Towards a social psychology of extreme situations: Primo Levi's "If This is a Man" and social identity theory.

The present study deals with social relationships in the extreme situation of the concentration camp, using Primo Levi's If This Is a Man, written just after the author's release from Auschwitz. This text was chosen because it is one of the most important testimonies of the Holocaust and, at the same time, a work of great artistic value. An analysis of the behaviour described gives us access to otherwise irretrievable data. Three aims have been pursued: (1) to explore and describe interpersonal and intergroup behaviour in extreme situations from the victims' perspective; (2) to analyse these types of behaviour through social identity theory (SIT); and (3) to highlight certain observations and comments by Levi, an excellent 'privileged observer', which might suggest new directions of research in this field. Turning our attention to interpersonal and intergroup relations, we submitted the text to content analysis. Correspondence analysis was then carried out. The results support the importance of Tajfel's (1981) theory for the analysis of extreme situations, but also suggest possible extensions of the present model following Levi's theorizing. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.