_ Source: _Volume 45, Issue 2, pp 214 - 236 In the winter semester 1934–35 Heidegger used the occasion of an introductory seminar on Hegel’s Philosophy of Right as the context for a sustained confrontation with the legal theorist Carl Schmitt. In this paper, I establish the context for Heidegger’s confrontation with Schmitt from 1933 to early 1935; I explain why Heidegger chose Hegel as the context for his discussion; and above all, I demonstrate how their various attempts to make (...) sense of the seizure of power by the Nazis was combined with a systematic neglect of the pervasive violence of the times. (shrink)

Kriege, Terrorismus, Völkermord, humanitäre Interventionen und andere Formen kollektiver Gewalt sind in den letzten Jahren auch in der Philosophie verstärkt in den Blickwinkel gerückt. Dabei wurde der Tradition des 'gerechten Krieges' neue Aufmerksamkeit zuteil und somit der Frage, ob und wann Kriege als 'moralisch gerechtfertigt' bewertet werden können. Die grundlegendere Frage, wie 'Gewalt' definiert werden kann, ist hingegen kaum nicht beachtet worden. Im Mittelpunkt des vorliegenden Buches steht die Frage nach Gründen für die moralische Rechtfertigung oder moralische Verurteilung (...) gewaltsamen Handelns. Zur methodischen Vereinfachung wird nur so genannte interpersonale Gewalt, also der Einsatz von Gewalt durch genau eine Person gegen eine andere Person, betrachtet. Das Buch gliedert sich in drei Teile: Im ersten Teil wird die Idee vom 'gerechten Krieg' vorgestellt und gezeigt, das grundsätzlich auch heute noch an die klassischen Autoren angeknüpft werden kann. Der zweite Teil liefert einen Überblick über philosophische Positionen zum Begriff der Gewalt. Der dritte Teil führt die Ergebnisse zusammen und liefert (i) eine Explikation des Begriffs interpersonaler Gewalt und (ii) einen Rahmen zur Bewertung verschiedener Fälle derartiger Gewalt. Damit eine konkrete Gewaltanwendung als gerechtfertigt gelten kann, muss sie einer Liste von Kriterien genügen. Dieses Buch diskutiert die Bedingungen, die in Ausnahmesituationen vorliegen müssen, damit das prima facie-Verbot des Einsatzes von Gewalt situativ aufgehoben wird und Gewalt moralisch legitim sein kann. (shrink)

Studies of mythology and the philosophy of religions ascribe violence an important role in understanding traditional societies. Whether perceived as sacred and capable of renewing the world, or as oppressive and destructive, violence acquires a twofold valence, whose constituents are interpreted in a complementary relation of interdependence and entail a world outlook with profound implications. Retrieving this ambiguous dimension of religious violence, Kenzaburō Ōe’s novel imagines, against the historical background of post-war Japanese society, a game that enacts the eternal rivalry (...) between two brothers. Lest the history of this seemingly lost present should fall prey to political abuse, the Japanese writer proposes a return to myth, without, however, idealising it; instead, myth is revalorised and tradition is re-conceived from the vantage point of rationalism, with full and alert awareness of the dangers inherent in an ideology that is imposed by force and aggression. Kenzaburō Ōe’s novel is a lucid meditation on Japan’s modern and contemporary history. (shrink)

This article is a reflection on Balibar's account of the concept of Gewalt in Marx, Engels and Marxism. The German term contains both the meanings of power and violence. At the centre of the analysis is the structural link between the notion of Gewalt and the capitalist mode of production and state-form. The problem is whether Gewalt can be understood in relation to the actions of the working class. Balibar rightly refuses any sort of counter-politics of power (...) set against the power of the state which would retain the same overall logic as the latter. However, the question is how such a critique of the ahistorical ontology of violence can interact with Marx's idea of capital as a constitutively violent entity which threatens to subordinate to itself any stance of non-violence. (shrink)

How was violence justified in early Islam? What role did violent actions play in the formation and maintenance of the Muslim political order? How did Muslim thinkers view the origins and acceptability of violence? These questions are addressed by an international range of eminent authors through both general accounts of types of violence and detailed case studies of violent acts drawn from the early Islamic sources. Violence is understood, widely, to include jihad, state repressions and rebellions, and also more personally (...) directed violence against victims (women, animals, children, slaves) and criminals. By understanding the early development of Muslim thinking around violence, our comprehension of subsequent trends in Islamic thought, during the medieval period and up to the modern day, become clearer. (shrink)

This book explores Gilles Deleuze's contribution to film theory. According to Deleuze, we have come to live in a universe that could be described as metacinematic. His conception of images implies a new kind of camera consciousness, one that determines our perceptions and sense of selves: aspects of our subjectivities are formed in, for instance, action-images, affection-images and time-images. We live in a matrix of visual culture that is always moving and changing. Each image is always connected to an (...) assemblage of affects and forces. This book presents a model, as well as many concrete examples, of how to work with Deleuze in film theory. It asks questions about the universe as metacinema, subjectivity, violence, feminism, monstrosity, and music. Among the contemporary films it discusses within a Deleuzian framework are Strange Days, Fight Club, and Dancer in the Dark. (shrink)

Intra-species killing occurs in all known human societies as well as among chimpanzees as wars between different groups. This parallel may be the product of a common evolution as both species are the closest biological relatives. Unlike apes, however, human beings not only compete for territories but also for power in general, goods, etc. As the product of mankind's further evolution, religions legitimate this inter-group violence.

