No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the authors.
Rehumanizing the Other: Empathy and Reconciliation
Abstract
The health effects of intra-ethnic conflict include hatred and fear among neighbors and friends who have become enemies. The dehumanization of specific groups through concomitant stereotyping does not stop when conflicts end. The inability to see former enemies as real people impedes reconciliation. While much attention has been paid to the reconstruction of infrastructure and the establishment of rule of law, little thought has been given to what is required at the day to day level in order to restore a sense of interpersonal security. To reverse the destruction of social and familial networks that normally sustain health and well-being, a process of rehumanization must occur. We suggest that the promotion of empathy is a critical component of reconciliation.
... This aspect highlights the need to address the effects of conflict on people more than on infrastructure and institutions. Therefore, the main challenge for social reconstruction in the post-conflict period (Halpern and Weinstein 2004) is to ensure that people coexist in everyday spaces with former aggressors, so it is key to restore interpersonal relationships transformed by conflict that legitimizes violent actions. For this reason, empathy -understood as the ability to share the emotions of another person (Klimecki 2019)-becomes relevant for the reconciliation of former enemies. ...
... For this reason, empathy -understood as the ability to share the emotions of another person (Klimecki 2019)-becomes relevant for the reconciliation of former enemies. In this sense, while social reconstruction occurs at the state and community levels, reconciliation involves the individual capacity to regain empathy for others (Halpern and Weinstein 2004). ...
The signing of the peace agreement with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia-People’s Army (FARC-EP) deepened the debate on the reconstruction of memory as a right of the victims and a way to advance in the reconciliation of Colombian
society. This article uses data from the 2019 Colombian Reconciliation Barometer of the Program of Alliances for Reconciliation of the United States Agency for International
Development and ACDI/VOCA to analyze the individual and contextual factors that affect how individuals perceive the reconstruction of memory as a tool that contributes to
reconciliation. We estimated a probabilistic model for which the dependent variable is the predisposition toward memory reconstruction as a predictor of reconciliation based on the context of the Colombian armed conflict, and a set of individual factors that capture the effects of community initiatives and state institutions and programs arising within the framework of transitional justice. We sought to verify whether the character�istics of individuals and their way of relating to each other in a community and municipal context shape the perception of the contribution of reconstructed memory to reconcil�iation. The results show that being a female victim of the armed conflict, developing empathy, residing in municipalities with the presence of Places of Memory, and trusting in the processes of transitional justice —such as clarifying the truth— increase an individual’s predisposition to consider that the reconstruction of memory contributes to reconciliation. In contrast, other policies and programs that emerged after the agreement, such as residing in municipalities with Territorially Focused Development Plans (PDET in Spanish) and the presence of Casas de Verdad (Truth Houses), operate in the opposite direction. This work suggests challenges for transitional justice by identifying the factors that condition positive outlooks toward the reconstruction of memory in reconciliation processes and opens the possibility of formulating actions with greater citizen acceptance .
... Strategic empathy is defined as the use of empathetic emotions in critical and intentional ways (Lindquist, 2004). To practice empathy, individuals are well-served by recognizing, but not necessarily adopting, others' views (Halpern & Weinstein, 2004). While research on empathy is relatively scarce and largely ambiguous (Zembylas, 2012), existing scholarship focused on empathy as a tool for equity and learning (e.g., Lindquist, 2004;Meyers et al., 2019;Zembylas, 2012). ...
... The TSLC programs had the ideal conditions to nurture both empathy and critical reflexive practice. To facilitate empathy, organizations must foster conditions such as trust, respectful disagreement, and relationships (Halpern & Weinstein, 2004). ...
At-promise students (low-income, first-generation college students, and/or racially minoritized) have long encountered disproportionate barriers in navigating higher education, resulting in disparate impacts during the COVID-19 pandemic. In this study, we examined how higher education practitioners in three comprehensive college transition programs facilitated the validation of at-promise students during the pandemic. By drawing upon empathy, practitioners engaged in critically reflective practice that allowed them to adapt previous strategies to the current context and provide key support.
... Esto último guarda una relación estrecha con la empatía, otro elemento que interviene en el proceso. Aquí se considera la empatía como el imaginar y buscar comprender la perspectiva de otras personas (Halpern y Weinstein, 2004), por lo que "depende, en buena medida, de la capacidad de la persona para ponerse en el lugar del otro e imaginar las vivencias y consecuencias de lo que les pasa a los demás" (Martín- Baró, 1985, p. 347). Los(as) jóvenes conectan empáticamente tanto con el presente como con el pasado de sus familiares. ...
Este artículo se interroga sobre cómo los(as) jóvenes de una comunidad desplazada construyen las memorias del conflicto armado de El Salvador (1980-1992), a pesar de no haberlo vivido. Desde una perspectiva cualitativa, mediante relatos de vida y foto-elicitación, se trabajó con diez jóvenes, quienes nacieron después del fin del conflicto armado en Nueva Trinidad, una comunidad al norte de El Salvador, desplazada por operativos militares y reconstruida por exrefugiados y excombatientes de la guerrilla. Se evidencia en los(as) jóvenes la construcción de memorias propias a través de los mecanismos de la imaginación y la empatía, siendo central en ello los relatos fragmentados que familiares y vecinos les han transmitido en una cotidianidad comunitaria que constantemente remite al conflicto armado.
