A Criminological Study of Psychological State of Perpetrators of Crimes Against Humanity

The crimes committed against humanity are amongst the clear violations of criminal international law and are extra ordinary forms of collective violence which have escaped the notice of criminologists for a long time, since the prosecution, trail and punishment of those committing these crimes did not prevent them from perpetrating crimes. Studying the criminological nature of these crimes could be a good help for international criminal justice to fight against them knowingly and to achieve an effective international criminal policy to prevent them. A criminological approach to do so is the study of psychological state of those perpetrating these crimes. The present article aims to attain such a goal. The criminological findings indicate that those committing these crimes are common people. The us-them thinking and justifications of perpetrators to overcome cognitive dissonance and their natural inhibitions to deceive themselves have an effective role in realization of given crimes. Dehumanization of victims, scapegoating of victims and deserving them to be punished, resorting to the amnesty and forgiveness world views are amongst those justifications to be dealt with herein