이 논문에서 필자는 가장 오래된 남성폭력의 기술화 버전이라 할 수 있는 디지털 성폭력에 대한 철학적 담론을 개진해보고자 한다. 첫 번째로 불법도촬 카메라의 전방위적 공간성의 작동방식과 디지털 데이터 베이스로 전환된 새로운 시간성의 구조를 분석할 것이다. 나아가 디지털 성폭력과 사이버 성폭력 개념이 혼용되어 사용되고 있는 현재 담론지형에 개입해 들어가 볼 것이다.BR 두 번째로 정보통신기술의 발달과 사물 인터넷에 기반한 초연결성을 통해, 불법도촬 카메라의 설치와 촬영이라는 물리적 공간에서의 활동이 사이버 공간이라는 디지털 매트릭스로 즉각 편입이 가능해짐으로써 여성신체이미지가 디지털 재화로 기능하는 측면을 분석할 것이다.BR 세 번째로 (...) 필자는 디지털 성폭력이라는 피해경험을 재언어화하기 위해, 새로운 감정구조를 고안해보고자 한다. 즉 성적 수치심이 아닌, 성적 불쾌감, 사회적 분노감이라는 다층화된 감정구조로의 이행을 통해, 피해자다움이라는 프레임에 갇힌 약자의 전형화에서 벗어나도록 한다. 새로운 감정 양식은 저항적, 도전적 신체감응 양식의 창출을 도모함으로써 더 이상 사라져야할 자는 피해자가 아닌, 가해자들임을, 수치의 몫은 피해자가 아닌 가해자에게 부과해야하는 것임을 낱낱이 드러낼 것이다. 나아가 디지털 성폭력에 대한 대항실천은 한 개인의 문제가 아닌 공공성의 문제이자 정치적 시민권의 실행에 관한 문제로서 접근되어야한다. (shrink)

The relationship between “Towards a Critique of Violence” (1921) and the work of Franz Kafka has been well established by several critical studies devoted to Walter Benjamin. However, it is striking that Benjamin himself, already well acquainted with the work of the Czech writer in 1921, never made any comment to Kafka’s work in this essay, and, more broadly, in any of the related texts that make up the project on the ‘Critique of Violence’. In this article, we analyze a (...) set of notions (Entstellung, Entsühnung, Zurechstellen) that allow us to establish a mediated relationship between this essay and the articles and letters that Benjamin devoted to Kafka in the 1930s. This relationship takes us back to the only piece in which Benjamin carries out an autonomous treatment of the “category of justice” (1916) in which he identifies -as it will happen eighteen years later, in the essay on Kafka (1934)- the locus of justice in the “non-violence”, thus untying the knot that binds in a perhaps indiscernible way in the Jewish tradition the notions of “messianism” and “violence”. (shrink)

Das vorliegende Buch präsentiert eine phänomenologische Analyse der verschiedenen Formen zwischenmenschlicher Gewalt und ihrer oft unterbelichteten Beziehungen. Auf der Grundlage einer Transformation der Phänomenologie und im Rekurs auf den aktuellen Diskurs der Gewaltforschung entwickelt es einen methodologischen Rahmen für eine nicht-reduktive Analyse von Gewalt, der in angewandten phänomenologischen Fallstudien erprobt wird. -/- Gewalt war bislang vorwiegend in den Human und den Sozialwissenschaften ein zentrales Thema, wurde aber nur allzu selten zum Gegenstand genuin philosophischer Reflexion. Um dieses Desiderat (...) aufzugreifen und die Bedeutung philosophischer Reflexion für den Diskurs über Gewalt zu demonstrieren, entwickelt das vorliegende Buch einen phänomenologischen Ansatz zur Analyse zwischenmenschlicher Gewalt. Seine Intention besteht darin, ein Korrektiv zu den konventionellen, allzu einseitig verfahrenden instrumentalistischen, essentialistischen oder funktionalistischen Erklärungen von Gewalt vorzulegen. -/- Im Anschluss an eine kritische Reflexion auf zentrale Aporien des Gewaltdiskurses, denen es sich zu stellen gilt, integriert der Autor relevante Theoreme klassischer Phänomenologie mit neueren Ansätzen in einen umfassenden Analyserahmen. In drei „Fallstudien“ wird dieser Rahmen in konkreten Phänomenanalysen angewandt und der ihm zugrunde liegende weite Gewaltbegriff auf die Probe gestellt. Das Buch schließt mit einem Entwurf einer „relationalen Phänomenologie“, die es erlaubt, die vielfach unterbelichteten bzw. ausgeblendeten Beziehungen zwischen den verschiedenen Formen von Gewalt ins Auge zu fassen. (shrink)

