A Socio-Ecological and Multilevel Approach to the Role of Honour Cultures on Violence Justification: Resource Scarcity and Ineffective Law Enforcement

This study examines the role of the socio-ecology of honour in violence justification by focusing on the scarcity of resources and inadequate law enforcement at both national and personal levels. Using data from the WVS and adopting a multilevel approach (57 countries, N = 73,838), we found that greater personal experience of economic precarity and crime witnessing predicted stronger justification of violence. These relationships were moderated by the country-level socio-ecological roots of honour, defined in terms of national-level low income, unequal distribution of resources, and low adherence to the rule of law, used as proxies of resource scarcity and inadequate law enforcement. In countries with weak socio-ecological roots of honour, personal experiences of precarity and crime were associated with stronger justification of violence, whereas in countries with strong socio-ecological roots of honour, the effect sizes of these associations were negligible. We discuss the social comparison, cultural fit, and cultural backlash hypotheses as potential explanations of the interaction effect observed between nation- and personal-level factors.