Not by Bread Alone: Immoderate Politics and the Roots of Suffering

Abstract

Baumeister and Bushman explicitly limit their theorizing to the US and the present-day context, but the system of division and union functions similarly in all environments that have defined ingroups and outgroups, limited or poorly distributed resources, social discontent, and those who seek power. The basic premise that society produces, and shares resources applies to all past, present, and future collectives, and if this is the assumption from which all predictions follow, they should apply equally to all countries (unless there is a non-articulated boundary condition that can explain why it only applies to the US and the present).