L'exercice de la violence est largement, massivement, le fait des humains mâles. Les femmes, ou humains femelles, en sont souvent les principales victimes. Mais tel n'est pas l'objet de cet ouvrage. Lorsque, exceptionnellement, des femmes ont recours à des actes de violence, sont elles-mêmes auteurs de tels actes, elles transgressent les normes, les frontières imposées à leur seule catégorie de sexe. Ce sont ces cas de dissidence, de subversion, de transgression qui intéressent Hacker...

General social theory has hardly been concerned with violence. The closest to constituting an exception to this rule are Weber and Foucault. But they largely pass over the symbolic, order-generating significance of violence and leave it open whether and in what way violence, including physical and deadly violence, plays a general role in the formation of order. In this article I argue that the general significance of violence for order formation can only be grasped if sociation is conceptualized starting from (...) embodied actors and systematically takes the figure of the third into account. Doing so leads to the following hypotheses about violence: violence is an antagonistic bodily interaction that communicates moral claims in a symbolically generalized way in reference to a third party. (shrink)

In contrast to the widespread assumption that the state has the monopoly on violence and on the legal use of force, this essay draws attention to forms of violence which cannot be sublated in any political form of life that lays claim to the legitimate use of violence and force. The author asserts that any way of legitimization of violence is suspect of concealing reverse sides of new forms of violence that possibly escape political attention. This insight refers back to (...) the “political paradox” as it was described in Paul Ricoeur’s political philosophy. (shrink)

Hypothesis-driven approaches identified important characteristics that differentiate violent from non-violent radicals. However, they produced a mosaic of explanations as they investigated a restricted number of preselected variables. Here we analyzed without a priory assumption all the variables of the “Profiles of Individual Radicalization in the United States” database by a machine learning approach. Out of the 79 variables considered, 19 proved critical, and predicted the emergence of violence with an accuracy of 86.3%. Typically, violent extremists came from criminal but not (...) radical backgrounds and were radicalized in late stages of their life. They were followers in terrorist groups, sought training, and were radicalized by social media. They belonged to low social strata and had problematic social relations. By contrast, non-violent but still criminal extremists were characterized by a family tradition of radicalism without having criminal backgrounds, belonged to higher social strata, were leaders in terrorist organizations, and backed terrorism by supporting activities. Violence was also promoted by anti-gay, Sunni Islam and Far Right, and hindered by Far Left, Anti-abortion, Animal Rights and Environment ideologies. Critical characteristics were used to elaborate a risk-matrix, which may be used to predict violence risk at individual level. (shrink)

The modern idea of the rule of law is based on the assertion that with the establishment of law as a central instrument of control, the incidence of violence within society could be reduced. This understanding of law is radically questioned by Walter Benjamin in his essay "Critique of Violence" and by certain poststructural authors; for them law itself is entangled in a violent momentum.This study reconstructs the discourse between Walter Benjamin, Jaques Derrida, Giorgio Agamben, and Christoph Menke on the (...) violence of law and reflects on it from a legal perspective. In doing so, it addresses both – the philosophy of law as well as jurisprudence interested in basic principles of law. (shrink)

This paper deals with the role of Judaism in Walter Benjamin's famous 1921 essay on violence and law, Zur Kritik der Gewalt. Despite the intense attention devoted to this essay, the role of Jewish myth in it has not yet been thoroughly explained. This study contends that the association between what Benjamin termed revolutionary violence and the Jewish messianic tradition, which plays a central role in the evaluation of Benjamin's text, is far more problematic than has hitherto been assumed, (...) and poses a serious challenge, which has not been fully examined in its historical context. Second, this essay claims that the subversive elements that many have supposedly found in Benjamin's text and the attempts to link these elements to messianic traditions are also unconvincing. Third, the paper contextualizes Benjamin's thought within the framework of the Jewish political–theological debate of the period. It contends that Benjamin's theory of law and justice should be understood not as a revolutionary, anti-republican text, as has been generally accepted, but as a secularized conservative orthodox one. In doing so, it seeks to shed light not only on Benjamin's early thinking and its influences, but also on the neglected element of Jewish orthodoxy within the broader topic of political theology. (shrink)

