Using mimetic theory to engage political studies, Farneti highlights reciprocal imitation as the fundamental cause of human discord, the mechanisms of spontaneous polarization in human conflicts (i.e., the emergence of dyads or "doubles"), and the strange and ever-growing resemblance of the mimetic rivals, which is precisely what pushes them to annihilate each other.

Roberto Farneti is Assistant Professor of Politics at the School of Economics and Management of the Free University of Bozen-Bolzano in Italy.