous groups ('imagined communities' to use Anderson's prescient term) can develop (or further intensify) a shared feeling of resentment. As a consequence, the
resentful articulations can become yet more dominant in the group's discourse, up to the point
where nobody any longer dares to challenge these negative stereotypes.
Finally, by eliciting action tendencies, resentment should also directly (that is, on top of the motivational consequences of resentful discourses) affect non-verbal behavior. It is likely to promote
some types of actions while restraining others. As already outlined at length, resentful actors will
primarily strive to 'cut down' their object in order to 'put it back in its place' and take revenge for
its 'unfair' conduct. Preferably, they will do so publicly so that the resented actor's status dimunition immediately becomes apparent (and thus even greater). This tendency, of course, gets reinforced by the anticipated satisfaction people imagine for the moment when they finally can 'settle
the account'. Correspondingly, resentful actors will naturally tend to avoid any actions that could
enhance the object's status or might improve its chances for holding on to it. In addition, resentment constrains actions in other domains: resentful actors typically develop a certain fixation
on their object the more they come to despise it. Apart from closely watching its moral conduct
they also keep looking out for any possible weaknesses while preparing for their most efficient
exploitation. After all, they do not want to pass up the long awaited opportunity to finally settle
accounts. Accordingly, this obsession tends to impede the resenting actor's activities in all other
areas. Specifically, this unsound fixation can cause an actor to pass up promising opportunities to
achieve other goals which might have more instrumental value. For instance, a national
government may come to neglect bilateral relations with other nations.5
Methodological Challenges: Demonstrating the Existence and Effects of Resentment
Demonstrating the political influence of emotions is rarely an easy task. Emotions cannot be directly observed (nor can rationality). Even with fMRIs neuroscientists can only track the
activation of certain areas of the brain, such as the amygdala, but can hardly tell what test persons
5 Interestingly, it has been demonstrated that emotions can also strongly mediate the effect cognitive biases have on
behavioral tendencies towards other status groups. However, these studies have not yet analyzed if this also holds
for feelings of resentment (Cuddy, Fiske, and Glick 2007; 2008, 116). Still, these findings indicate that taking the
emotional side of resentment seriously might significantly enhance our understanding of this type of bias.
12
actually feel. Real world conditions, of course, pose far more daunting challenges. Besides,
politicians tend to mislead themselves and their audiences about the rationality of their decision
making processes. On the other hand, they may sometimes also be inclined to feign emotions, be
it to put an opponent on the defensive or to enhance their own popularity.
Fortunately, resentment should be among the more conspicuous emotional phenomena. While the
actual experience of resentful feelings will be difficult to prove, the attitude of resentment can be
observed by both psychologists in the laboratory and social scientists analyzing texts. As pointed
out above, resentment should be more manifest in discourses and semi-official narratives than
most other kinds of emotions or emotional attitudes. Resentful persons or groups have a special
need for allies or other kinds of supporters. In order to mobilize their backing, they must try to
convince these actors – be they bystanders or reluctant domestic audiences – of the legitimacy of
their cause. They need to explain their grievances and must justify the means they want to
employ in order to redress the 'unfair' status mismatch. These requirements are especially
prominent for collective actors, such as nations. Moreover, resenting actors will try to shape the
wider public discourse (here: the international discourse) in all kinds of ways that might hurt the
resented actor's status. Finally, in more private settings (e.g., private letters or cabinet meetings)
they may enjoy articulating imagined scenarios in which they are finally teaching their object the
lessons which had deserved all along (Petersen 2002, 49p.; Scott 1990, 8p.). Accordingly,
researches should watch out for the following kinds of indicators:
•
accusations of 'unfair' status shifts or unjust obstruction of social mobility
•
principled calls for rectifying 'unfair' policies
•
justifications of retributive measures taken against those policies
•
articulations which tarnish the social or moral status of the resented actor (in particular accusations that seem far fetched)
•
satisfaction expressed about minor setbacks experienced by that actor (Schadenfreude)
•
articulations of revenge fantasies
To prove the actual impact of that sentiment on preferences and decisions, as always, is somewhat
more demanding. To study its consequences for preferences scholars can analyze discourses for
specific patterns. In particular, researchers could look out for links between negative
13
representations of the Other and demands for uncooperative policies. Typical evidence for the
impact of resentment include the following articulations:
•
When discussing options for cooperation, the moral deficits of the Other (such as its
unreliability) are highlighted in order to justify the demand for special guarantees to
minimize the risk of cheating.
