Why Do Civilizations Clash?
There are at least two answers Huntington offers to this question: these clashes have roots in the human psyche and in the nature of cultures. At the deepest level, the clash of civilizations is rooted in our psyche. People define themselves by identifying with “cultural groups: tribes, ethnic groups, religious communities, nations, and, at the broadest level, civilizations.” But this is not enough: in order to deepen our identity we must also hate others. In other words, the clash of civilizations is rooted in natural human frailties. This two-part thesis is problematic in both its parts. The psychic need for identity is better fulfilled by identifying with smaller groups-one’s family, village, tribe, trade union, club, or team-rather than with larger, secondary, more distant groups, such as nations and civilizations. If we do identity with a nation or civilization, this is socially constructed, not rooted in our psyche. Similarly, if our self-definition does feed on hatred, we might