... In view of these, some measures should be developed to improve medical professions' awareness about humanization. For instance, empathy is regarded as a requirement for overcoming dehumanization (67). Therefore, physicians' empathy should be promoted by medical training. ...
Background
Patients’ attribution in negative medical situations plays a vital role in reducing medical conflicts and developing high-quality healthcare. The purpose of this study was to investigate the triadic relations among patients’ attribution, medical humanization and communication. Furthermore, the mediating effect of communication was tested.
Methods
A cross-sectional study on the relationship between patients’ attribution in negative medical situations and medical staff’s humanization and communication was conducted, with 3,000 participants totally from 103 hospitals of three different levels in different regions.
Results
There were significant positive correlations among medical staff’s humanization, communication and patients’ attributional styles ( r = 0.112–0.236, p < 0.001 for all). Medical humanization had direct predictive effects on patients’ attributional style in negative medical situations ( β = 0.14, p < 0.01). Mediation analysis also indicated the indirect predictive effect of medical humanization on patients’ attributions through communication ( β = 0.02, p < 0.01).
Conclusion
Patients’ attribution in negative medical situations is predicted by patients’ perception of medical staff’s humanization in healthcare and physicians’ communication skills. Medical humanization not only affects patients’ attributions in negative situations directly, but also influences patients’ attributions via communication indirectly. The humanistic care should be included in medical education for healthcare professionals, and professional training on medical staff’s humanization and communication skills is strongly needed to establish healthy and harmonious doctor–patient relationship.
... Measures already discussed, such as new political institutions and transitional justice actions, can be expected to contribute to reducing the defining role of threat to identity. However, conceiving of reconciliation as identity change brings into play many other future-facing methods which can foster 're-humanisation' (Halpern and Weinstein, 2004) and 'integrative ties' (Gawerc, 2006). ...
A rich and complex literature on reconciliation has emerged in response to political transitions since the 1990s, yet reconciliation’s value as a concept within peace studies is unclear. Definitions are contested, impressionistic or overlap with other concepts, while ‘reconciliation’ remains politically contested in many conflict-affected societies. This article considers the four leading understandings of reconciliation: reconciliation as peacebuilding, reconciliation as transitional justice, reconciliation as forgiveness, and reconciliation as identity change. Each is assessed according to whether it is (1) conceptually coherent, and (2) likely to be credible to people in conflict. The article argues that by restricting reconciliation’s meaning to a modified version of the fourth understanding – reconciliation as transformed social identity – the term can hold a distinct meaning in the peace studies field and direct a clear research agenda, as well as attract much less political criticism and misunderstanding.
... This seems to be consistent with what Bandura (2001) found the threat to the sense of morality that could lead perpetrators to disengage themselves from uncertain acts which are committed by their group (Pakistan or Muslims). Such an approach lacked empathy for the suffering (to India/Hindus) caused by Pakistan and Muslims (Halpern and Weinstein 2004). Teachers in Lahore were influenced by family routines or oral histories, which may help to egitimate the anti-India sentiments. ...
The rivalry between India and Pakistan began on British withdrawal from the British Indian Empire in 1947, and with the sudden partition of India immediately afterwards. It has proven remarkably resilient. While the countries share a long history and have considerable social–cultural affinity, relations since Partition have been marked by three wars, constant border skirmishes and a deep distrust that permeates both societies. In each, teaching about those relations is weighted with political and cultural significance, and research shows that curriculums have been used to shape the mindset of new generations with regard to their neighbouring state. This book explores the attitudes and pedagogical decision-making of teachers in India and Pakistan when teaching India–Pakistan relations. Situating teachers in the context of reformed textbooks and curriculums in both countries that explicitly advocate critical thinking and social cohesion, Kusha Anand explores how far teachers have enacted these changes in their classrooms. Based on data collected from teachers via semi-structured interviews and classroom observations in India and Pakistan she argues that, despite whole-nation policies and texts, teaching of India–Pakistan relations is dependent on the socio-economic status of schools. While there is progress towards the stated goals, teachers in both countries face pressures from the interests of school and state, and often miss opportunities to engage with multiple perspectives and stereotypes in their classrooms.
... 78 The question then becomes, 'how to reverse this dehumanization and to return the humanity to those from whom categorization has removed all individual attributes'. 79 To rehumanise requires really listening to and hearing the voices of those who are often not heard. It is important to recognise that really 'hearing' their stories is: embodied in the process of mutually recognizing our claims on each other as reflexive human agents, each with an account to give, and account of our lives that needs to be registered and heard. ...
... Asimismo, la competencia y la lucha por el reconocimiento social generan sesgos en la empatía (Halpern & Weinstein, 2004;Penić et al., 2021;Quinn, 2016). Las personas son más propensas a mostrar empatía cuando comparten objetivos dentro de un grupo y evidencian antipatía por los propósitos de otros grupos y de personas ajenas a su comunidad, especialmente cuando entran en disputa. ...
