Inaugural Lecture Carsten de Dreu: On Saints and Soldiers: Rethinking the Co-evolution of Group Cooperation and Conflict

On Friday the 21st of March, Professor Carsten de Dreu will deliver his inaugural lecture on rethinking the co-evolution of group cooperation and conflict. Carsten de Dreu holds the interfaculty chair Fundamentals of Cooperation and Social Organization, an initiative of FEB and the Faculty of Behavioural and Social Sciences of the University of Groningen.

In his lecture, De Dreu will delve into the questions of why and how individuals form groups and cooperate, and what explains the co-ocurrence of cooperation and intergroup conflict. In answer to these questions, prominent theories in the social, behavioural and biological sciences hold that individuals organise in groups, and that cooperation evolved, to defend against dangerous other groups. What remains open, however, is where conflict and enemy threat comes from in the first place.

In his lecture, De Dreu aims to answer the question of why individuals form groups and cooperate to fight other groups when there is no history of violence to revenge, and other groups pose no threat to oneself or one’s group. He discusses the results of experiments that examined two possible answers.

He first examines the possibility that individuals cooperate to aggress out-groups because of evolved dislike for (members of) outside groups and communities – saints towards us and soldiers against them. His experiments disconfirm this possibility.

Next, de Dreu examines the possibility that individuals cooperate to aggress out-groups to win ‘spoils of war’ that benefit themselves and their in-group – saints towards, and soldiers for us. Experiments performed in the Netherlands, China and rural parts of Africa support this possibility – individuals cooperate to make their groups strong and dangerous because they care about the groups they depend on for status, resources and opportunities.

In the ultimate, group cooperation did not evolve because of conflict. Conflict evolves because of cooperation.

More information

Carsten de Dreu's inaugural lecture will take place on Friday 21 March 2025,16:15 - 17:00, in the aula of the Academy Building.

Livestream on 21 March 2025, see: www.rug.nl/digitale-oratie

Questions? Please contact Carsten de Dreu.