•
Demands for an uncompromising stance in negotiations are based on the argument that
the Other does not 'deserve' any kind of accommodation.
•
Proponents of cooperation are ridiculed as 'naive' sympathizers with the Other who do not
understand its true character.
•
Uncompromising stances towards the Other are justified with past negative experiences
which are re-represented in a more biased (i.e. more negative) manner.
To investigate the impact on decisions scholars need to look the kind of deviations from
instrumentally-rational decision processes which would be typical for actors motivated by
resentment. The most important indicator in this regard is the co-variation between perceived
status changes and policy shifts. In particular, policy shifts should co-vary more closely with
changing views about the legitimacy of status changes or the status orders themselves than with
other changes in the political environment. Specifically, resentful actors should either consciously
or by mere oversight pass up opportunities to improve their material conditions. Among other
things, they should tend to miss opportunities for cooperative projects involving the resented
actor because they lack trust in it or because they want to avoid an implicit recognition of its
status. In particular, they should reject any material offers for compensation (by the resented
actor) that fail to correct the perceived status mismatch. Finally, the symbolic content of
resentment might provide useful indicators: Since retributive policies usually target socially
constructed status markers, they can be expected to vary with any reevaluations of such symbols
(Löwenheim and Heimann 2008).
Ultimately, however, social scientists should not put too much effort into disentangling the
emotional aspects of international resentments. While raising the IR community's awareness of
this dimension remains important, it might be futile to look for the precise impact of emotional
factors on negative stereotypes. Neuroscientists and psychologists have increasingly become
14
aware of the fact that emotions, cognitions and rational decision-making go hand in hand. Some
psychologists even have come to doubt that emotions should be seen as distinctive entities, i.e. as
separate phenomena which cause and constrain mental activities. Instead they prefer to stress
their procedural nature.6 Accordingly, it seems somewhat awkward if political scientists were to
look for the precise moments where the emotional “component” of resentment made the crucial
difference or to argue about the relative influence of emotional effects. Rather, it might be more
useful to thoroughly integrate findings about emotional processes into existing theories on the
emergence and effects of social stereotypes – in the hope that such revisions foster a better
understanding of collective attitudes in international politics.
Conclusion
Paying more attention to resentment may benefit IR in a number of ways. It holds particular
promise for the analysis of long lasting international status conflicts (such as most enduring rivalries) that defy purely materialistic explanations (e.g. India vs. Pakistan, U.S. vs. Iran). In these instances, yet also in other cases, a better understanding of this emotional orientation can help to
grasp the remarkable endurance of antagonistic collective identities. In fact, it provides one of the
most obvious arguments for the claim that collective identities are also emotional phenomena
(Ross 2006). Resentment is also worth studying as one of the clearest manifestations of emotions
in public discourses. Taking it into account more systematically might enhance our understanding
of the familiar mutual escalation of nationalist discourses which tend to constrain decisionmakers room for compromise. Studying such discourses, finally, could shed some light on the
transformation of collective emotions, such as anger, into long-term emotional orientations like
resentment or even hatred.