(analítico)Este estudio analiza la relación entre la empatía y la disposición a la reconciliación socioemocional en adolescentes infractores de la ley. Con un diseño no experimental, correlacional-predictivo, participaron 171 jóvenes entre 15 y 23 años, judicializados con medida privativa de la libertad en Colombia, 81.1 % (n = 137) hombres y 19.9 (n = 34) mujeres. Se utilizó el índice de reactividad interpersonal y la escala de reconciliación socioemocional. Se hallaron correlaciones positivas (p < 0.05) entre la empatía y la reconciliación socioemocional. El análisis de regresión mostró que la empatía tiene efecto predictor positivo (p < 0.001) sobre la reconciliación socioemocional total (R2=0.154), intrapersonal (R2 = 0.081) e interpersonal (R2 = 0.185). Se concluye que la empatía incide en los procesos de reconciliación socioemocional de los adolescentes judicializados. Palabras clave: Delincuencia juvenil; empatía; reconciliación; emociones; problema social; solución de conflictos.
... Third, the last category, depth, can again be linked to empathy: Without feeling as others feel, how can one achieve a deep understanding of their situation? It is thus not surprising that empathy is seen as one of the most important ways to prevent and overcome dehumanizing (Halpern and Weinstein 2004). Furthermore, autonomy is often withdrawn when someone is dehumanized by others (Haslam 2006), which emphasizes the importance of autonomy. ...
Decision support systems are increasingly being adopted by various digital platforms. However, prior research has shown that certain contexts can induce algorithm aversion, leading people to reject their decision support. This paper investigates how and why the context in which users are making decisions (for-profit versus prosocial microlending decisions) affects their degree of algorithm aversion and ultimately their preference for more human-like (versus computer-like) decision support systems. The study proposes that contexts vary in their affordances for self-humanization. Specifically, people perceive prosocial decisions as more relevant to self-humanization than for-profit contexts, and, in consequence, they ascribe more importance to empathy and autonomy while making decisions in prosocial contexts. This increased importance of empathy and autonomy leads to a higher degree of algorithm aversion. At the same time, it also leads to a stronger preference for human-like decision support, which could therefore serve as a remedy for an algorithm aversion induced by the need for self-humanization. The results from an online experiment support the theorizing. The paper discusses both theoretical and design implications, especially for the potential of anthropomorphized conversational agents on platforms for prosocial decision-making.
... Thus, empathy is 'a process that involves a temporary letting go of the self in order to inhabit or share the feeling world of the other' (Yeomans, 2016: 75). Existing research has argued that when promoted and institutionalised, empathy can help bring about reconciliation and provide an antidote to the fear, anger, resentment and hatred that are seen as driving violence and conflict (Bleiker and Hutchison, 2021;Crawford, 2014;Halpern and Weinstein, 2004). However, Neta C. Crawford cautions that 'it will be difficult to develop empathy between the leaders and peoples of states' (Crawford, 2014: 550). ...
In the final analysis, is the security dilemma inescapable? Or can the protagonists in world politics learn to live with never-ending insecurities and the risk of attack without producing precisely the outcomes that they wish to avoid? This article explores this fundamental problem for International Relations theory by performing a thought experiment, in which it applies lessons from aikido to world politics. A form of Japanese budo, or martial art, aikido provides practitioners with a method for harbouring insecurities, and for dealing with attacks that may or may not occur, by empathically caring for actual and potential attackers. The article builds on practice theory in assuming that any social order is constructed and internalised through practices, but also capable of change through the introduction and dissemination of new practices. Although an unlikely scenario, aikido practice could serve as such a method of fundamental transformation if widely applied in world politics. Empirical examples ranging from international apologies and security cooperation to foreign aid and peacekeeping operations are discussed, suggesting that contemporary world politics is at times already performed in accordance with aikido principles, albeit only imperfectly and partially.
Empathy plays an important role in a holistic understanding of the religious other. Though empathy is often seen as a purely affective, biological or pre-linguistic response to the experience of other, this article points out that language contributes to mediating an appropriate empathic resonance. It creates a proper mental frame for opening oneself up to the religious life of another; it helps in preventing a mere projection of one’s own experience onto the other; and it nourishes the imagination with ideas and concepts that may broaden one’s experiential horizon.
Political apologies have been argued to contribute to reconciliation among groups and nations but their efficacy has also been questioned. This paper examines the acceptance of political apologies, their content and the protagonists in the victim nation, the perpetrator nation and their subgroups. Guided by studies on the structure of apologies, it distinguishes 10 features of apologies, seven of which concern their content and three of their protagonists. Following the analysis of apology statements by Japan to South Korea, the paper further breaks these features (factors) down into 32 elements (levels). The acceptance of around 70,000 possible apology combinations is examined in a randomized conjoint experiment, which was embedded in online quota-based surveys in Japan (n = 2700) and South Korea (n = 3000). The analysis reveals that the content of apologies matters, protagonists matter more than content and some subgroups matter more than protagonists. The subgroup analysis showed that some within-country differences are larger than cross-country differences, which challenges the SIT. Apology statements that would be acceptable in both nations are summarised.
