Arne Johan Vetlesen argues that to do evil is to intentionally inflict pain on another human being, against his or her will, and cause serious and foreseeable harm. Vetlesen investigates why and in what sort of circumstances such a desire arises, and how it is channeled, or exploited, into collective evildoing. He argues that such evildoing, pitting whole groups against each other, springs from a combination of character, situation, and social structure. Vetlesen shows how closely perpetrators, victims, and bystanders interact, and how aspects of human agency are recognized, denied, and projected by different agents.
Author(s): Arne Johan Vetlesen
Series: Cambridge Cultural Social Studies
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2005
Language: English
Pages: 326
Cover......Page 1
Half-title......Page 3
Series-title......Page 4
Title......Page 5
Copyright......Page 6
Dedication......Page 7
Contents......Page 9
Preface......Page 13
A note on the cover image......Page 14
Introduction......Page 15
Introduction......Page 28
The Holocaust as modernity's window......Page 29
Reformulating the relationship between society and morality......Page 35
The many meanings of proximity......Page 37
Uncoupling responsibility from reciprocity......Page 41
Goldhagen's challenge......Page 43
Reassessing Bauman's thesis in the light of recent scholarship......Page 47
Mistaking the bureaucratic design for the reality......Page 55
Rendering human beings superfluous......Page 61
Introduction......Page 66
Assessing the influence of St Augustine......Page 68
'I cannot possibly want to become my own adversary': the Socratic bottom line......Page 71
Conscience and temptation......Page 77
Did Eichmann have a conscience?......Page 83
The notion of conscience in Heidegger's Being and Time......Page 85
Arendt's advocacy of the Socratic model of conscience......Page 91
Double dehumanization and human agency......Page 98
Lessons of an unforeseen proximity: Eichmann meets Storfer......Page 103
The attraction of superfluousness......Page 112
Introduction......Page 118
'Evil is pleasure in hurting and lack of remorse'......Page 120
Klein's positions of experience......Page 127
Imagining evil as the alternative to doing it: the role of culture......Page 134
Evil as envy......Page 138
Problems with Alford's theory......Page 142
Identifying with Eichmann......Page 149
The limitations of Alford's approach......Page 154
Introduction......Page 159
Approaches to 'ethnic cleansing' in the former Yugoslavia......Page 162
What is genocide?......Page 168
The explosive dialectic of individualization and collectivism......Page 173
'Ethnic cleansing' as a case of securitization......Page 181
The differences between individual and collective evil......Page 184
Genocidal logic and the collectivization of agency......Page 189
Girard's theory of the surrogate victim......Page 196
The design of genocide as 'ethnic cleansing'......Page 202
Genocidal rape: its nature and function......Page 210
Rape, shame, and agency......Page 217
Introduction......Page 234
How to pass judgment on evil?......Page 235
A culture of indifference......Page 243
The responsibility of bystanders: when inaction makes for complicity......Page 249
Bosnia: the follies of impartiality enacted as neutrality......Page 255
Three lessons of moral failure......Page 267
Collective agency and its disaggregation......Page 271
Truth commissions, trials, and testimonies......Page 279
Reconciliation, forgiveness, and collective guilt......Page 286
Assuming vicarious responsibility and guilt......Page 295
6 A political postscript: globalization and the discontents of the self......Page 303
References......Page 313
Index......Page 324
