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Humans define groups to which they belong in abstract terms, striving to bond with anonymous others, making their greatest exertions in killing and dying not to preserve their own lives or to defend families and friends--but to affirm transcendent ideologies.
Across cultures, group identity is bound by sacred values. Whether for cooperation or conflict--devotion to God or a collective cause--signal group identity operating as moral imperatives inspiring non-rational exertions independent of likely outcomes.
Interviewing Palestinians, Israelis, Indonesians, Indians, Afghans, and Iranians, my research finds that offering material incentives (large amounts of money, guarantees for a life free of political violence) to compromise sacred values backfires, increasing willingness to use violence.
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