This article examines how Milla, the Afrikaner protagonist of Marlene van Niekerk’s post-apartheid novel Agaat, engages with others’ empathy toward herself. Theorizing empathy as a multivalent engagement with others’ experiences, I argue that Milla attempts to variously invite, avoid, and manipulate others’ empathy as she negotiates the anxiety of being misunderstood, the sense of vulnerability in being understood, and the dependence of her self-image on others’ opinions. Illustrating the fraught experience of encountering empathy toward oneself—a neglected topic in studies of empathy—the novel shows that empathy is neither always welcomed nor received passively by potential empathizees. Further, I suggest, the contrast between Milla’s approaches to empathy as empathizer and empathizee ironizes her struggles by indicating her proclivity for controlling empathic interactions. Demonstrating how power relations inform empathy, Agaat complicates the popular notion of empathy as a straightforward gateway to reconciliation by highlighting its characters’ ambivalences about receiving empathy.
Dehumanization, the perception or treatment of people as subhuman, has been recognized as "endemic" in medicine and contributes to the stigmatization of people who use illegal drugs, in particular. As a result of dehumanization, people who use drugs are subject to systematically biased policies, long-lasting stigma, and suboptimal healthcare. One major contributor to the public opinion of drugs and people who use them is the media, whose coverage of these topics consistently uses negative imagery and language. This narrative review of the literature and American media on the dehumanization of illegal drugs and the people who use them provides a perspective on the components of dehumanization in each case and explores the consequences of dehumanization on health, law, and society. Drawing from language and images from American news outlets, anti-drug campaigns, and academic research, we recommend a shift away from the disingenuous trope of people who use drugs as poor, uneducated, and most likely of color. To this end, positive media portrayals and the humanization of people who use drugs can help form a common identity, engender empathy, and ultimately improve health outcomes.
Despite the adversity Syrian refugees face, the majority of them present positive functioning and do not show clear signs of psychiatric diagnoses. To understand what constitutes this resilience and the concept of mental health among Syrian refugees, a total of four semi-structured groups interviews (N = 25) was conducted in Istanbul (Turkey) and Buffalo (USA). Findings suggest that resilience was cultivated by living in the present with hope for the future; future for their children; feelings of personal safety; being with similar others; religion, and a positive outlook on life. Syrians’ conceptualization of mental health differs depending on their exposure to new practices, knowledge, and available resource in their new country.
This study investigates media coverage of Afghan refugees by English-language media in Pakistan and explores how coverage is shaped by a shift in the political stance of the Pakistani state and establishment towards Afghanistan. The author examines how Afghan refugees, their forced repatriation from Pakistan, and the subsequent conflict between Pakistan and Afghanistan were framed in both long-form and short-form media coverage over three years. Using Galtung’s Peace and War Journalism Model to inform the Critical Discourse Analysis, this study finds that conflict-escalatory frames dominated media coverage, and media stance changed over time to reflect state policy on the forced repatriation of over three million Afghan refugees in Pakistan. Findings reveal that the coverage in all four publications was highly politicized and inflammatory, the voice of Afghan refugees was significantly missing from coverage, while the Pakistani government and military elite were predominantly used as news sources. Based on the findings, the author argues that pressures from the Pakistani state and military establishment are key reasons why media coverage of Afghan refugees frequently contained negative frames of terrorism and ethnonationalism. Sporadic employment of limited peace-oriented framing was, however, observed in some of the coverage.
Politics of Impunity investigates the failure of the anti-impunity agenda in Brazil, from the release of the truth commission report denouncing the crimes of the military regime (1964-1985) in 2014, to the election of the former-paratrooper and far-Right leader Jair Bolsonaro in 2018. Connecting debates on critical military studies, transitional justice and memory studies, the book moves beyond the conditions of implementation of accountability measures, the so-called best practices for the delivery of justice and reconciliation in the wake of conflict. It examines the conditions of possibility of the global anti-impunity agenda: when, how and why the question of impunity came to dominate debates on large-scale political violence. The book provides an extensive analysis of Brazilian official documents of the truth commission, including semi-structured interviews with activists and practitioners. It opens a pathway for exchange and comparison between representations of militarism and different strategies for resisting military violence, from both the Global North and the Global South. Finally, the manuscript reveals non-Eurocentric ways to represent and think about militarism by investigating the work of local scholars and practitioners in Brazil.
The interplay between peace and justice plays an important role in almost any contemporary conflict. Peace and conflict studies have generally devoted more attention to conflict than to peace. Peace is often described in adjectives, such as negative/positive peace, liberal peace or democratic peace. But what elements make a peace just? Just war theory, peacebuilding, or transitional justice provide different perspectives on the dialectic relation between peace and justice and the methods of establishing peace after conflict. Experiences such as the Colombian peace process show that peace is increasingly judicialized. This volume analyses some of the situational, normative, and relational elements of peace in processes of transition. It explores six core themes: conceptual approaches towards just peace, macro-principles, the nexus to security and stability, protection of persons and public goods, rule of law and economic reform and accountability. It engages with understudied issues, such as the pros and cons of robust UN mandates, the link between environment protection and indigenous peoples, the treatment of illegal settlements, the feasibility of vetting practices or the protection labour rights in post-conflict economies. It argues that just peace requires only not negotiation, agreement and compromise (e.g., moderation), but contextual understandings of law, multiple dimensions of justice and strategies of prevention. It complements the two earlier volumes on the legal contours of jus post bellum, namely Just Post Bellum: Mapping the Normative Foundations (2014) and Environmental Protection and Transitions from Conflict to Peace: Clarifying Norms, Principles and Practices (2017).
