Collective victimhood and support for joint political decision-making in conflict regions: The role of shared territorial ownership perceptions

Abstract

In territorial interethnic conflicts people often claim exclusive land ownership for their ingroup. However, they can also view the ingroup and outgroup as entitled to the land. It is unknown what explains such shared ownership perceptions and how these in turn inform opinions about conflict resolution. We focused on different types of collective victimhood as precursors of shared ownership perceptions, and on joint decision-making as a political outcome. In the context of the Israeli–Palestinian and Kosovo disputes, using national samples of Jewish Israelis (N = 609, Study 1) and Albanians and Serbs (N = 995, Study 2), we found that inclusive victimhood was related to higher, and competitive victimhood to lower, shared ownership perceptions. Shared ownership was, in turn, related to more support for joint decision-making. Our findings highlight the importance of collective victimhood in explaining shared ownership perceptions, which consequently inform opinions about the political route to conflict resolution.