In such a situation, a sociologist, though preferring the evidence of participants and witnesses, would have to rely on circumstantial evidence. Fortunately, such evidence is usually abundant. The first item of evidence is, of course, the disappearance of a group. Such disappearances occur only rarely due to chance. Additional evidence would consist of a whole range of events and activities that are unlikely to be chance events.
Many illustrations come readily to mind.
Nor can the continuing victimization of the non-Moslems in the Southern Sudan be explained without reference to intent. Difficulties arise when the event could have been the result of misguided policies or the incompetent execution of well-intentioned policies. Thus, the attraction of persecuting a group during wartime is that the perpetrator can claim that the losses were the unavoidable by-product of wartime conditions. The current government of Turkey still advances this explanation in its denial of the Armenian genocide although quite enough evidence has been accumulated to show that it was a carefully planned event. The other time that is favoured by many perpetrators for the persecution of their victims is a period of natural events that adversely affect agriculture, such as drought, extreme heat or extreme cold, floods, insect plagues, etc.