The volume presented here is a collection of the contributions to an author s colloquium with Walter Burkert, which was held in November 2007 in the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research at the University of Bielefeld. Well known experts looked in detail at the work of the internationally renowned scholar of Greek. In his epochal cultural-scientific studies focusing on the origins of human co-existence in rites, on violence, sacrifice, guilt and horrific scenarios of death, Burkert approached questions of biological behavioural research, (...) anthropology and aggression theory, and developed an enormous intellectual impact that reached beyond classical and religious studies. ". (shrink)

English summary: The relationship of art to physical violence in European cultural history has always been intricate. Aestheticised violence in the fine arts, on the stage or in literature has often been discredited, but at the same time - not least because of the contiguity of violence and sexuality - it is received with pleasure. In a survey of literary examples from antiquity, the Renaissance and modernity, the author begins by elucidating the development in Europe of the troubled relationship between (...) aesthetics and violence. This relationship is then examined from a psychoanaltical angle in two exemplary studies of music. The dual perspective continues with the analyses of contemporary cultural producers (a theatre director, a photographic artist and a film director) together with those of cultural scientists (from theatre studies, art history, and film and media studies). In this way, the actual process of aesthetisizing violence, on the one hand, and theoretical reflections on it, on the other, become clear.German description: Das Verhaltnis der Kunste zur physischen Gewalt ist in der europaischen Kulturgeschichte immer schon ein intrikates gewesen. Asthetisierte Gewalt in der Kunst, auf der Buhne oder in der Literatur wurde zwar oft diskreditiert, zugleich aber - auch wegen der Nahe von Gewalt und Sexualitat - mit Genuss rezipiert. An den Beispielen der Literatur der Antike, der Renaissance und der Moderne zeigt der Band die europaische Entwicklung des ambivalenten Verhaltnisses von Asthetik und Gewalt auf. Aus psychoanalytischer, kulturwissenschaftlicher und medienwissenschaftlicher Perspektive verdeutlichen die Beitrager sowohl konkrete Verfahren des Asthetisierens von Gewalt als auch ihre theoretische Reflexion. Erganzt durch Analysen aus dem Kulturbetrieb - u.a. von Daniel Rademacher, Wilfred H.G. Neuse und Thomas Sieben - bietet der Band so einen umfassenden Einblick in die Beziehung zwischen Kunst und Gewalt. (shrink)

Cet article cherche à interroger Heidegger en tant que traducteur. Nous montrons d’abord que le refus de traduire hypokeimenon par subiectum rend possible une onto-héno-chrono-phénoménologie de la choséité de la chose comme constance. Ensuite, nous démontrons que la tentative visant à penser la transformation de l’ alētheia ne peut éviter la traduction et toutes ses violences. Enfin, nous faisons retour aux Grecs en vue de penser la traduction comme metalēpsis , de réinterpréter la traduction platonicienne des Idées comme choses, de (...) repenser le noūs aristotélicien comme auto-traducteur, et de suggérer que l’origine de la pensée réside peut-être aussi dans la traduction. (shrink)

Die Beiträge des Bands analysieren die vielen Gesichter der Gewalt und fragen nach übergreifenden Wesenszügen des Phänomens Gewalt. In phänomenologischer Perspektive rücken sie das erfahrende Subjekt ins Zentrum der Analyse. Der Band fokussiert Gewalt als ein perspektivisches Phänomen, als erlittene, verübte oder aus der Perspektive Dritter erfahrene, etwa bezeugte Gewalt, ohne zu unterstellen, dass sich schlicht von der Gewalt reden ließe. Dass der Sinn der Gewalt immer perspektivisch erfahren wird, besagt nicht, dass zwischen (...) class='Hi'>Gewalt als Widerfahrnis, als Intention und als sozialem Ereignis ein unüberbrückbarer analytischer Abgrund bestünde, wie er handlungs- und diskurstheoretische Ansätze traditionell trennt. Vielmehr ist dem Sinn der Gewalt nur im Rückgang auf jenes Zwischenreich von subjektivem Sinn und objektiven Ordnungen auf die Spur zu kommen, in dem wir als leibliche Wesen der Welt Sinn abgewinnen, in dem aber auch unsere vielfältige Verletzlichkeit gründet. (shrink)

There is hardly any other art form as immersive as film. Thus, if a movie focuses on the abyss of human behaviour, dealing with crimes, violence or even murder, it is often accused of being immoral and corrupting its audience. On the basis of selected examples from Alfred Hitchcock’s ›Rope‹ to Martin Scorsese’s ›Taxi Driver‹ and Lars von Trier’s ›Dogville‹, this critical essay explores the question of the moral claims movies can make. Considering contemporary films such as ›Promising Young Woman‹ (...) and ›Joker‹ this text asks how modern anti-heroes influence the audience and what changes can be seen over the last decades in the moral reception of movies. Finally, the essay concludes with the latest attempts of censorship and looks at who determines the moral value of art. (shrink)

Mit Sprache können wir nicht nur über Gewalt reden, mit Sprache können wir auch Gewalt zufügen. Der Band bietet eine systematische Erschließung dieser Gewalt der Sprache, indem er durch eine Vielzahl von Autorenportraits unterschiedliche Grundpositionen freilegt.

