Afro-communitarian forgiveness and the concept of reconciliation

The main aim of this paper is to investigate the role of forgiveness (specifically in the post-apartheid South African context) within the process of reconciliation as understood from what I call an ‘Afro-communitarian’ perspective. Forgiveness, as understood from within this world-view, is performed as an invitation to commence a relationship based on equality, extended by victims/survivors towards perpetrators/ beneficiaries of harm. This invitation is understood to be a tentative one, and is meant to ‘draw out’ a response of taking responsibility for harms on the part of the perpetrators/beneficiaries. Lucy Allais’ account of forgiveness (that hails from a Kantian perspective), and her analyses of two cases from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) is considered in order to contrast it with the Afro-communitarian account. A development of Antjie Krog's (what I label as) ‘Afro-communitarian’ account of forgiveness is then compared to Allais’ account, and it is argued that this account is able to explain what is happening in the TRC cases better than Allais’ understanding of forgiveness.     

Growing Up in Conflict: The Personal and the Political

This article is an autobiographical account of conflicts, both personal and political, that I experienced growing up in South Africa in a context of racism and civil conflict. It speaks to how these conflicts shaped my work as an analyst and as a person. In regard to specific issues that were fore-fronted, these included an interest in the ugly emotions, trauma and dissociation in both victims and perpetrators, the application of psychoanalysis in war zones, the issue of voice, the effects of emigration and the diaspora, the centrality of context, and the dynamics of racism.     

Taking up offenses: secondhand forgiveness and group identification

When a person or group is mistreated, those not directly harmed by the transgression might still experience antipathy toward offenders, leading to secondhand forgiveness dynamics similar to those experienced by firsthand victims. Three studies examine the role of social identification in secondhand forgiveness. Study 1 shows that the effects of apologies on secondhand victims are moderated by level of identification with the wronged group. Study 2 shows that identification with the United States was associated with less forgiveness and greater blame and desire for retribution directed at the 9/11 terrorists, and these associations were primarily mediated by anger. Finally, Study 3 shows that participants whose assimilation needs were primed were less forgiving toward the perpetrators of an assault on ingroup members than participants whose differentiation needs were primed, an effect that was mediated by empathy for the victims.     

Getting Even or Getting Equal? Retributive Desires and Transitional Justice

This article examines the effect that different policy interventions of transitional justice have on the desires of the victims of human rights violations for retribution. The retributive desires assessed in this article are conceptualized as individual, collective, and abstract demands for the imposition of a commensurate degree of suffering upon the offender. We suggest a plausible way of reducing victims' retributive desires. Instead of "getting even" in relation to the suffering, victims and perpetrators may "get equal" in relation to their respective statuses, which were affected by political crimes. The article hypothesizes that the three classes of transitional justice: (1) reparation that empowers victims by financial compensation, truth telling, and social acknowledgment; (2) retribution that inflicts punishment upon perpetrators; and (3) reconciliation that renews civic relationship between victims and perpetrators through personal contact, apology, and forgiveness; each contributes to restoring equality between victims and perpetrators, and in so doing decreases the desires that victims have for retribution. In order to test our hypotheses, we conducted a survey of former political prisoners in the Czech Republic. Results from the regression analysis reveal that financial compensation, social acknowledgement, punishment, and forgiveness are likely to reduce victims' retributive desires.     

Victim and offender accounts of interpersonal conflict: autobiographical narratives of forgiveness and unforgiveness

Participants wrote 2 narratives that described an incident in which they angered or hurt someone (offender) or in which someone angered or hurt them (victim) and the offense was forgiven or not forgiven. Victims portrayed the offense as continuing (open), and offenders portrayed the offense as over (closed). Forgiveness narratives portrayed offenses as closed and with positive outcomes; however, for some victims, forgiveness coincided with continued anger, suggesting incomplete forgiveness. Dispositional empathy was associated with more benign interpretations of offenses, and situational empathy (e.g., for the offender) was associated with victims' forgiveness. In contrast, offenders' empathy for victims was associated with less self-forgiveness. Thus, both victim or offender role and forgiveness must be considered to understand narratives of interpersonal offenses.     

Making findings for the future: representational order and redemption in the work of the TRC

The following paper examines the ways in which the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission provided redemption to both individual perpetrators and to political organisations responsible for Gross Human Rights Violations by virtue of the particular representational ordering that was adopted. While the genealogy of this representational ordering can be traced back to the Information Management System, a database used for capturing data about perpetrators and victims, this ordering is ultimately apparent in the Final Report. Here we find evidence of the TRC’s use of a particular representational ordering to reconcile the dual imperative to be impartial on the one hand, while on the other hand trying not to equate the violations of human rights perpetrated by the ANC with those perpetrated by the apartheid state. The representation of the apartheid state as a unified and homogenous entity is discussed as central to this strategy.     

