Research Jungle E-Book

• Herausgeber: Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 268

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

The International Student Research Conference (ISRC) 2021 attracted students all over the world to present their works to an interested audience at Zeppelin University. Under this year's theme "Research Jungle", eight participants were chosen to be part of its conference proceedings. Spanning a broad variaty of topics from gender & culture to economics and politics as well as COVID-19 and Digitalization, this anthology aims to capture and preserve the research efforts of students from all over the world. Visit our Research Jungle and discover the findings of our young researchers.

Leseprobe

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION by Aynur Erdogan and Jan Söffner

DECORUM AND CIVIL WAR: THEORY OF A CIVIL WAR INDEX by Nicolas Stojek

ECONOMIC FREEDOM AND OLIGARCHY IN GEORGIA: HOW WEAK INSTITUTIONS MADE OLIGARCHS INTO THE BENEFICIARIES OF LIBERALIZATION by Yannick Scharf

WHAT ARE THE DETERMINANTS OF SOCIAL INEQUALITIES IN THE LIVING CONDITIONS OF EASTERN GERMAN FARMERS TODAY? by Carla Ulrich

FORENSIC GERONTOLOGY – ETIOLOGY PHENOMENOLOGY AND PREVENTION OF BREACH OF DUTY OF CARE IN NURSING AND MEDICAL CARE FOR THE ELDERLY IN GERMANY by Victoria Soddemann and Sarah Flotho

ASSESSING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE EMAP MODEL FOR ADDRESSING SEXUAL AND GENDER-BASED VIOLENCE AMONG REFUGEE COMMUNITIES: REFLECTIONS FROM BIDIBIDI REFUGEE SETTLEMENT IN UGANDA by Doreen Birungi and Catherine Anena

“I DOUGH, I DOUGH” AND #I’MCOMINGOUT – (PERFORMATIVE) ALLYSHIP IN DIGITAL COMMUNITY-BASED MARKETING by Anna Rohmann

THE IMPACTS OF THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC ON DOMESTIC VIOLENCE by Leo Lindenschmid

CONCLUSION: VENTURING INTO THE RESEARCH JUNGLE – A REVIEW OF THIS YEAR’S VIRTUAL ISRC CONFERENCE by Felix Krell, Florian Horky and Maya Geiss

CONTRIBUTERS

INTRODUCTION

by Aynur Erdogan and Jan Söffner

This is a jungle book; a book gathering chosen papers from a “research jungle” – as was the motto of the International Student Research Conference (ISRC) held at Zeppelin University in April 2021. The aim of the event was to bring together undergraduate and graduate student researchers for an international conference. Research-based learning within the German higher education landscape is part of a larger network within the DHDG, the German Association for Educational and Academic Staff Development in Higher Education. Successful forerunners include conferences at the Universities of Oldenburg, Bochum, Berlin, Kiel and Stuttgart (Hohenheim). In addition to continuing the series of conferences, we invited international students to share their research results with us. All submissions were based on original research conducted by the presenter/s, and concerned the areas of economics, politics, culture, and the social sciences. Furthermore, most research projects involved inter- and multi-disciplinary approaches – they hence dared to venture into the densest parts of the research jungle, blazing a trail for further research.

For the editors, who are practitioners, educators and researchers, it was also intriguing to connect with international partner universities in order to see how they tackled research-based learning (RBL) at their institutions. While RBL opens innovative and diverse ways of learning as well as shaping individual curricula, it also entails certain administrative hurdles. While students came together to discuss their projects and their first steps as researchers, the editors of this volume shared their experiences in the implementation of research modules within undergraduate and graduate programs. It also became clear that some higher education cultures provide a limited space within which RBL can become a scholarly playground for students.

Zeppelin University proved to be an apt venue for this project, as it pursues an interdisciplinary, individual and international approach to teaching that includes both mandatory and voluntary modules on research-based learning. Different formats of undergraduate and graduate research allow students to work through the entire process of a research project: from hammering out a research question, to applying a methodological framework, to finally presenting their findings in a paper or published article. It also allows students to identify – beyond the borders of their study programs – topic areas that they want to explore further. The conference, however, was a challenge for the university, since it was intended to promote exchanges between students with very different backgrounds. Obviously, none of us could have predicted the pandemic, which is why we were very much looking forward to welcoming student researchers at Zeppelin University. However, we did manage to arrange a virtual conference, enabling as much formal and informal exchange as possible on virtual sites specifically created for the event, allowing the participants to get lost in the jungle and find their own way through it.