Though for the Western political tradition violence is usually deemed merely instrumental, and thus neither essential to, nor constitutive of, the bios politikos, Walter Benjamin ’s “Zur Kritik der Gewalt” [“Critique of Violence,” 1921] and Georges Sorel ’s RØflexions sur la violence [Reflections on Violence, 1908] constitute an exception. 1 In very different ways, both texts put forward a notion of violence which comes to coincide with pure praxis, that is, with pure political action, in great contrast with a (...) political tradition which rather identifies in violence a non-political or anti-political form of action. In Benjamin ’s case, the ambiguity of the term Gewalt is not secondary to the argument: in German, it can mean force, power, might and violence, depending on the context; it reunites thus potestas and violentia in a dialectics that Etienne Balibar values as positive and fructuous. The French violence, on the contrary, presents a univocal connotation, though Sorel, as we will see, redefines it to his own purposes. 3 However, the explanation cannot be limited to the terminology, but must rather be pursued in their notion of praxis. (shrink)

As a commentary on the initial paragraph of Benjamin’s “Zur Kritik der Gewalt,” this article shows that its characterisation of the “sphere of moral relations” as circumscribed by the poles of law and justice generates the rationale for the critique of violence. After describing how Benjamin reproduces the structure of Kant’s Metaphysik der Sitten, the article outlines the procedure whereby the initial definition of Gewalt as an “intervention” into moral relations is supplemented by an exposition of the situation (...) in which law “encroaches” upon “the living” by presenting itself as an “expiation” of moral ambiguity; but inasmuch as the sphere of moral relations is constitutively split between the mutually repugnant poles of law and justice, the process of expiation intensifies the ambiguity of the situation law purports to resolve. Benjamin’s solution to this dilemma consists in claiming the reality of “de-expiation”, which he associates with “pure” and thus “divine” violence. (shrink)

This paper deals with the role of Judaism in Walter Benjamin's famous 1921 essay on violence and law, Zur Kritik der Gewalt. Despite the intense attention devoted to this essay, the role of Jewish myth in it has not yet been thoroughly explained. This study contends that the association between what Benjamin termed revolutionary violence and the Jewish messianic tradition, which plays a central role in the evaluation of Benjamin's text, is far more problematic than has hitherto been assumed, (...) and poses a serious challenge, which has not been fully examined in its historical context. Second, this essay claims that the subversive elements that many have supposedly found in Benjamin's text and the attempts to link these elements to messianic traditions are also unconvincing. Third, the paper contextualizes Benjamin's thought within the framework of the Jewish political–theological debate of the period. It contends that Benjamin's theory of law and justice should be understood not as a revolutionary, anti-republican text, as has been generally accepted, but as a secularized conservative orthodox one. In doing so, it seeks to shed light not only on Benjamin's early thinking and its influences, but also on the neglected element of Jewish orthodoxy within the broader topic of political theology. (shrink)

We live in an age beset by religiously inspired violence. Terms such as "holy war" are the stock-in-trade of the evening news. But what is the relationship between holiness and violence? Can acts such as murder ever truly be described as holy? In Does Judaism Condone Violence?, Alan Mittleman offers a searching philosophical investigation of such questions in the Jewish tradition. Jewish texts feature episodes of divinely inspired violence, and the position of the Jews as God's chosen people has been (...) invoked to justify violent acts today. Are these justifications valid? Or does our understanding of the holy entail an ethic that argues against violence?Reconstructing the concept of the holy through a philosophical examination of biblical texts, Mittleman finds that the holy and the good are inextricably linked, and that our experience of holiness is authenticated through its moral consequences. Our understanding of the holy develops through reflection on God's creation of the natural world, and our values emerge through our relations with that world. Ultimately, Mittleman concludes, religious justifications for violence cannot be sustained. (shrink)

On 24 January 41 the emperor Caligula was murdered. Modern scholarly interpretations mainly focus on the alleged attempt by the senate to restore the republic. Taking a different point of view, this paper focuses on the act of murder itself. Caligula’s assassination was, after all, an act of violence against an emperor - unprecedented in the principate so far. It is argued that, by portraying the killing as justified, the narratives of the conspiracy fulfilled two main functions. On the one (...) hand, they can be viewed as immediate responses to views which questioned the violence against Caligula. On the other hand, they develop mechanisms on how to deal with an emperor who was no longer deemed acceptable. (shrink)

