Making decisions in groups - Essay Example

Application Essay: Groups If there is an example that demonstrates how bad a group’s decision making can get when taken to the extreme, it would be the terrorist groups. In this essay, the group “Hizb ut-Tahrir” will be taken as an example to illustrate the villainous stance of a group when done in extreme. The group in discussion would be the “Hizb ut-Tahrir”, a global Sunni network committed to establishing an international Islamic empire which is reportedly tied to Al Qaeda, the world’s most notorious terrorist group.

It preaches “jihadism” or holy war and indoctrinates kids ages 9 to 18 about the idea of forming an empire that will rule according to Islamic law and the means to achieve it including jihad. It has also controversial stands like it permissiveness to hijacking planes if it belongs to a country that is at war with Muslims like Israel. Experts said that “Hizb ut-Tahrir” can be likened to a middle school of terrorism that prepares the candidates to be recruited by the high school of terrorism which is Al Qaeda.

Although the group says that change must come from the minds of people and does not endorse violence, it however has some alarming political stands as pronounced by the leaflets it circulated in March calling of “a state of war against America.” But despite of this, the group “Hizb ut-Tahrir” still remains to be off the government’s terror watch list. The social psychological concepts that can be applied in group are the ill effect a group can get on when it goes extreme; especially in this case when individuality is being relegated to religion.

Taken to the extreme, it can get delusional as its religion calls for world domination without considering other type of beliefs. Reason lost its grip as the group acts like a herd and becomes close-minded and delusional in assessing the reality and feasibility of its intended plan. It also became biased in processing information and prejudiced to the extreme with its inability to consider that there will always be a belief system that will not coincide with their religion and that the solution to real peace is tolerance not jihad.

And to teach jihad or holy war at this day and age where everybody is striving for peace as we learn from the lessons of the devastation of war, is just unthinkable. The group is a classic example where group decisions can get more extreme than an individual making its own decision. Individuality is being lost in the name of religion and at some point taken to some extreme deviant acts. It also typifies the ill-effect of group thinking like close-mindedness as it indoctrinates an ideology that is not grounded in reality like establishing an empire that will rule according to Islamic law without considering the reality we are living in a pluralistic society.

This group’s dynamics directly connects to the psychological concept of overestimating itself as a group of what it can do when it called for Islamic imperialism. It presented the ill symptom of a dreadful group of being very biased in the processing of information and surveying of alternatives. Finally, groups of “Hizb ut-Tahrir” kind, clearly illustrates the psychological concept of how can a group will lose the individuality of its member towards an end that not only coerce, but sows fear and terror to mankind.

REFERENCE http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,533525,00.html