Modern law seems to be designed to keep emotions at bay. The Sentimental Court argues the exact opposite: that the law is not designed to cast out affective dynamics, but to create them. Drawing on extensive ethnographic fieldwork - both during the trial of former Lord's Resistance Army commander Dominic Ongwen at the International Criminal Court's headquarters in The Netherlands and in rural northern Uganda at the scenes of violence - this book is an in-depth investigation of the affective life of legalized transitional justice interventions in Africa. Jonas Bens argues that the law purposefully creates, mobilizes, shapes, and transforms atmospheres and sentiments, and further discusses how we should think about the future of law and justice in our colonial present by focusing on the politics of atmosphere and sentiment in which they are entangled.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
In recent years, social scientists have increasingly recognized the interconnectedness of thought on emotions. Nowhere is the role of passions more evident than international politics, where pride, anger, guilt, fear, empathy, and other feelings are routinely on display. But in the absence of an overarching theory of emotions, how can we understand their role at the international level? Emotions in International Politics fills the need for theoretical tools in the new and rapidly growing subfield of international relations. Eminent scholars from a range of disciplines consider how emotions can be investigated from an international perspective involving collective players, drawing evidence from such emotionally fraught events as the Rwandan genocide, World War II, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iranian nuclear standoff. The path-breaking research collected in Emotions in International Politics will be a valuable theoretical guide to understanding conflict and cooperation in international relations.
Manuel Rivas mediates an icon of Galicia through the recontextualization of painting and pictorial narratives, sculptures and scriptures, as a counter-memory of the Nationalist victors’ mythmaking. Applying Derrida’s hauntologie, Colmeiro’s national ghostliness, and Nora’s places of memory, this chapter explores symbols of identities and ideologies, the sociopolitical manipulation, and subsequent ironic subversion of cultural icons in Rivas’ novel. Rivas’ novel reveals Pierre Nora’s theories and “inventories” of loci memoriae (places, historical figures, emblems) that codify a quintessential nation and create a symbolic realm, space, or place which roots or grounds identity. The reframed polyvalent symbols and spaces delegitimize Nationalist rhetoric that imbued meaning to and consecrated its institutionally sanctioned genocide.
Taiwan has emerged from its authoritarian past into a democratic present, bearing the scars of traumatic and violent historic events. As symbols of repressive histories, penal museums in Taiwan stand at the center of questions about how traumatic pasts can be reconciled and justice sought for victims of previous regimes. By close semiotic examination of two museums that served as sites of incarceration during the White Terror period (1949–1987), this study uses multimodal discourse analysis to understand how these places are used to construct narratives about transitional justice. Hardship, control and human rights narratives are used to construct empathy, conducive to the acceptance and deepening of transitional justice efforts in post-authoritarian Taiwan. These museums help to recover the truth of the authoritarian past and place the experience of Taiwanese political prisoners in the larger context of global human rights and transitional justice narratives.
Political elites continue to instil notions of fear of the Other in Bosnia & Hercegovina (BiH), which could lead to renewed violence in a context of growing socio-economic and political instability. Considerable literature on BiH indicates that more should have been done to foster reconciliation between the antagonists. The purpose of this article is to clarify the relationship between trust, a crucial element of reconciliation, and identity. Based on a series of semi-structured interviews conducted in BiH, this article also seeks to deepen our understanding of significant factors to consider for building trust through an incremental process.
This chapter relies on the author's findings from a qualitative grounded theory study of six peacebuilding organizations. The goal was to provide peace leaders with additional tools and strategies to support efforts to improve conditions on the ground in areas racked by politically driven conflict. This research was focused on how and why specific interventions motivate and equip individuals to reconcile with their perceived adversaries as part of a larger process of peacebuilding. Two main themes emerged, the power of dialogue and contact as mechanisms to challenge the deeply entrenched narratives perpetuating the conflict. These findings suggest peace leaders may need to pay closer attention to helping individuals learn to make peace with their own stories and perceptions of the other as a necessary step towards sustainable co-existence with individuals who have been considered their enemies.
This research investigates the influence of disgust, as an emotion, on charitable giving. We propose that feeling disgusted decreases consumers’ engagement in charitable behavior (e.g., giving money and time) because it lowers empathy—and empathy is an important determinant in charity-giving decisions. Across three experimental studies in which we manipulate incidental or integral disgust, we illustrate a negative effect of feeling disgusted on charitable giving, with empathy playing an explanatory role. The effect of disgust mainly arises when disgust is paired with an other-focused (not self-focused) ad appeal. The findings shine light on the links between disgust, empathy, and charity. They offer implications for non-profit organizations that depend on the goodwill of donors while at the same time their very cause or even promotional materials may elicit disgust.
This chapter argues that the successful reimagining of former enemies as co-citizens and ultimately, the achievement of civil peace as peaceful cooperation depends on two things: discursive civility and safe discursive spaces. Discursive civility is a universal feature of self-sustainable civil peace which aims to ensure dignity-as-respectfulness in civil engagement. It is a minimal communicative requirement for civil engagement defined by three principles: emotional forbearance, perspective-taking and a requirement for reasonableness. A safe discursive space is a space, place or location in which language and behaviour in civil engagement are governed by these three principles of discursive civility. Discursive civility acts as a guarantor for safety in civil engagement with former enemies and thereby provides a real possibility for the safe and effective reimagining of former enemies as co-citizens.