This paper deals with the question, how an abstract practice like ‘violence’ can be measured. On a methodological level, there are two possibilities: On the one hand, a quantitative approach that tries to determine homicide rates allegedly allowing comparisons over regions and time. On the other hand, there is a qualitative approach that analyses key concepts like ‘cruelty’ in order to define the limits of acceptable violence. However, both approaches have clear shortcomings. This article proposes another perspective: Using the example (...) of France in the later Middle Ages, it scrutinises contemporary ideas of violence as they were expressed in chronicles and treatises. By focussing on decidedly negative descriptions of violent acts, we can pinpoint several characteristics that show which cultural aspects were of special importance for the contemporaries, e. g. the social standing of the people involved, the context of the act itself as well as the physical integrity of the nobles’ bodies. (shrink)

Anhand exemplarischer Filme verschiedener Genres – vom Western über den Polizei- und Kriegsfilm bis hin zum Animationsfilm – untersucht der Band, wie die Verzahnung von Recht, Gesetz und Gewalt im Kino dramatisiert wird. Mit Beiträgen von Thomas Assheuer, James Conant, Günter Frankenberg, Lisa Gotto, Julika Griem, Klaus Günther, Vinzenz Hediger, Konrad Paul Liessmann, Verena Lueken, Anja Peltzer, Rainer Winter, Hans-Jürgen Wulff sowie den Herausgebern.

This article (in German) develops the outlines of a Wittgensteinian philosophy of the proper name. It goes beyond standard analytical treatments of proper names as referential devices in asking what kind of role the proper name of a person has for that person's identity. Hence, proper names are discussed in their relations with the capacity of saying "I", with the capacity of addressing persons as persons (or saying "you"), and with the general role words play for a person's symbolic identity. (...) It is thereby made clear in which ways people's names can matter to themselves or to other people, and how this makes persons vulnerable to specific kinds of violence through words. (The article appeared in a collection on the topic of language and violence.). (shrink)

The Kantian approach to the sublime in the Critique of the Power of Judgment is based on an antagonism between two faculties, Imagination and Reason. In order to understand this conflict under new conceptual coordinates, and pursuing a triple exegetical, aesthetical and political interest, the aim of the present paper is to develop the brutal character proper to the conceptual dynamics deployed in such an approach. Reconstructing this mouvement from the incidences of the term Gewalt, under a brutalism of (...) the sublime, we focus on the inquiry of the violence that the Imagination experiences in its mathematical determination and, on the other hand, of the power that Reason holds according to the dynamic determination of the sublime. Thus, under such a perspective, violence, power and subjective impotence will appear as constitutive characters of the genesis of the feeling of the sublime within the horizon of transcendental philosophy. (shrink)

This paper examines the idea, prevalent in post-Husserlian scholarship, that violence is a ‘limit problem’ of phenomenology. It offers a critical approach to this idea and proposes an alternative way of understanding the phenomenology of violence. The study comprises four analytical moments. First, I show the implications and shortcomings of interpreting violence as a ‘limit phenomenon’. Second, I address the issue of aggression as a mode of interaction between agents who can take on the role of perpetrators, victims, or witnesses. (...) Here the intentionality of aggression as a phenomenon of the will in interpersonal relations will be addressed. It will be concretely shown to what extent intentional analysis, the kind of analysis prescribed by the ‘general scheme’ of transcendental phenomenology, is indispensable for fleshing out the experiential nature of aggression as interaction between agents who can either exert, suffer, or witness violence. Third, I turn to Husserl’s brief account of violence (_Gewalt_) in _Zur Phänomenologie der Intersubjektivität_ and, expanding upon it, propose a definition that aims to express the most fundamental structure of violence as a phenomenon of consciousness. Next, this phenomenologically grounded definition will be shown to be consistent with the sociological and intentional approach adopted by the World Health Organization in its _World Report on Violence and Health_. This will lead to the realization that the transcendental approach to violence can both contribute to the philosophical grounding of this _Report_ and benefit from its multidisciplinary perspective—in particular its ecological model for analyzing the experiential horizons constitutive of the individual-environment relationship. Finally, it will become clear that violence harbors no more mysteries than any other form of intersubjective encounter and that transcendental phenomenology provides indispensable tools for conceptual clarification in interdisciplinary violence research. (shrink)

Child-to-parent violence has dramatically risen in the last decade, becoming a concerning issue in many countries, so research on this issue has also increased. However, most of the studies on this topic have been conducted with samples of adolescents, and very few with samples of parents. In addition, the variety of assessment instruments does not reflect the elements of this type of violence. Thus, the current study was aimed to examine the factor structure, reliability, and validity of the Child-to-parent Violence (...) Questionnaire, parents’ version, in a sample of Spanish parents of adolescents. Moreover, the prevalence rates of the different types of violence and the reasons for violence were also examined. A total of 1,012 Spanish parents of adolescents aged between 12 and 17 years old were assessed using the CPV-Q-P. Data indicated a matrix of four factors with 14 items, assessing psychological violence, physical violence, financial violence, and control/domain over parents, and two factors with 8 items capturing the reasons for child-to-parent violence, with adequate psychometric properties. The more frequent type of violence was control and domain over parents, followed by psychological, financial, and physical violence, with no significant differences between mothers and fathers. Otherwise, instrumental reasons were more frequent than reactive types, with no differences between mothers and fathers. The CPV-Q-P is a useful instrument to assess child-to-parent violence from the parents’ perspective in both professional and research settings. (shrink)