6 To quote Frijda's state of the art article: „For psychological analysis, however, it might be better to treat emotions
as the observable results of processes that are better denoted by verbs. “She is angering” might not be a bad
expression, which neatly matches “She has been angered,” as well as “She is loving.” Instead of talking about
emotions, one might instead describe streams of concurrent and interacting ongoing processes: appraisals that last
and change, that activate processes of action readiness that generate action preparations and overt actions, which
in turn act back upon appraisals, and that all vary in degree of activation, each having different time courses and
different moments at which they die down. This is the picture sketched by multicomponential emotion theory
(e.g., Scherer, 2000), according to which matching categories to ongoing processes—“an emotion,” “a mood,” and
even “anger!” or “excitement!”—can only be sloppy, often a bit arbitrary, and not very consequential except for
verbal communication“ (Frijda 2008, 74).
15
Hopefully, a better of grasp of these dynamics would also be of use to decision-makers and diplomats who want to promote international cooperation rather than conflicts. At the very least, it
should make them more cautious before they try to enhance their countries status (particularly, at
the clear expense of another nation). Perhaps, it also could make them aware of the fact that negative short-term emotions may have enduring affective consequences which limit both the ability
to learn and to adjust policies when new opportunities for cooperation arise.
References
Aydin, Cemil. 2007. The politics of anti-Westernism in Asia. Visions of world order in panIslamic and pan-Asian thought. New York: Columbia University Press.
Bar-Tal, Daniel, Eran Halperin, and Joseph de Rivera. 2007. "Collective Emotions in Conflict
Situations: Societal Implications." Journal of Social Issues 63 (2):441–60.
Cuddy, Amy J. C., Susan T. Fiske, and Peter Glick. 2007. "The BIAS map. Behaviors from
intergroup affect and stereotypes." Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 92 (4):631–
48.
–––. 2008. "Warmth and Competence as Universal Dimensions of Social Perception: The
Stereotype Content Model and the BIAS Map." In Advances in Experimental Social
Psychology, ed. Mark P. Zanna: Academic Press, 61–149.
Fattah, K. and K.M Fierke. 2009. "A Clash of Emotions: The Politics of Humiliation and Political
Violence in the Middle East." European Journal of International Relations 15 (1):67–93.
Feather, N. T. 2008. "Effects of observer's own status on reactions to a high achiever's failure:
Deservingness, resentment, schadenfreude, and sympathy." Australian Journal of Psychology
60 (1):31–43.
Feather, N. T. and Katherine Nairn. 2005. "Resentment, envy, schadenfreude, and sympathy:
Effects of own and other's deserved or undeserved status." Australian Journal of Psychology
57 (2):87–102.
Feather, N. T. and R. Sherman. 2002. "Envy, Resentment, Schadenfreude, and Sympathy.
Reactions to Deserved and Undeserved Achievement and Subsequent Failure." Personality
and Social Psychology Bulletin 28 (7):953–61.
Festinger, Leon. 1957. A theory of cognitive dissonance. Stanford, Calif: Stanford University
Press.
Frank, Robert H. 1986. Choosing the right pond. Human behavior and the quest for status. New
York, NY: Oxford Univ. Press.
Frijda, Nico H. 2008. "The Psychologists' Point of View." In Handbook of emotions, eds.
16
Jeannette M. Haviland-Jones, Lisa Feldman Barrett, and Michael Lewis. 3rd ed. New York:
Guilford Press, 68–87.
Gries, Peter Hays. 2004. China's new nationalism. Pride, politics, and diplomacy. Berkeley,
Calif: Univ. of California Press.
Groenendyk, E. 2011. "Current Emotion Research in Political Science: How Emotions Help
Democracy Overcome its Collective Action Problem." Emotion Review 3 (4):455–63.
Haidt, Jonathan. 2013. The righteous mind. Why good people are divided by politics and religion.
New York: Vintage Books.
Halperin, E. 2008. "Group-based Hatred in Intractable Conflict in Israel." Journal of Conflict
Resolution 52 (5):713–36.
Higgott, Richard. 2000. "The International Relations of the Asian Economic Crisis. A Study in
the Politics of Resentment." In Politics and Markets in the Wake of the Asian crisis, eds.
Kanishka Jayasuriya: Hyuk-Rae Kim Beeson, and Richard Robison. London: Routledge, 263–
85.