Human Rights Quarterly 24.3 (2002) 573-639
Karl Jaspers
In the last decade, there has been a burgeoning interest in the question of how countries recover from episodes of mass violence or gross human rights violations. This interest has focused on the concept of transitional justice, a term we use to describe the processes by which a state seeks to redress the violations of a prior regime. Despite the fact that military and political leaders who ordered or directed mass terror generally have evaded accountability for their deeds, justice—in the form of criminal trials—has been the rallying cry of many who seek to repair the injury individuals and communities have sustained as a result of these heinous acts. As dictatorships and repressive regimes fell in Latin America in the 1980s and 1990s, human rights scholars and advocates pressed states to initiate domestic criminal proceedings against the notorious intellectual authors of mass terror and their faithful subordinates. However, the fragile democracies, weak judiciaries, and amnesty laws made domestic trials difficult to institute.
Further, the character of war has shifted from inter- to intra-state conflict since World War II. These wars reflect intense competition for power and wealth among groups struggling for supremacy. Often characterized as racially, ethnically, or tribally motivated, one commonality among these conflicts is that warring forces target civilian populations, particularly women and children, and cause massive destruction of infrastructure. Mass violence results in the breakdown of societal structures—social and economic institutions, and networks of familial and intimate relationships that provide the foundation for a functioning community. Indiscriminate and episodic violence occurs at random and affects people at a neighborhood level. Even where the violence is centrally planned (as in Bosnia-Herzegovina or Rwanda), the collaboration of paramilitary with military units produces acts of violence and cruelty that are designed not only to kill but to terrorize and destroy the basis of community life. Neighbor-on-neighbor violence is characteristic of this form of aggression as seemingly peaceful community members are swept up in the inexorable process of killing. Thus, human suffering at a communal level is a shared feature of contemporary conflict.
Yet, with the exception of the Nuremberg and Tokyo Tribunals, there have been no international mechanisms for accountability until the recent ad hoc criminal tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. Drawing on the Latin American context, international criminal trials have become a significant response to mass violence, and this trend is strengthened as the International Criminal Court ("ICC") comes closer to a creation.
Thus, the predominant mechanism to respond to mass violence focuses on individual perpetrators of war crimes and other serious violations of international law. Frequently, advocates for this model suggest that international trials may be the single most appropriate response to communal violence. While transitional justice scholars recognize that judicial and truth-seeking mechanisms constitute one important component of a response to mass violence, events of the last decade suggest that many diplomats and human rights advocates conceive of international criminal trials as the centerpiece of social repair. Indeed, "social reconciliation" has become a mandate of these proceedings. While international trials are laudable, assigning accountability for mass atrocities to individuals has certain limitations. This article explores certain of these limitations and offers a new model to understand the contribution of trials to social...
Little is known about the impact of trauma in postconflict, low-income countries where people have survived multiple traumatic experiences.
To establish the prevalence rates of and risk factors for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in 4 postconflict, low-income countries.
Epidemiological survey conducted between 1997 and 1999 among survivors of war or mass violence (aged >/=16 years) who were randomly selected from community populations in Algeria (n = 653), Cambodia (n = 610), Ethiopia (n = 1200), and Gaza (n = 585).
Prevalence rates of PTSD, assessed using the PTSD module of the Composite International Diagnostic Interview version 2.1 and evaluated in relation to traumatic events, assessed using an adapted version of the Life Events and Social History Questionnaire.
The prevalence rate of assessed PTSD was 37.4% in Algeria, 28.4% in Cambodia, 15.8% in Ethiopia, and 17.8% in Gaza. Conflict-related trauma after age 12 years was the only risk factor for PTSD that was present in all 4 samples. Torture was a risk factor in all samples except Cambodia. Psychiatric history and current illness were risk factors in Cambodia (adjusted odds ratio [OR], 3.6; 95% confidence interval [CI], 2.3-5.4 and adjusted OR,1.6; 95% CI, 1.0-2.7, respectively) and Ethiopia (adjusted OR, 3.9; 95% CI, 2.0-7.4 and adjusted OR, 1.8; 95% CI, 1.1-2.7, respectively). Poor quality of camp was associated with PTSD in Algeria (adjusted OR, 1.8; 95% CI, 1.3-2.5) and in Gaza (adjusted OR, 1.7; 95% CI, 1.1-2.8). Daily hassles were associated with PTSD in Algeria (adjusted OR, 1.6; 95% CI, 1.1-2.4). Youth domestic stress, death or separation in the family, and alcohol abuse in parents were associated with PTSD in Cambodia (adjusted OR, 1.7; 95% CI, 1.1-2.6; adjusted OR, 1.7; 95% CI, 1.0-2.8; and adjusted OR, 2.2; 95% CI, 1.1-4.4, respectively).
