Recreation of Girard's "Scapegoating Mechanism" in Discourse of National Identity Politics

As globalism becomes an increasingly encroaching force, nation-states strive to maintain social solidarity to counter effects such as extensive migration flows and accelerated acculturation. Owing to the unique history and socio-political nature of GCC nation-states, the methods of establishing and maintaining the spirit of the nation and imagined community are very particular and contingent on exclusion and glorification of ethnic origins. This paper explores the intellectual viability of Rene Girard’s scapegoating mechanism in national identity discourse with a particular focus on GCC nation-states, and particularly Kuwait as a case study. Based on that, the paper asks, “How does discourse maintain national identity as populations become more fluid and transient in an increasingly globalized world?”  In line with Girard’s definition of the scapegoating mechanism, it is when the majority identifies and physically “sacrifices” lesser socially integrated surrogate victims to diffuse internal tensions. To examine intellectual sacrifice in GCC national identity discourse, the paper presents a theoretical framework identifying the elements that lead to nationalistic sentiments and hostilities toward the Other within a nation-state (i.e. imagined community) both in general and within the GCC nation-states, followed by a survey of Kuwaiti newspaper headlines spanning the years of 2010-2015 to identify common patterns of impersonalization, and aggregation, among others. The findings show that public discourse in newspapers clearly reflects social dynamics among nationals and non-nationals within rentier GCC nation-states. This study concludes that there is a tendency for rentier GCC nation-states to utilize “intellectual sacrifice” to maintain their national solidarity as a result of demographic imbalance.