Beyond Collective Victimhood: How Diverse Conflict Knowledge Relates to Community Cohesion

In conflict-affected societies, collective victimization can undermine social cohesion or foster narrow ingroup bonding and parochialism. We examine whether the possibility to know and freely communicate about diverse conflict experiences, which go beyond collective (ingroup) victimhood, can serve as a resource for community cohesion (i.e., community attachment and efficacy). Nationally representative surveys from two conflict-ridden societies, Sri Lanka (N = 1188) and the Occupied Palestinian Territory (N = 1000), reveal that individuals with broader knowledge of diverse conflict experiences exhibit stronger attachment to their local communities and perceive them as more efficacious, but only when they believe knowledge of these experiences can be shared within their community. Conversely, diverse conflict knowledge is related to a lower sense of community cohesion when individuals perceive diverse conflict experiences as unspeakable in their community. The findings contribute to our understanding of the potential effects of violent conflict on social cohesion and highlight the importance of openness to discuss the full range of conflict experiences.