Some of the best outcomes of this endeavor can be found in this volume. All papers focus on the challenges of our times from various points of view and through various scholarly disciplines. Nicolas Stojek’s paper takes its cue from Benedict Anderson’s imagined community to elaborate on what he refers to as the civil war index, a theory that describes the stability of a society using the bandwidth of its central artefacts. Yannick Scharf uses the case study of Georgia to investigate the role that institutional prerequisites play for economic liberalization, and to show the positive effects and challenges involved in reforming oligarchic systems. Scharf concludes that the problem lies not in the power of oligarchs per se but in the difficulty inherent in reforming political systems, as individuals occupying positions of power tend to simply be replaced by other individuals. In the following paper, Carla Ulrich takes on the topic of agricultural workers in former East Germany in order to examine the ongoing process of social differentiation, which the East German agricultural population has been engaged in since reunification.

Another topic area highlights various forms of violence. The paper by Victoria Soddemann and Sarah Flotho analyzes violence against the elderly in nursing and medical care. Their study reveals an array of risk factors and identifies key features of the perpetrator-victim relationship. The authors conclude that better working conditions could improve the overall situation in nursing and care homes. While the previous paper focused on violence against the elderly, in their paper Doreen Birungi and Dr Catherine Anena analyze gender-based violence in refugee settlements in Uganda. They posit that most cases of gender-based violence in their research project stem from biased gender-socio-cultural norms, beliefs and values that are taught to children and young people, leading to a continuation of violence against vulnerable groups.

In turn, two papers explore aspects of gender and gender performativity. Anna Rohmann explores cases of LGBTQ+-friendly marketing in social media. Her research focuses on the social media platform TikTok and ice-cream giant Ben & Jerry’s. She argues that companies can successfully integrate marginalized communities into the neoliberal consumer system by using social media. Subsequently, Leo Lindenschmid’s paper focuses on domestic violence against women during the COVID-19 pandemic. Her project highlights cases in Hamburg and Berlin to explore factors such as economic status that most likely led to an increase in domestic violence against women. Her research ties in with the claim put forward by Birungi and Catherine that early childhood education is vital when it comes to teaching respect for persons of all genders, sexualities, ethnicities and religions. Lindenschmid argues that domestic violence is an intersectional problem that is not only based on gender discrimination but also determinants such as education.

The spectrum of papers presented in this volume is a testament to the fact that RBL allows students to conduct research in those areas that they find most interesting. Also, it proves that students gain knowledge and insights into societal change and develop skills that are becoming more and more important on today’s post-graduate job market. What may seem like a jungle of disparate papers is in fact evidence that – despite the administrative workload – RBL in higher education is worthwhile in terms of creating an inclusive learning environment in which students can explore research questions actively rather than serving as passive consumers. In this way, students become producers of knowledge within said environment.

Both the conference and this edited volume are part of a larger project “Forschendes Lernen 2.0” that was funded by the Ministry of Science, Research, and the Arts of the State of Baden-Württemberg. The project was not only intended to further foster RBL at Zeppelin University, but has also allowed the editors to interconnect with student researchers from all over the world. The project’s internationalization strategy is twofold: beyond the ISRC, it encompasses the establishment of a Visiting Student Research Program that allowed and allows external students to conduct research at Zeppelin University, or our students to pursue research stays at other universities. We wish to thank the funding institutions, all researchers who presented papers at the ISRC, and all authors who shared their findings in this volume.

The innovative spirit of Zeppelin University in teaching and research has been made possible through generous and ongoing financial support by the Gips Schüle Stiftung. The editors would like to thank the Gips Schüle Foundation, and foremost Dr. Stefan Hofmann, for our excellent cooperation in the field of RBL. We look forward to many years of fruitful conversation in the fields of student research and student exchange. Likewise, the editors would also like to extent a heartfelt thank you to the following student assistants, some of whom have in the meantime graduated: Tristan Brömsen, Laurenz Bramlage, Mario Ferrufino, Adrian ter Hell, Büsra Kabakci, Leo Lindenschmid, Johanna Nagel, and our chief-editor Maya Geiss. Along with Florian Horky and Felix Krell, they set up the ISRC as a successful hybrid conference using streaming as well as VR elements.