Using the same assessment methods, a wide range of rates of symptoms of PTSD were found among 4 low-income populations who have experienced war, conflict, or mass violence. We identified specific patterns of risk factors per country. Our findings indicate the importance of contextual differences in the study of traumatic stress and human rights violations.
Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) has been the subject of growing recognition since its inception in 1980. Owing in part to the relatively recent inclusion of PTSD in the psychiatric nomenclature, research is only beginning to address its treatment in methodologically rigorous studies. In this review, we discuss issues such as prevalence of trauma and of PTSD, and gold standards for treatment outcome research. We then critically review the extant literature on the treatment of PTSD. Finally, we include a discussion of issues specific to various trauma populations and factors that may influence treatment efficacy across types of trauma.
Identity and culture are two of the basic building blocks of ethnicity. Through the construction of identity and culture, individuals and groups attempt to address the problematics of ethnic boundaries and meaning. Ethnicity is best understood as a dynamic, constantly evolving property of both individual identity and group organization. The construction of ethnic identity and culture is the result of both structure and agency-a dialectic played out by ethnic groups and the larger society. Ethnicity is the product of actions undertaken by ethnic groups as they shape and reshape their self-definition and culture; however, ethnicity is also constructed by external social, economic, and political processes and actors as they shape and reshape ethnic categories and definitions. This paper specifies several ways ethnic identity and culture are created and recreated in modern societies. Particular attention is paid to processes of ethnic identity formation and transformation, and to the purposes served by the production of culture-namely, the creation of collective meaning, the construction of community through mythology and history, and the creation of symbolic bases for ethnic mobilization.
This article explores forgiveness and remorse in the context of gross human rights violations. The discussion focuses on encounters between victims and perpetrators who appeared before South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission. An apology offered by Eugene de Kock, the apartheid government’s chief assassin, is presented to explore how a remorseful apology can contribute to a vocabulary of forgiveness in the context of evil. The discussion examines victims’ empathy and forgiveness for perpetrators as a consequence of what is termed the paradox of remorse. It is argued that genuine remorse humanizes perpetrators and transforms their evil from the unforgivable into something that can be forgiven.
Human Rights Quarterly 20.4 (1998) 737-816
From its very inception in 1993, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) was surrounded by the so-called "peace versus accountability" controversy. The ICTY was established by the UN Security Council as a measure for the restoration of peace and security under Chapter VII of the UN Charter. But commentators of a realist persuasion suggested that the ICTY was actually an impediment, and not a contribution, to reconciliation in the former Yugoslavia. It was argued that indicting political and military leaders such as Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic would undermine the prospects of a peace settlement because they were indispensable to ongoing negotiations, and because they would have no incentive to put an end to the fighting without assurances of immunity or amnesty. An anonymous commentator went so far as to suggest that "[t]housands of people are dead who should have been alive -- because moralists were in quest of the perfect peace. . . . The quest for justice for yesterday's victims of atrocities should not be pursued in such a manner that it makes today's living the dead of tomorrow."
The prognosis of the skeptics was wrong. The indictment of Karadzic and Mladic and their exclusion from the Dayton talks did not prevent the conclusion of a peace agreement in 1995. Nor was the ICTY sacrificed at the altar of realism as the Dayton Agreement obliged the parties to recognize its jurisdiction. Some attributed this notable achievement to the skillful diplomacy of Richard Holbrooke, Warren Christopher, and other US mediators. Others suggested that "realities on the ground dictated the terms of the peace," and that even without a guarantee of immunity or amnesty, the whims of particular leaders could not obstruct an agreement.
In the immediate post-Dayton phase, the peace versus accountability debate focused on the view that "certain leading Yugoslav protagonists do not genuinely believe in legal justice in the form of cooperation with the Yugoslav Court," that Croat and Serb parties "have stalled with regard to cooperation with international criminal prosecutions," and that it remains to be seen whether international forces would arrest indicted suspects. Evidently, there was an initial reluctance on the part of international forces to become embroiled in a potential quagmire. But eventually, from July 1997 onwards, elements of the Stabilization Force (SFOR) began arresting indicted persons -- both Bosnian Serbs and Bosnian Croats -- in Bosnia-Herzegovina. The momentum generated by the fear of further arrests furthermore resulted in several Bosnian Serb indictees voluntarily surrendering themselves to the ICTY starting in February 1998. In addition, an alliance between Bosnian Serb moderates and the international community has significantly diminished the influence of Karadzic and his cohorts, who face ever-increasing isolation and antagonism in Republica Srpska. To the disbelief of many, the possibility that Karadzic may be arrested by the Bosnian Serb police, or that he may even voluntarily surrender himself, let alone be arrested by international forces, is no longer a mere fantasy. Supplementing these positive developments, the Republic of Croatia -- succumbing to international diplomatic pressures -- also facilitated the "voluntary" surrender of several indictees in October 1997...
The story of the failure of bargaining among ethnic élites and of international diplomacy is well known. What has not been well explained is the spread and support for xenophobic nationalism and ethnic violence among people who had lived cooperatively for thirty-five years. I draw on key ideas of four views on ethnicity and ethnic conflict, and add the concept of cognitive frame in ethnic relations. Yugoslavs possessed two ethnic frames in their minds, an ethnic cooperation and peace frame for normal times, and a crisis frame anchored in World War II memories. Élite contention and mass media propaganda awakened the dormant crisis frame, suppressed the normal frame, and spread insecurity and fear. I explain why ethnic manipulation succeeded, people believed falsehoods, voted for nationalists, how moderates were purged and why men in militias killed innocent civilians.
