Coming Together After Genocide: How Openness to Communication About Conflict Experiences Shapes Willingness for Social Integration in Post Genocide Rwanda

Enhancing prospects for social integration after genocide is important, as past research has shown that greater social integration in local communities can curb future outbreaks of violence (McDoom, 2014) and reduce the severity of posttraumatic stress symptoms associated with past violence (Rieder & Elbert, 2013). Thus, the present research seeks to extend prior work investigating factors that increase willingness for social integration (Kauff et al., 2021; Paolini et al., 2018; Ron et al., 2017) to a post genocide context. Study 1 used self-reported responses from a large community survey (n = 435), and Study 2 used pre and post assessments from a year long structured dialog intervention (n = 81) with survivors, perpetrators, and bystanders of the Rwandan genocide. Across two studies we demonstrate that even after genocide, where divergent collective narratives are common and deeply connected to traumatic experiences, greater openness to communicating with outgroup members about conflict experiences is associated with greater willingness to socially integrate, controlling for age, gender, self-reported positive contact, and empathy. Study 2 found that although survivors tended to enter these programs significantly less open to communicate and less willing to socially integrate compared to perpetrators and bystanders, they grew more open and willing following their participation in dialog-based interventions with genocide perpetrators and bystanders. We discuss the implications of these findings for theory and practice.