DECORUM AND CIVIL WAR: THEORY OF A CIVIL WAR INDEX

NICOLAS STOJEK

KEYWORDS: Decorum; Civil war; Civil war index; TRACE; Architecture

ABSTRACT: This article shows the close connection between common sense and ingroup stability and proposes, on this basis, a theory of an experimentally measurable civil war index. The argumentation follows the assumption that there is a cultural rule-ranking system that ranks artefacts on the spectrum of high-ranking to low-ranking. High-ranking artefacts are linked to very intense emotions, such as fear of death, and can therefore be encoded more effectively. Following a cultural stress theory that describes cultures as Maximal Stress Cooperation Units, high-ranking decorum can even be transmitted in biological memory systems. The perception of decorum rules could therefore be biologically inherited as well as culturally transmitted. Measuring the perception of high-ranking artefacts could then show the bond between a population and its central artefacts, and based on those results, one could draw conclusions regarding the ability of the ingroup/cooperation unit to cooperate.

1.0 INTRODUCTION

On the 6th of January 2021, a group of American protesters stormed the Washington Capitol, an incident portrayed by the German media at the time in direct comparison with events six months earlier in Germany, during which anti-COVID-policy protesters and so-called Reichsbürger (conspiracy theorists who claim the law of the German Kaiserreich still applies) attempted to storm the German parliament building. In both cases, the actions were interpreted as an attack on the ruling democratic system; in the US, the incident was framed as an act of domestic terrorism and a near-coup (Sacco 2021; Tucker & Jalonick 2021; Flicking 2021). This portrayal, however, cannot be made in qualitative terms, since the violence in the US had serious repercussions, whereas the protesters in Germany were prevented from entering the Reichstag by just three police officers. Nevertheless, a similarity between the two cases can be found, namely, both involved the intrusion of hostile symbols in the domain of the official constitutional sphere.

Based on the works of Thomas Hobbes and Carl Schmitt, it could be argued that these two incidents are two intensity levels on the same escalation spectrum, which has at its end the tensions that could spark a civil war. Hobbes describes the state as a unified multitude with a common goal to leave the so-called state of nature,1 as a group that makes a contract that empowers one sovereign to rule over the people (Hobbes 1996). The newborn state can be destroyed by having its sovereign power undermined by a competing force that claims sovereignty within the same state, or which questions the legitimacy of the ruling sovereign, given that it creates a grouping of citizens that perceives the “other side” as the enemy (Schmitt 2015). The intensification of the conflict that leads to friend-enemy grouping can go so far as to become a civil war. If we accept this interpretation, there needs to be a criterion that allows us to determine the intensity levels, so that the acute danger of violent inner conflicts can be gauged within a spectrum. The goal of this article is, then, to explore one potential criterion.

Based on the investigations of the research group TRACE (Transmission in Rhetorics, Arts and Cultural Evolution), one can formulate a theory that links the central elements of a functioning society to the perception of its central artefacts and consequently to the stability of the observed culture/community/society. Since a strong bond to this “imagined community” (Anderson 2006) is crucial to creating common sense, measuring people’s perceptions regarding their central artefacts could be considered a valid means of assessing the stability of a given culture/community/society, as well as the risk of political instability, which in the worst-case scenario could lead to civil war.

In this article, the crucial concepts for a successful culture/community/society will first be clarified, after which said concepts will be combined with insights on the subject of civil war and the latest experimental findings. This will allow the theory presented in the following sections to be transformed into a concrete experiment design that is meant to offer at least the first parameter for creating a civil war index. This parameter alone will of course not be sufficient to reliably forecast civil wars; nevertheless, it will be of great value in terms of exploring the connection between the people and their central artefacts, given that their perceptions of the latter can offer important insights into their state of mind, their willingness to cooperate, and consequently, to maintaining political stability. Developing such a measurement instrument and subsequently finding and exploring further important and measurable parameters could allow us to assess the risk of civil war and precisely analyze its causes. In this way, it may be possible to prevent civil wars from erupting, or at the very least to be sufficiently prepared to stop them from becoming catastrophic.

Considering that the theory presented here is directly derived from the successfully tested experiment design of the TRACE group and employs their theoretical models and methods, other references that might discuss this particular topic will not be taken into account at this stage of the creation of a civil war index.