Healing Multiculturalism: Middle-Ground Liberal Forgiveness in a Diverse Public Realm

This article examines debates about political forgiveness in liberal, pluralist societies. Although the concept of forgiveness is not usually taken up by liberals, I outline a plausible conception by exploring two recent approaches. The first, ‘unattached articulation’, concept requires no real emotional change on the forgiver’s part, but rather a form of civic restraint. In contrast, the second version highlights a strong form of empathy for perpetrators. In spite of their advantages, each concept proves too extreme. The problems are revealed by focusing on the case of the Harkis, who fought for the French during the Algerian war. Often still marginalised in French society, their case helps to highlight the conceivability of a ‘middle-ground’ or moderate concept of political forgiveness. Its core rests on the forgiver’s care for the social world. While this concept brings considerable challenges also, and is not inevitable in any particular case, it entails a more plausible combination of emotional and rational shifts in the forgiver’s world-view. Although the article does not recommend forgiveness by any person or group, it observes, recalling Arendt’s idea of amor mundi or ‘love of the world’, that political forgiveness may sustain a viable connection between diverse citizens’ public and non-public lives.     

The forgiveness process in primary and secondary victims of violent and sexual offences

It is possible that the physical and mental health of crime victims might be improved by forgiving those who have offended against them. To date, no research has been undertaken to examine the processes that influence victims' forgiveness. The goal of this project was to examine the forgiveness process in primary and secondary victims of violent and sexual crimes. In Study 1, qualitative data were collected by interviewing 21 people who had been affected by sexual or other violent crime. Data analysis identified five themes that were common to both primary and secondary victims, namely benefit of forgiveness, self‐forgiveness, perspective taking, offender behaviour, and time. An empowerment theme was unique to primary victims, and a principal victim theme was unique to secondary victims. To further explore these qualitative findings, a quantitative survey of 60 primary and secondary victims was conducted. Results confirmed that primary victims are pragmatic forgivers who are internally focused and forgive because that will benefit their healing. Conversely, secondary victims did not think forgiveness benefited, or would impact on, their own or the primary victim's recovery process. Neither group saw forgiveness as a moral issue, nor thought that forgiveness should influence whether an offender should face court.     

Forgiveness intervention for female South Korean adolescent aggressive victims

We investigated an intervention designed to help female aggressive victims improve their levels of psychological and school adjustment. Adolescent aggressive victims are youth who demonstrate heightened levels of aggressive behavior and are frequently victimized by others. A program focused on the psychology of forgiveness was implemented and tested against both an alternative skillstreaming program and a no-treatment control group. Forty-eight female adolescent aggressive victims in South Korea (age 12 to 21 years) were recruited from a middle school and a juvenile correctional facility. Participants were randomly assigned to groups. Both forgiveness and skillstreaming interventions were implemented in a small-group format for 12 weeks. Participants in the forgiveness group reported significant decreases in anger, hostile attribution, aggression, and delinquency at post-test and follow-up; they also reported significant increases in empathy at post-test and follow-up and grades at post-test. We discuss implications for the psychological development of adolescent aggressive victims.     

Victim and perpetrator accounts of interpersonal transgressions: self-serving or relationship-serving biases?

Two studies investigated perpetrator and victim biases in reported transgressions. Study 1 showed that in nonromantic relationships, perpetrators were more likely than victims to emphasize details that minimized their transgressions, whereas victims were more likely to exaggerate the severity of the event. Study 2 examined these perspective-related differences in romantic relationships and their relationship to forgiveness. Although victims were less likely than perpetrators to include features that minimized the event, they were no more likely to include features that magnified the event; individuals in highly satisfying relationships were less likely to exhibit self-serving biases than were individuals in less satisfying relationships. The data also were consistent with a causal sequence in which positive relationship quality led to more benign interpretations of a transgression, which in turn, promoted forgiveness.     