Examines 4 explanations for ethnic violence. Main topics discussed in this chapter are: (1) Prijedor: a case study; (2) can the theories account for what happened? (3) what is to be explained? (4) from latent to populist nationalism; (5) crisis: nationalists win the 1990 elections; (6) hate and propaganda through the mass media; (7) state breakdown or state repression? (8) militias take over; and (9) the extremists eliminate the moderates. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Little research to date has examined the ability of self-report measures to assess changes in symptom severity and diagnostic status as a function of treatment. This study investigated the validity of the posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) checklist (PCL) as a measure of symptomatic change following programmatic treatment. A sample of 97 Vietnam veterans with combat-related PTSD was assessed using the clinician-administered PTSD scale (CAPS) and the PCL prior to, and 9 months following, participation in a PTSD treatment program. Using the CAPS as the “gold standard” measure of PTSD symptomatology, the PCL demonstrated high diagnostic accuracy pre- and posttreatment. However, significant variations in accuracy were evident in the ability of the PCL to determine the presence and severity of individual symptoms at each time point. In addition, as symptoms improved from pre- to posttreatment, and approached the threshold criteria, the PCL demonstrated reductions in diagnostic accuracy. As a measure of overall symptomatic change, the PCL underrated improvement in comparison to the CAPS. The results supported the use of an overall cut-off score of 50 on the PCL for a diagnosis, and an item score of 3 for symptom criterion, in this population.
From shopping bags in California bearing "Friends make good medicine" to editorials in the Journal o/the American Medical Association, "A Friend, Not an Apple, a Day Will Help Keep the Doctor Away" (19), the message is that social support is both good preventive and curative medicine. Like chicken soup, its powers are believed to be pervasive, the reasons for its effects are unknown, and knowledge of its qualities is widespread and based on folk wisdom. No other "risk factor" has recently gained so much sustained attention so rapidly. From interactions among mice litter mates to collegiality among university graduates, evidence has been garnered to support the notion that social ties are related to good health and well-being. The very popularity of this concept demands that we examine critically and in detail the evidence linking social networks and social support to health outcomes. Therefore, my purpose in this paper is to review the data relating social ties to physical health. I do not examine the large body of research linking social ties to self-reported symptoms of illness or to mental health except where a particular model is especially useful in explaining a concept. Issues regarding definition and measurement of social networks and social support are addressed and problems with particular study designs are discussed. On a more speculative level, I consider (a) what are the functions of social networks and social support, and what do they provide for people; and (b) what are the potential biologic pathways that link social networks to morbidity and
Studies on forgiveness have only recently emerged in the psychological literature. Despite evidence that forgiveness is associated with positive therapeutic outcomes, the concept has received little theoretical consideration in mainstream psychology. Existing definitions and models of forgiveness differ widely, and little attempt has been made to integrate these diverse approaches. Based on a review of the Medline and Psychlit databases, the present article evaluates current conceptualizations of forgiveness in the psychological literature. The values and limitations of each approach are discussed with reference to two case studies: a close interpersonal relationship and a human rights violation presented to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa. A new theoretical model, integrating the most valuable aspects of existing approaches, is proposed.
- Charles Villa-Vicencio And Wilhelm Verwoerd
- Looking Back
- Reaching Forward
CHARLES VILLA-VICENCIO AND WILHELM VERWOERD, LOOKING
BACK, REACHING FORWARD: REFLECTIONS ON THE TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION COMMISSION OF SOUTH
AFRICA (2000).
for a discussion of myths and symbols. See also John R. Gillis, Memory and Identity: The History of a Relationship
- Stuart J See
- Modern Kaufman
- Hatreds
The literature on collective memory and social identities is found in such fields as
political science, law, and psychology. One of the definitive sources is BENEDICT ANDERSON,
IMAGINED COMMUNITIES: REFLECTIONS ON THE ORIGIN AND SPREAD OF NATIONALISM (1983). See STUART
J. KAUFMAN, MODERN HATREDS: THE SYMBOLIC POLITICS OF ETHNIC WAR (2001), for a discussion of
myths and symbols. See also John R. Gillis, Memory and Identity: The History of a
Relationship, in THE POLITICS OF NATIONAL IDENTITY 3 (John R. Gillis ed., 1994);
See generally MARK OSIEL, MASS ATROCITY
- Joane Nagel
Joane Nagel,
Constructing Ethnicity: Creativity and Recreating Ethnic Identity and Culture, 41 SOCIAL
PROBLEMS 152 (1994). See generally MARK OSIEL, MASS ATROCITY, COLLECTIVE IDENTITY AND THE LAW
(1997);
Tracing Missing Persons, 312 INT'L REV
- Christopher Girod
- Herzegovina Bosnia
Christopher Girod, Bosnia and Herzegovina: Tracing Missing Persons, 312 INT'L REV. RED
CROSS 387 (1996).
Interview with "Marija
- Id
Id.
72. Interview with "Marija" (Aug. 2002).