RELATIVE DEPRIVATION THEORY: CONTRIBUTION OF RUNCIMAN AND GURR What is Relative De, Theory (ROT)? Relative Deprivation Theory (RD7) is a theory that explains the subjective dissatisfaction caused by one person’s relative position to the situation or pasition of another. Far many people, relative deprivation means the lack of resources or time to support certain lifestyles, activities, and amenities that an individual or group has become accustomed to. ‘The pressure of the saciety to which people belong encourages them to participate. When this isnot possible, a person begins to constantly compare his ar her own position with the situation or position of another. From above definition af relative deprivation, two similar terms follow: paverty and social exclusion. The term is used in social sciences to express feelings or forms of economic, social Relative deprivation strongly influences bath behavior and attitudes. This also includes experienced levels of stress and political views. The phenamenon of relative deprivatian is also associated with the biological cancept of retative fitness, where an organism successfully defeats its natural competitors, therefore producing more offspring. Relative deprivation is often cited as the reason for the emergence of social movements. which in extreme cases lead to politics, such as terrorism, riots, civil wars and other instances of so deviation. The opposite of relative deprivation is relative satisfaction. Conditions for relative depriv: In Garry Runciman’s Relative Deprivation Theory, four conditions are set for retative deprivation. ‘The conditions are about object X in relation to Person A. Person A does not have X Person A knows other people wha have X Person A would like to awn X Person A believes itis realistic to own X Relative deprivation according to Garry Runciman The first is Garry Runciman, bor in 1994. He distinguished between fratemal and selfish deprivation. An example of fratemal deprivation is a large social movement, such as the American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s, as a result of racial discriminationAnother example of fraternal deprivation is the envy that middle class people feel when they see people on television portrayed as middle class driving expensive ears and wearing exclusive watches. Fratemal deprivation is also linked to voting behavior. This mainly coneems voting behavior for extreme right-wing political movements. ‘The second form of relative deprivation is selfish deprivation. According to Gary Runciman, this. is primarily caused by the unfavorable social pasition of ane individual compared to that of another. ‘An example of selfish relative deprivation is an emplayee wha feels he should have gotten that promotion earlier Relative deprivation can then cause this employee to take action to improve his awn position in relation to his colleagues. However, many af these actions hardly ever contribute to the position of the employee. Relat jvation according to Ted Gurr ‘The second person to be one of the first to research relative deprivation is Ted Gurr. Ted Robert Gurr believed that if an obstacle is created to the way people achieve their demands and goals. they will be subject to relative deprivation. The natural response to this is to damage the source of the barrier. ‘Ted Gurr expiains the link between relative deprivation and political violence in his book ‘Why Men Rebel’. The book discusses why peaple commit political violence and how regimes respond to viglence. Although the book was written long before this time, it has a lot to do with what is happening in the 21st century. In the book Gurr examines whether the primary source of the human capacity for violence is the frustration-aggression mechanism, as the frustration-aggressian theory states. ‘According to Gurr, frustration does not always lead to violence, but if someone or a graup is exposed to frustration for a long time, it often leads ta anger and ultimately violence.