Violence and the Contexts of Hostility Conference Session 10

Monday 5th May - Wednesday 7th May 2008
Budapest, Hungary

Conference Programme, Abstracts & Papers

Session 10: Theory and Violence
Chair: Jane Welsh

Three Conditions for Comprehensive Conceptions of Violence
Kenneth A. Parsons
Department of Philosophy & Religion, Central Michigan University, Mount Pleasant, Michigan, U.S.A.

In the last few years we have again reached a familiar point within philosophical accounts of the concept of violence: that we just don't have a clear enough understanding of what it is as a concept. The aim of this essay is not to defend one particular conception of violence over another based on a set of analytic distinctions. Rather, I argue for conditions we must recognize if we are to accept any broad conception of violence or, to use Vittorio Bufacchi's phrase, Comprehensive Conceptions of Violence (CCV). At a broad level this step is necessary for at least two reasons. On the one hand, the splintering of what we mean by 'extending' violence within political theory leads to divergent kinds of extensions of violence – rights violations, needs deprivations, impediments to human freedom, and even most broadly, all forms of social injustice. On the other hand, we must be provide clear theoretical justifications for whether or not this extension retains a distinctive understanding of 'violence' from other normative concepts used by social and political theorists. I propose three particular conditions for any CCV: i) violence should be understood as a normative concept; ii) the effects of social activity and the recognition of moral responsibility extends beyond the actions and intentions of subjects; and, iii) that violence necessarily denotes bodily harm or violation. By clarifying these conditions as necessary for CCV, we can avoid both an overextension of the concept that includes virtually all social evils or injustices while retaining both the necessary understanding of the pervasiveness of violence beyond direct, intended human activity and also its distinctiveness from other normative concepts.

Download Conference Paper -

A Possible Approach to Hostility and Violence: Ricoeur’s Insight into the Relationships of Individual, Smaller and Larger Contexts of Hostility and Violence
Rachel I. Waterstradt
Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, USA

The assessment is too often made that a violent context inevitably leads to the individual being violent, thus removing personal choice. But clearly this is not the case because within these violent contexts (genocides, inner cities, familial abuse) there are often persons who choose to stand against the violence and based on values that embrace human worth, work to preserve life rather than destroy it. Any understanding or argument that we have to address violent or hostile contexts must address not only those who choose (and they do choose) to take part, but also those who choose not to take part and work to change the context. What I hope to do in this paper is to address the basic components of decision and choice as discussed by Paul Ricoeur both in his early work on the will and his last work, Reflections on the Just, to draw out the role of the individual within the smaller violent context, i.e., the face to face decision to perpetuate the hostility and violence or to work for a change (which might not come about). I will then tie this role to the relationship of the smaller contexts to the larger social-political context. It is often the larger political context that advocates for the violence (in cases of genocide, atrocity and unrest), but there can be pockets of smaller communities that unite against such a view just as much as there can be communities that surrender their identity wholly to the larger political will. Finally, I will argue that such an approach reveals violence and hostility to not be intractable evils, but difficult problems which can be addressed with positive results if those working for the change can be supported and encouraged and those working to promote violence can be limited in their scope through education (limit the base). This does not present a ‘magic pill’ solution that will cure all the ills of violence in one fell swoop, but give persons the tools to begin to address the issues wherever they arise in their many manifestations.

What is Symbolic Violence? On the Uses and Abuses of the Concept
Alejandro Cervantes-Carson
Director of Research & Project Development, Inter-Disciplinary.Net, Barcelona, Catalunya, Spain

No abstract is presently available