DUMONDE
Part of: Digital Nationalism and the Fragmentation of European Identity
Essay 1 / 7Working Paper17 min

The Tribal Brain: Why We Belong

|Updated February 4, 2026|Introductory
Why do we feel a shiver when the national anthem plays? What drives us to passionately defend strangers who share our flag? The answer lies deep within our brain, in neural circuits forged hundreds of thousands of years ago. This essay explores the evolutionary roots of our need to belong — and how that need has become a vulnerability in the digital age.
tribalismneuroscienceevolutionary-psychologygroup-identityoxytocin

Abstract

Why does an anthem raise goosebumps? Why does social exclusion hurt like a physical blow? This essay explores the evolutionary roots of human tribalism — from oxytocin to Benedict Anderson's imagined communities — and why those mechanisms make us vulnerable to digital manipulation.

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