2.0 CULTURE AND COMMON SENSE

2.1 COOPERATION

Populations develop certain habits and gestures that may be specifically linked to their culture and that may distinguish them from other populations who developed their own habits in parallel (Mühlmann 2011). These particular behaviors can “out” a possible stranger among a given population, who could instantly be seen as a potential threat for the ingroup and elicit a hyper-reactional defensive attitude (Mühlmann 2007). A perfect example of this situation is the scene in Quentin Tarantino’s movie Inglorious Basterds , when a British spy disguised as a German officer reveals his real identity by ordering three drinks with a gesture showing his pointer, middle and ring fingers, instead of his thumb, pointer and middle fingers, which is the German way. After the revelation, a gunfight breaks out and everyone dies.

If a population is under constant stress, the need to outnumber the enemy and consequently to cooperate increases (Turchin 2007). To prevail against the other group, it is necessary for the leader to mobilize the ingroup population. To achieve this, he or she must evoke a range of emotions that help create a bond between the ingroup members themselves, as well as between the ingroup and the cooperation framework (e.g. the nation). Intense emotions that can give a sense of unity to a population can be linked to certain identifying symbols, like a national flag or a statue of a person relevant to the group’s survival, and may be used as triggers to motivate the defense of said group (see also Freud 2017; Weber 1926). The symbol becomes a label for an underlying emotion that is regulated in a beneficial way for the ingroup population, in this case to mobilize for war (Mühlmann 2006).

In summary, the struggle for survival and resources creates tensions between populations. Populations develop communication markers, such as certain habits that distinguish them from other populations. In order to survive, the ingroup needs to mobilize sufficient members to outnumber the enemy’s forces. Larger populations mediate the sense of community with symbols that serve as placeholders for the emotions that underlie a sense of unity. These emotions can be regulated by the application of artefacts and declarative markings, which, when used in life-threatening situations, can be memorized biologically, in keeping with the encoding process described above (Mühlmann 2007; Grunwald 2008).

The following clarification of the term decorum will show how cultural artefacts are closely connected to the struggle for survival and can be related to the symbols mentioned in this chapter.

2.2 DECORUM

Decorum is a Latin term, meaning “what is appropriate,” accompanied by the synonym aptum in ancient Roman and an even older similar term in ancient Greek: to prepon (Mühlmann 2005). It is evident, then, that the concept of decorum, if not the specific term, dates back at least 2,500 years (Thimann 2003). In cultural theory, decorum is used as a ranking system for cultural rules on a scale from high-ranking to lowranking. In the context of art, an artefact with decorum is seen as combining two characteristics: pulchritudo (an innate quality of the body) and ornamentum (external supplements to the body). For an artefact to be considered appropriate, there needs to be an accurate match between ornamentum and pulchritudo . This interdependence becomes obvious when we ask ourselves whether a ramshackle hut could be an appropriate meeting place for the parliament of a leading nation, which would of course be answered in the negative, given the mismatch of circumstances. Thus, it can be argued that a discrepancy between substance (pulchritudo) and supplements (ornamentum) can give the impression of ridiculousness (Kirjuchina 2018).

In the distant past, victory parades and certain religious rituals were held on procession roads, places of the highest public dignity on which only rituals of the highest importance were performed. Consequently, the surroundings of the procession road, such as the architecture, had to match the dignity and importance of the ritual in order to maintain the proper relation between ornamentum and pulchritudo and lend the event a sense of decorum (Mühlmann 2005). Events of the highest public importance can only be caused by developments that have a major impact on every member of the ingroup, the maximum impact being the risk of death to oneself; to the population; or to the cooperation group one belongs to and is to some degree dependent on.

In societies, decorum artefacts are those that contribute to the central functions that can endanger or ensure the survival of a culture. Since what is high-ranking is linked so closely to survival, it generates intense emotions that can be memorized very effectively. This is found to be in accordance with the doctrine of affections (Mühlmann 2005, 2007). Furthermore, and even more importantly, it shows that the artefacts that form the identity and perception of a culture are actually rooted in the MSC event. As soon as they are part of the event, they are subject to selection pressure. Artefacts that were perceived as high-ranking in the past and continue to be seen as such in this day and age have then proven their evolutionary success.

2.3 ARCHITECTURE AS HIGH-RANKING ARTEFACT

For the theory presented in this paper, architecture is the most relevant artefact. Accordingly, we will now go over the most important features of successful high-ranking architecture based on European-Western decorum. The first high-ranking architectural object is the town’s outer wall with its gates, the visible separation of in and out, safety and danger (Mühlmann 2005). The second high-ranking building is the temple, as it is considered the earthly connection between human sinners and divine power, a place where mortal meets immortal. The temple is also seen as a place of justice and, back when the ruler was said to be divinely chosen, it was also the seat of the sovereign. Further high-ranking ancient architectural structures share common features like archways, ancient Greek columns (Doric, Ionic, Corinthian), gables and ornamental facades, as well as dome ceilings.