Die Themen Kreativität, Selbsttranszendenz und Gewalt erzeugen in der Forschung des Soziologen und Sozialphilosophen Hans Joas eine Spannung, aus der ein kreativer und eigener Denkansatz in der deutschen Sozialwissenschaft entstanden ist. Er schöpft aus der Quelle einer langjährigen Auseinandersetzung mit dem US-amerikanischen Pragmatismus und seiner Betonung der Bedeutung menschlicher Handlungen. Daraus hat Joas eine eigene Position zur Entstehung von Werten und Normen entwickelt. Seine neueren Forschungen zur Entstehung der Menschenrechte als einem Prozess der Verarbeitung von Gewalterfahrung sowie der Sakralisierung (...) der Person setzen dieses Programm konsequent fort. (shrink)

ZusammenfassungSeit Jahren steigt in Indien die Anzahl der spezifisch gegenüber Frauen, hierarchisch tieferstehenden Geburts- (varṇa) und Berufsgruppen (jāti) sowie Kastenlosen (dalits;scheduled castes) und indigenen Gemeinschaften (ādivāsī;scheduled tribes) angezeigten Gewalttaten kontinuierlich an. Diese Gewaltakte und Tötungsdelikte sind aufgrund ihrer Qualität und vor allem aufgrund ihrer quantitativen Größenordnung als systemisch anzusehen. Dass sie in dieser Form noch immer ein akutes Gegenwartsproblem von allerhöchster sozialer und politischer Brisanz im vordergründig säkularisierten Indien darstellen, legt einen gesamtgesellschaftlichen Konsens über deren grundsätzliche Rechtmäßigkeit nahe, der sich (...) anhand tradierter Normen- und Wertvorstellungen sowie prämoderner Denk- und Handlungsmuster legitimiert, die auf traditionell hinduistischen Ideen basieren. Dabei kann der politische Aufstieg der nationalreligiös argumentierenden und agitierenden „Indischen Volkspartei“ (BJP:Bhāratīya Janatā Pārṭī) sowie ihr politisch forcierter Rückgriff auf den Hinduismus als einzelner, aber dennoch entscheidender Einflussfaktor gesehen werden, der die anhaltende Verschärfung innergesellschaftlicher Gegensätze und die kontinuierliche Intensivierung der Gewaltdynamiken ursächlich zu erklären vermag. Um diese Zusammenhänge zu beleuchten, vollzieht der Beitrag die ideengeschichtlichen Grundlagen religiös legitimierter Entmenschlichung und Gewalt sowie latenter wie offener Misogynie im Hinduismus von seinen vedischen Ursprüngen im 2. vorchristlichen Jahrtausend bis zur Gegenwart nach. (shrink)

In this paper, I seek to clarify, criticize, and expand upon the ambiguous-yet-influential concept of divine violence introduced by Walter Benjamin’s “Zur Kritik der Gewalt”. I proceed in three parts: in the first, I outline Benjamin’s argument about the cycle of mythical violence and divine violence’s special role as an interruption of that cycle. Next, I explicate Spinoza’s key concepts of potentia and potestas, which can be used to more clearly define what ought to instead be translated as “divine (...) force”. In the third part, through Benjamin’s brief discussion of Sorel’s theory of the anarchist general strike, I equate potentia as a determinate power of aggregative individuals to divine force, both as a collective action and as an idea itself. I use this renewed and more sophisticated concept of divine force to oppose several interpretations of Benjamin’s concept, including Benjamin’s own quietist stance toward divine force. (shrink)

Wars and Fatal Illusions of Defeatability as a Threat. Metatheoretical Observations and Desiderata of a Contemporary Philosophy of Martial Violence This essay deals with the question how war threatens us even when peace seems to reign. Refering to Heraklit, Kant, and recent theories of war, the author takes answers to this question into account especially with respect to the problem if it is possible to keep in check illusions which make us believe that one can get rid of enmity by (...) way of 'final solutions'. (shrink)

Analyses of gender-based violence during mass conflict have typically focused on violence committed against women. Violence perpetrated against men has only recently been examined as gender-based violence in its own right. Using narratives from 1,136 Darfuri refugees, we analyze patterns of gender-based violence perpetrated against men and boys during the genocide in Darfur. We examine how this violence emasculates men and boys through four mechanisms: homosexualization, feminization, genital harm, and sex-selective killing. In line with an interactionist approach, we demonstrate how (...) genocidal violence is gendered and argue that perpetrators committing gender-based violence perform masculinity in accordance with hegemonic gender norms in Sudan. We also show how gender-based violence enacts, reinforces, and creates meaning on multiple levels in a matrix of mutually reinforcing processes that we term the gender-genocide nexus. By extending the gender–violence link to the context of mass atrocity, this study facilitates an understanding of the mechanisms through which gender inequalities can be reproduced and maintained in diverse situations and structures. (shrink)

This book is a rounded well-informed study of violence, especially from a hermeneutical and social-studies perspective. It is relevant to peace studies. It raises key issues about the phenomenology of the person, of violence, of the foundations of ethics. Although it tends to skirt normative phenomenological, eidetic as well as moral issues they are always insistently on the edge of the rich discussions philosophical-hermeneutical issues and contemporary writings on these matters.