Hilton, James L. and William von Hippel. 1996. "Stereotypes." Annual Review of Psychology 47
(1):237–71.
Kahneman, Daniel. 2012. Thinking, fast and slow. London: Penguin Books.
Katzenstein, Peter J. and Robert Owen Keohane. 2006. Anti-Americanisms in world politics.
Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press.
Löwenheim, Oded and Gadi Heimann. 2008. "Revenge in International Politics." Security
Studies 17 (4):685–724.
Mackie, Diane M., Eliot R. Smith, and Devin G. Ray. 2008. "Intergroup Emotions and Intergroup
Relations." Social and Personality Psychology Compass 2 (5):1866–80.
McDermott, Rose. 2004. "The Feeling of Rationality: The Meaning of Neuroscientific Advances
for Political Science." Perspectives on Politics 2 (04):691–706.
Meltzer, Bernard N. and Gil Richard Musolf. 2002. "Resentment and Ressentiment."
Sociological Inquiry 72 (2):240–55.
Mercer, Jonathan. 2010. "Emotional Beliefs." International Organization 64 (01):1–31.
Miller, Dale T. 2001. "Disrespect and the experience of injustice." Annual Review of Psychology
52 (1):527–53.
Mishra, Pankaj. 2012. From the ruins of empire. The revolt against the West and the remaking of
Asia. London ; New York: Allen Lane; an imprint of Penguin Books.
Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm and Douglas Smith. 2008. On the genealogy of morals. A polemic :
by way of clarification and supplement to my last book, Beyond good and evil. Oxford ;:
Oxford University Press.
Oldmeadow, Julian A. and Susan T. Fiske. 2012. "Contentment to Resentment: Variation in
Stereotype Content Across Status Systems." Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy:no.
Petersen, Roger Dale. 2002. Understanding ethnic violence. Fear, hatred, and resentment in
twentieth-century Eastern Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Rawls, John. 1971. A theory of justice. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Redlawsk, David P., ed. 2006. Feeling politics. Emotion in political information processing. 1st
ed. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
17
Reginster, Bernard. 1997. "Nietzsche on Ressentiment and Valuation." Philosophy and
Phenomenological Research 57 (2):281–305. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2953719.
Revel, Jean-François and Diarmid Cammell. 2003. Anti-Americanism. 1st ed. San Francisco,
Calif: Encounter Books.
Rosen, Stephen Peter. 2007. War and human nature. Princeton, N.J. ;, Woodstock: Princeton
University Press.
Ross, A. A. G. 2006. "Coming in from the Cold. Constructivism and Emotions." European
Journal of International Relations 12 (2):197–222.
Rydell, R. J., D. M. Mackie, A. T. Maitner, H. M. Claypool, M. J. Ryan, and E. R. Smith. 2008.
"Arousal, Processing, and Risk Taking. Consequences of Intergroup Anger." Personality and
Social Psychology Bulletin 34 (8):1141–52.
Sasley, Brent E. 2011. "Theorizing States’ Emotions." International Studies Review 13 (3):452–
76.
Scheler, Max and Manfred S. Frings. 1994. Ressentiment. Milwaukee, Wis: Marquette University
Press.
Scott, James C. 1990. Domination and the arts of resistance. Hidden transcripts. New Haven,
Conn: Yale University Press.
Solomon, Robert C. 1990. A passion for justice. Emotions and the origin of the social contract.
Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley Pub. Co.
Tajfel, H. and J.C Turner. 1979. "An Integrative Theory of Intergroup Conflict." In The Social
Psychology of Intergroup Relations,, eds. W.G Austin, and Worchel S. Monterey, CA:
Brooks/Cole, 33–47.
Turner, B. S. 2011. "Max Weber and the spirit of resentment: The Nietzsche legacy." Journal of
Classical Sociology 11 (1):75–92.
Wilson, D. C. and D. W. Davis. 2011. "Reexamining Racial Resentment: Conceptualization and
Content." The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 634 (1):117–
33.
18