High-ranking architecture has to be situated at the spatial and symbolic center of the community (Mühlmann 2005; Oppenheim et al. 2010; see also Koch 2000), since it belongs to the whole ingroup population; whereas low-ranking architecture belongs to the sphere of individual – secular – needs, and therefore does not have to fulfill the strict formal requirements that apply to high-ranking artefacts in the sphere of sacrality. This implies that low-ranking architecture is rather at the periphery, where the ornamentum can be decorative without any sense of seriousness (Mühlmann 2005). Low-ranking buildings may then be admired for their pleasant appearance but will not evoke any deeper significance for the population; Jugendstil architecture could be an example.

The research group TRACE has specialized in investigating the previously described effects: the transmission of cultural traits in biological memory systems. TRACE succeeded in showing experimentally that the described culture x genetic interaction actually occurs (Oppenheim et al. 2009). The experiment in question was designed and executed as follows: the goal was to determine whether or not the distinction between high-ranking and low-ranking architecture is made in a preconscious cognitive state. Therefore, the subjects were shown three kinds of pictures: pictures of everyday objects, pictures of high-ranking architecture and pictures of low-ranking architecture. The preconscious effects were detected in three ways:

1. Those conducting the experiment focused on the response period of up to 300ms after the stimulus input. Conscious perception occurs in the response period between 300ms and 600ms. Thus, the observed effects only concern an effect outside the area of conscious perception.

2. Only statistical average values of the minimum number of subjects and the statistical minimum number of stimuli were of interest. That is to say, no information was gathered on individual reactions.

3. The subjects were asked to determine whether or not the pictures displayed on the screen were everyday items or architecture. In this way, their focus was shifted away from the actual question of the experiment, namely, whether or not high-ranking architecture is preconsciously perceived as such. The experiments were conducted using the neuroelectric method, the results of which are called event related potentials (ERPs).

Findings: It was observed that brain waves peaked in a response period before 300ms when the subjects were shown drawings of highranking architecture. This effect was called “300ms-hro-i” (300ms: 300 milliseconds – hr: high-ranking; o: ornament – inclusion). In other words, in a timeframe of up to 300ms, preconscious perception of highranking ornaments manifested as an inclusive effect among European subjects (see Fig. 1). The brain waves of Chinese subjects, however, did not show such effects for drawings showing high-ranking architecture designed according to European-Western decorum (Mecklinger et al. 2013). TRACE interpreted the 300ms-hro-i effect as preconscious cultural proprioception (eigenperception=inclusive effect).

In order to gain reliable results, the subjects’ attention not only had to be shifted away from the actual research question, but the drawings of high-ranking architecture could not show buildings that actually existed (Gabriel 2011, see Fig. 2). All this was necessary so as to not contaminate the results via anecdotal memories linked to existing buildings. Such an anecdotal memory could be, for example, a marriage proposal made in front of Notre-Dame cathedral. In the subject’s emotional episodic memory, this anecdote would distort the measured perception of Notre-Dame as a high-ranking building. To avoid distortions, the drawings were created not by copying existing buildings, but by the illustrator following the ancient rules of high-ranking architecture, as recorded by authors like Vitruvius in ancient Rome or Leon Batista Alberti and Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola during the Renaissance (Burckhardt 1953).

Figure 2. Top row: low-ranking architecture; middle row: high-ranking architecture; bottom row: everyday objects.

3. CIVIL WAR INDEX

We have already seen that cultures are rooted in maximal stress events that are deeply encoded in both cultural and biological memory systems. The culture x genetic interaction manifests these memories. This effect was experimentally shown by TRACE. Cultures are MSC units, which means that cooperation is essential to survival. A population that sees itself as an ingroup is emotionally rooted in the same MSC event and, as TRACE’s experiments have shown, perceives its culture-specific highranking artefacts preconsciously. By evoking these shared, intense emotional symbols, one could potentially mobilize the population of an MSC unit. Since large societies, e.g. modern societies, are far too large for personal relationships between all ingroup members (Gamble et al. 2015), conveying a sense of community and the will to cooperate has to be achieved using mediating artefacts (Anderson 2006). One such artefact is high-ranking architecture, since there is evidence that this architecture can be perceived as prototypical culture-specific artefacts (Oppenheim et al. 2010; Gabriel 2011).