“得寸进尺”还是“适可而止”:冒犯者得到宽恕以后的行为

对于冒犯者得到宽恕以后的行为,已有研究存矛盾之处,有研究认为冒犯者得到宽恕后会再次伤害被冒犯者,但也有研究认为会停止对对方的伤害。本研究通过囚徒困境范式研究冒犯者得到宽恕以后的行为。结果显示:(1)当对方是熟悉的人时,冒犯者在得到宽恕后更倾向于不再伤害对方;(2)当存在报复的可能性时,无论得到宽恕与否,冒犯者都不倾向于再次伤害对方;(3)当冒犯者是被迫伤害被冒犯者时,无论得到宽恕与否,其都不倾向于再次伤害对方。总体而言,冒犯者在得到宽恕后更倾向于不再伤害对方。该结果一定程度上澄清了以往研究的矛盾之处,并对人际互动具有一定的指导意义。。     

Forgiveness: The Victim’s Prerogative

Abstract

This article explores and offers a qualified defence of the claim that the entitlement to forgive a wrongdoer belongs to the victim of the wrong. A summary account of forgiveness is given, followed by arguments in favor of the victim’s prerogative to forgive. Primary, or direct victims are then distinguished from secondary and tertiary ones, which point to a plurality of prerogatives to forgive. In cases of conflicts between these prerogatives it is emphasized that special care should be taken to protect the primary victim’s entitlement, without giving an absolute and exclusive status to the latter prerogative. Grounds for limiting the primary victim’s prerogative regarding forgiveness include (a) cases where harm to secondary and/or tertiary victims are greater than the harm resulting from the original wrong committed against the primary victim, (b) the social dimensions of the elements of forgiveness, and (c) the need for self-forgiveness when a repentant wrongdoer is not forgiven by any of the victims. The practical significance of these arguments are illustrated by considering the criticism that the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission have forgiven perpetrators in ways that inappropriately pre-empted the primary victims’ entitlement to forgive.     

An integrative review of South Africa’s approach to victim support

This integrative review seeks to consider the evidence on how crime victims’ rights are served within South Africa’s criminal justice system. Victims view criminal proceeding as the means through which justice for the harms they suffered can be obtained. Such aspirations are often misplaced since criminal proceedings are a legal process between the state and accused with the sole purpose of determining guilt or innocence. As such, the concerns of victims are secondary. Victim’s rights in South Africa was only truly acknowledged during the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in 1995. South Africa’s victim empowerment policy is underpinned by restorative justice principles. Contradictory to legal procedures, restorative justice is not offender-driven, but aims to elevate the role of crime victims in the criminal justice system.     

Remembering as Necessary for Forgiving

As Japan marks the 75th anniversary of World War II in 2020, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe did not offer a fresh apology and maintained that future generations should not have to keep apologizing for past mistakes. This paper uses the unresolved war issue of the military comfort women system as a context to discuss what it means for political apologies to be more than mere political gestures founded on political interests and discusses what it takes to facilitate forgiveness. It will examine the features of a repentant wrongdoer who deserves forgiveness based on how one relates to one’s past wrongdoing in order to distinguish political apologies that are genuine from those that are mere gestures aimed at hasty reconciliation. This will be discussed through the works of Jacques Derrida and Vladimir Jankélévitch. Next, through Jankélévitch’s and Paul Ricoeur’s ideas of forgiveness, it will be discussed how matters of justice and forgiveness should be understood as well as how the history of past wrongs and injustice is necessary for a genuine apology and makes forgiveness possible. It is also a moral responsibility for both perpetrators and victims to remember history in order to achieve personal forgiveness as well as begin social and political reconciliation.

     

Hegelian restorative justice

In the Philosophy of Right, Hegel claims that crime is a negation of right and punishment is the “negation of the negation.” Punishment, for Hegel, “annuls” the criminal act. Many take it that Hegel endorses a form of retributivism—the theory that criminal offenders should be subject to harsh treatment in response and in proportion to their wrongdoing. Here I argue that restorative criminal justice is consistent with Hegel's remarks on punishment and his overall philosophical system. This is true, in part, because restorative justice integrates Hegel's instructive discussion of confession and forgiveness in the Phenomenology of Spirit. Hegel claims that true moral relationships allow space for persons to confess their moral shortcomings and forgive the shortcomings of others. Restorative criminal justice brings the perpetrators and victims of crime together to offer confessions and forgiveness and to work to heal the various wounds caused by crime. I do not claim that Hegel must be read as advocating restorative justice. While Hegel tells us what punishment does, he does not commit himself to any form of punishment. What I offer here is a rational, progressive reconstruction and extension of Hegel's conception of crime and punishment.     