The present considerations discuss the systematic opposition between a practice of nonviolence to experienced social injustice and violent relationships. At the point, we see existential decisions about war and violence, there are signs of misconduct of responsibility waiver form – the Security Council unable to act, the protective effect for the affected people lapsed, the effectiveness of international law too weak. What emerges in this starting position, especially for the present considerations as a problem, is nothing less than the question (...) of a meaningful rule between legitimate power and illegitimate violence, hence a question that has a historical and a fundamental anthropological side. In the present case should be explicitly asked for the meaning of criteria of modern violence ability. The modern power capability opens up a complex and challenging task field. The historical origin and existential explosiveness are often overlooked. (shrink)

ObjectiveA sickness history from General Practice will be unfolded with regard to its implicit lived meanings. This experiential matrix will be analyzed with regard to its medico-theoretical aspects.MethodThe analysis is grounded in a phenomenology of the body. The patient Katherine Kaplan lends a particular portrait to the dynamics that are enacted in the interface between socially silenced domestic violence and the theoretical assumptions of human health as these inform the clinical practice of health care.ResultsBy applying an understanding of sickness (...) that transcends the mind-body split, a concealed and complex logic emerges. This logic is embedded in a nexus of the impact of childhood abuse experience and the medical disinterest in subjective experiences and their impact on selfhood and health. Its core is twofold: the violation of embodiment resulting from intra-familial abuse and existential threat, and the embodiment of violation resulting from social rules and the theoretically blinded medical gaze.ConclusionA considerable medical investment, apparently conducted in a correct and consistent manner as to diagnostic and therapeutic measures, results in the complete incapacitation of a young physician. (shrink)

Is the figure of the intellectual still relevant in and for society in the late 20th and the beginning of the 21st century? The essays of this book from various disciplines explore this question based on the use of the term violence from a perspective of English Studies, German Studies, history and sociology. The focus is on the period between 1968 and the present. Geographically, the essays focus on conflicts in Europe, Latin America as well as South and Central Africa.

Die Studie untersucht die grundlegende Neuorientierung der deutschen theologischen Friedensethik seit dem Ende des Ost-West-Konflikts. Sie bietet Orientierung hinsichtlich der Denk- und Erkenntniswege führender katholischer und evangelischer Friedensethiker und damit der wesentlichen Entwicklungen der theologischen Friedensethik in Deutschland in der harten Schule der neuen Realitäten seit dem Ende der Blockkonfrontation. Dabei arbeitet sie heraus, welche normativen Vorgaben für friedensdienliches Handeln die deutsche theologische Friedensethik in Wahrnehmung ihrer Verantwortung für die Welt angesichts der neuen gewaltförmigen Konflikte unserer Gegenwart entworfen hat.

The main idea of the article is to define the role of imagination, violence and institutions in the formation of the modern state as well as to show that the important dimension of the state building is the image of the self, creative capacity of the individual to symbolic self-made activity and self-made reproduction. The symbolic world of the imaginary state is the product of the communities united symbolically, contingency and simultaneously the part of the social orders. The Nort conception (...) of the social orders as the structures that limit and control the violence takes the privilege place in the article. The first model of the social organization is defined as the “order of limited access”, and the second one as the “order of free access”. Thus the different state establishments are formed: “the natural state” that is formed in the natural way according to the violence restrain logic by means of limited access, and “the artificial state” by means of free access to the political and economic resources. In particular the impossibility of the automatic transition from the self-sufficient type of the natural state to the modern democratic state is emphasized. Nort conception is extrapolated on the experience of the Ukrainian independent state state-building after the abortive coup d’etat in 1991. The authors develop the tenet about the conservation of the institutional matrix of the soviet empire in the post-communist Ukraine. It deals with the institutional features: such as the authoritarian management, the secondary role of the law regulations, the supervisory instance uncontrolled by society. The transformation crises, accordingly to the authors approach, determined the conditions and the price of transitional countries entering not only the civilizational space of the contemporary Europe but also the system of global economic, political and social interrelations. This crises conditioned also the changes in the network of the international institutions. It determined the distinctive features of the national identity formation, legitimation strategies in the contemporary Nation-State, and primarily in the newest Ukrainian state-building. (shrink)