Hypothesis 1: If this aesthetic perception and political sentiment are essentially connected with high-ranking architecture, a positive perception of these central cultural artefacts could be equated with political stability.

Civil war: Through the millennia, the term “civil war” has constantly been used in different ways, depending on the current ruler’s specific interpretation of inner conflicts (Armitage 2016). Therefore, it makes sense to provide a personalized interpretation of civil war that fits the experiment design and thus the MSC theorem.

This specific interpretation would be: Civil wars are violent conflicts that occur within a homogenous set of Maximal Stress Cooperation Units, and which endure either until they lead to the decline of the homogenous set of MSC units, or until order is (violently) restored within the cooperation unit.

Hypothesis 2: If political instability correlates with the decline of the emotional and aesthetic bond to the central artefact of high-ranking architecture, which mediates a sense of community, this weakening of the bond should then be measurable.

These hypotheses are rooted in events surrounding the storming of the Capitol in Washington on the 6th of January 2021. If the US had had a functional set of MSC units, the rioters would have felt a pronounced reluctance to storm and invade the Capitol. This reluctance, which the rioters lacked, was subsequently felt by those members of American society who were outraged by their actions.

The Capitol belongs to the architectural category of “Palladianism” (Koch 2000). This classicist style is highly influenced by and integrates construction style elements from the rule systems of Vitruvius, Palladio and Vignola. Thus, the Capitol fulfills the conditions for being seen as high-ranking architecture that could be biologically memorized.

3.1 EXPERIMENT DESIGN

The experiment design can mostly follow the design that the TRACE group used for their previously mentioned research. The goal will thus be to investigate the preconscious perceptions of high-ranking and lowranking architecture and the responses to the former’s violated state by adding new drawings to the test, such as those of violated high-ranking architecture that will be shown along with those used in the first experiment. This defacing could include widely known/common signs of negation, e.g. a pentagram or a phallus graffitied on a church. It is of great importance not to confuse violated architecture with damaged architecture. Ruins of high-ranking buildings do not lose their potential to trigger emotions as long as the relevant parts of the building are still somewhat recognizable (Gabriel 2011).

It now must be observed how subjects react to violated and non-violated high-ranking architecture. The hypothesis is: if violated high-ranking architecture evokes pleasure or indifference and if non-violated highranking architecture is perceived indifferently or negatively, the mediation artefact fails in its function to mediate a sense of community and cooperation. This could be interpreted as a sign of political instability that could in the worst case lead to civil war. The inference concerning the suggested reactions stems from the relation between high-ranking architecture and affection, and must fulfill certain conditions, as previously mentioned in this paper.

The perception of high-ranking architecture is inherited and innate; the use of high-ranking elements has been a tradition for thousands of years. Accordingly, high-ranking architecture appears as everlasting and in its transcendency2 seems nearly divine, “automatically” commanding a certain amount of respect. If that respect is denied or disrespect promoted, the consequences can be the same as for intense emotions (Mühlmann 2014); accordingly, this emotional reaction should be measurable.

The TRACE group has been informed about the idea of an experimentally measurable civil war index and is currently evaluating its practicability. If the experiments are conducted and successful, the results could be used as early warning systems.

4. DISCUSSION

The civil war index as developed so far cannot offer a perfectly reliable method for predicting political instability, since it only measures a single, though very central, component of such complex processes as escalation dynamics within a society. Therefore, further efforts will be required to identify and test other parameters that contribute to destabilization processes. Other candidates that have already been proposed are the number of male offspring compared to the positions to occupy in a given society (Heinsohn 2006), the level of economic inequality in a given society, the rise of the crime rate and distribution battles among the upper class (Turchin 2007), and the relation between a certain kind of reporting and inner conflict (Mueller & Rauh 2017). These proposals will need to be given due consideration.

The specific contribution of a decorum-based civil war index lies in its deep embeddedness in members of Western European populations. The measurement of how decorum is perceived includes the deepest emotions that underlie sentiments towards one’s own culture/community/society and can therefore be seen as very pure, albeit highly abstract, indications of loyalty towards the ingroup.

As this still needs to be proven experimentally, the idea is to initially develop a theoretical framework based on extant literature, and to prepare the necessary experiments for examining the validity of this theoretical proposal and adjusting it if necessary.