A Study in Race Prejudice

Abstract

The preamble to the constitution of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation states: "Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must be constituted." The factors that arouse men to conflict are multiple. Specialists in one line of research give due stress to those factors which they term "economic", and in the same way, authorities in other fields emphasise "political" or "geographic" factors and numbers of other influences and causes which, in sum and in various combinations, go to make up the whole predisposing and exciting causation of wars. Insofar as every situation and each set of circumstances in which human beings are involved is "social", one might justifiably subsume the whole multiple causation of hostility (which may culminate in overt aggression) under this heading. "In the minds of men" are political aspirations, economic motives, motives of prestige, power, and so on. Yet conflict within any particular society is, if not entirely suppressed, at least controlled in the main by the channelling of hostility and aggression into socially acceptable avenues of expression. Yet what of the fears and dislikes of national groups toward other groups? It would seem reasonable to combat these feelings just as we do those within our own national group. The position is complicated by the problem of race prejudice which, if it is not an outcome of the tendency to preserve in-group solidarity by out-group hostility, certainly serves as a convenient vehicle for hostility. We have all formed certain opinions about the characteristics of the people of other countries, and with these opinions we also have views about the ways in which such people should behave toward us and how we should behave toward them. Our attitudes toward these peoples have conditioned our opinions. Attitudes of prejudice – expressed verbally or through direct action - may serve as pegs for international tension. Many of these attitudes may be based in large part on lack of understanding and ignorance due to a lack of information, misinformation or misinterpretation of what information there is. It is evident that the members of different national groups can be in conflict or near-conflict without really knowing very much about each other or partly, also, because they know very little about each other. In 1944, nearly 2400 psychologists in the United States signed a manifesto asserting ten principles which should play a part in the building of world peace. Among the principles was a statement affirming that racial, national and group hatreds can, to a considerable extent, be controlled. "Through education and experience people can learn that their prejudicial ideas about the English, the Russians, the Japanese, Catholics, Jews, Negroes, are misleading or altogether false. They can learn that members of one racial, national or cultural group are basically similar to those of other groups, and have similar problems, hopes aspirations and needs. Prejudice is a matter of attitudes, and attitudes are to a considerable extent a matter of training and information." In this principle is the key to the endeavour of the present study: its aim is to explore the usefulness or two methods of educating groups toward international tolerance. The investigator's hope is that in this study there lies a useful, even though small, contribution toward the construction of "defences of peace" ...... "in the minds of men."