Understanding Forgiveness as Discovery: Implications for Marital and Family Therapy

This article explores the concept of forgiveness in relationship systems and examines various conceptualizations and definitions found in the literature. Forgiveness is described as a complex psychological and relational process that is more a discovery than an act of will. A rationale for viewing forgiveness in a contextual, historical, and relational attachment paradigm is presented, and the association of forgiveness with empathy and emotional intelligence is discussed. Marital and family therapists are encouraged to attend to contextual family of origin issues and to facilitate an empathic relational environment where ambivalence is expected and tolerated for enhancing the process of forgiveness. Relevant clinical cases are shared to illustrate the process of forgiveness as discovery.     

Age Moderates the Mediational Role of Empathy in the Association Between Gender and Forgiveness

Researchers have suggested that empathy may serve to explain, at least in part, the relationship between gender and forgiveness. Some findings in the literature have supported this claim, while other studies have not. Accounting for the variable of age might help to explain these inconsistencies, as age has been found to influence the expression of empathy across gender. As such, in the present study we examined whether age might exert a conditional indirect effect on the relationship between gender and forgiveness as mediated by empathy. Participants were recruited from the community (N?=?62) and on a college campus (N?=?94). Within the community sample the average age was 74.8, while on the college campus the average age was 20.7. Participants were given a survey packet that included the Heartland Forgiveness Scale and the Empathy Quotient Scale, among other instruments. A moderated-mediational analysis showed that while gender was related to empathy and empathy was associated with forgiveness, empathy served as a significant mediator only for those younger than 62 years of age. This finding suggests that empathy serves as an important mediator in the relationship between gender and forgiveness for adults aged 61 and younger, because younger women are more likely to respond empathetically to a transgressor as compared to younger men. Older women also tend to be more forgiving than older men, but in the present study empathy was not as important of a factor in explaining this relationship for individuals 62 years and older. These findings help to address the inconsistencies in the literature with regard to the relationships among gender, age, empathy, and forgiveness.     

Providing compensation promotes forgiveness for replaceable,but not irreplaceable,losses

ABSTRACT

The present study aimed to examine how the replaceability of a loss moderates the effectiveness of compensation. In Study 1, we sampled real-life experiences of experiential loss, material loss, or loss of materials to which the victims had special attachment, and assayed subsequent feelings toward the transgressor who caused the loss. The results showed that for those who reported losses of an experience or cherished material object, perpetrators’ offers of compensation did not facilitate forgiveness. In Study 2, by manipulating replaceability of hypothetical losses in vignettes, we showed that compensation for replaceable losses effectively elicits forgiveness from a victim, but compensation for irreplaceable losses is ineffective. A series of mediation analyses showed that the effect of replaceability on forgiveness is explained by the victim’s perception of whether their loss was sufficiently recovered. We discuss the function of compensation and its inherent limitations.     

Blame attribution in sexual victimization

The current study explored how victims and third-parties attribute blame and perpetrator motivation for actual sexual victimization experiences. Although we do not assert that victims are responsible for perpetrators’ behavior, we found that some victims do not allocate all blame to their perpetrator. We sought to examine how victims and third-parties allocate blame in instances of actual completed and attempted sexual victimization and how they perceived perpetrator motivations. Victims of completed rape (n = 49) and attempted sexual assault (n = 91), and third-parties who knew a victim of sexual assault (n = 152) allocated blame across multiple targets: perpetrator, self/victim, friends, family, and the situation. Participants also described their perceptions of perpetrator’s motivation for the sexual assault. Victims tended to assign more blame to themselves than third-parties assigned to victims. Furthermore, victims perceived perpetrators as being more sexually-motivated than third-parties did, who viewed perpetrators as more power-motivated. Results suggest that perceptions of rape and sexual assault significantly differ between victims and third-party individuals who have never directly experienced such a trauma.     

Forgiveness aversion: developing a motivational state measure of perceived forgiveness risks

Given the demonstrated psychological, physical, and social benefits of forgiveness, it is striking that there are still strong impediments to its attainment. In this paper, we introduce the multi-dimensional construct of forgiveness aversion, an offense-specific motivational state based on perceived forgiveness risks. The construct and our proposed measure (the Forgiveness Aversion Scale) are composed of three related dimensions: unreadiness, self-protection, and face concerns. Unreadiness refers to the ongoing emotional turmoil that keeps victims from sincerely forgiving. Self-protection refers to the concerns about how offenders will interpret forgiveness. Finally, face concerns reflect victims’ concerns for their reputation. Four studies were completed to develop a state measure of forgiveness aversion through correlation, structural equations modeling, longitudinal analysis, and a hypothetical scenario experiment. Results of four studies reveal differential predictors of the three dimensions of forgiveness aversion and demonstrate that our understanding of the forgiveness process and impediments thereto is enhanced by addressing situation-specific impediments to forgiveness.