Authors: William Bole, Rev. Drew Christiansen S.J., Robert T. Hennemeyer
Product Code: 5-574
ISBN: 978-1-57455-574-5
Pages: 208
Binding Information: Perfect Bound Paperback
Pages: 208
Size: 6.0"" X 9.0"" X 1/2"
Availability: In stock.
|
Forgiveness in International Politics: <span class="subtitle">An Alternative Road to Peace</span>
Forgiveness in International Politics: An Alternative Road to Peace
|
"This book opens new vistas in the practice of international politics."
-Douglas M. Johnston
International Center for Religion and Development
In this provocative book, authors William Bole, Drew Christiansen, SJ, and Robert T. Hennemeyer argue that the core religious value of forgiveness can play a real, strategic role in the arena of international conflict and diplomacy. Recognizing that the religion plays a dual role in both nurturing peace and perpetuating strife, the authors help to move the debate beyond the negative, examining case studies drawn from Northern Ireland, Bosnia, and South Africa to demonstrate how religion can be a force for peace, a distinct part of the solution to intergroup conflict-and a power that can change lives for the good.
For more information from Social Development and World Peace |
Excerpt:
An American physician traveling in Bosnia witnesses an
unspeakable act: her translator, an ethnic Albanian Kosovar
with whom she has traveled for weeks, pulls out a gun in a
medical clinic and fatally shoots a surgeon. It turns out that the surgeon,
who is a Serb, has committed an arguably less gruesome but
serious political misdeed against the translator and his family. This
was payback time.
A Croatian woman sees her husband murdered in her home by
Serbian attackers. Instead of pleading with the aggressors to spare the
lives of her and her children, the mother lets the aggressors know
that she will strive to forgive them and that her sons will seek no
revenge. With her words, the surprised assailants end the slaughter in
that household.
These are, of course, snapshots of the forces of unforgiveness and
forgiveness, stories that will be detailed later in this chapter. More
deeply, they illustrate constitutive elements of two opposite forces in
human social relationships: colliding elements such as truth and myth,
forbearance and revenge, empathy and dehumanization.
Quotes:
"Timely and it is timeless, the message of Forgiveness in International Politics is more needed than ever at the dawn of the twenty-first century. Hennemeyer, Christiansen and Bole make such a convincing case that the surest path to peace is through forgiveness that one dares to hope their words will inspire many others to have the courage to set out upon that path."
Mary Ann Glendon, Harvard University
President, Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences
"In taking the concept of forgiveness to a deeper level, this book opens new vistas in the practice of international politics. . . . The authors have done a masterful job in addressing the operational implications of this powerful tool."
Douglas M. Johnston
President, International Center for Religion & Diplomacy
"For the healing of vast wrongs that we humans commit against each other, forgiveness is a journey from death to life. This clearly written, realistic, hopeful book will speed any reader on that journey. I am honored to have been a contributor to the work of its authors."
Donald W. Shriver, Jr.
President Emeritus, Union Theological Seminary in New York
TOC: Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Cardinal Theodore McCarrick
INTRODUCTION. FORGIVENESS: A RADICAL NEW FACTOR . . . . . . . 1
The Project and the Publication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
CHAPTER 1. THE FORCES OF UNFORGIVENESS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Cycles of Revenge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Dangerous Memories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
“Mytho-History” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Victimhood . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
The Institutional Abyss . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Rule of Law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Civil Society . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Global Institutions and Human Needs . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Culture and the “Hothead Factor” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
CHAPTER 2. WHY FORGIVENESS? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
A Future in South Africa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
New Dynamics of Conflict . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Globalization’s Challenge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Personal Healing and Reconciliation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Toward a Social Definition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
CHAPTER 3. UNDERSTANDING FORGIVENESS IN POLITICS . . . . . . 41
The Definition(s) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Moral Truth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Forbearance from Revenge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Empathy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Commitment to Repair a Fractured Human Relationship . . . 53
Toward a Dynamic Process of Forgiveness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
CHAPTER 4. POLITICAL FORGIVENESS: ACTS AND AGENTS . . . . . . 61
Victims and Prophetic Acts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Prophetic Burdens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Corporate Agents and the Forgiveness Process . . . . . . . . . . 66
Corporate Apologies and Mutuality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Who Shall Forgive? Who Shall Repent? . . . . . . . . . . . 71
The Culpable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Acts and Agents, Individual vs. Corporate:
An Assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
It’s Called Leadership . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Conditions of Forgiveness: Social and Political . . . . . . 80
Many Possibilities, Few Guarantees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
In (But Not Of) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
CHAPTER 5. SOCIAL TRUTH AND PERSONAL HEALING:
PROJECTS OF FORGIVENESS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
Societies in Search of Truth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
The South Africa Experience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Amnesty = Forgiveness? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Living with Amnesty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
Personal Healing: A Task of Truth Commissions? . . . 99
The Core Task: Promoting Atmospheres
of Forgiveness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
In Search of Personal Healing:
Small-Group Reconciliation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
The Limits of Dialogue: Alternatives and Variations . . . 109
CHAPTER 6. RELIGIOUS COMMUNITIES:
“COMPROMISED BUT CAPABLE” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
Skepticism and Its Limits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
The Secularization Question . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Irreducible Complexity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Religious Communities in the Balkans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
. . . and the Forces of Unforgiveness . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
. . . and the Forces of Forgiveness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
The “Semantics of Fault” and Other Assets . . . . . . . . 135
CHAPTER 7. RELIGIOUS INTERVENTION:
THE “OUTSIDER-NEUTRAL” PARTIES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
Mining Religious Assets: World Conference of
Religions for Peace (WCRP) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
Multi-Religious Collaboration: Speaking in Public . . 144
Beyond Words . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
Questions About “Big Interfaith Initiatives” . . . . . . . 148
Mining Religious Assets: Center for Strategic and
International Studies (CSIS) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
The Role of Acknowledgment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
CSIS, WCRP, and the Process of Forgiveness . . . . . . . . . . . 161
CSIS and the “Choice to Forgive” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
Making Public Space for Forgiveness: The WCRP . . . 165
CHAPTER 8. INTERLUDE: RELIGION,
CULTURE, AND FORGIVENESS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
Cultures, Institutions, and Faith . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
CONCLUSION. LESSONS LEARNED . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
APPENDIX. SOME ORGANIZATIONAL RESOURCES . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
About the Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
|
By: Philip Fischer, Review for Religious - July 1, 2005
"Easy to recommend and worth the efforts of many dedicated people to implement are the informed, thoughtful, and practicable ideas in 'Forgiveness in International Politics: An Alternative Road to Peace.'"
By: Eric Hanson, America Magazine - December 6, 2004
"This extremely useful book brings together the major conclusions of seven years of conferences on forgiveness sponsored by Washington's Woodstock Theological Center held in collaboration with the Office of International Justice and Peace of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops...The participants were leading figures and decision makers who had worked on the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia, Northern Ireland, and South Africa, the principal case studies. The first value of the book, then, is that it summarizes and provides a concise record of this excellent dialogue for those of us without the time to read the complete transcripts. The entire book can be read in a couple of hours, making it a perfect synthesis for international relations practitioners...From this reader's perspective, the author's key insight is that forgiveness is not an isolated personal event, but a social process...this is not a simple recipe book to be applied mechanically, but a call to deeper wisdom in international negotiations. My secondary emphasis would be on the book's superb treatment of the significance of moral turth and of memory in the process."
By: Russell Shaw, The Catholic Herald - September 23, 2004
"...the thesis of 'Forgiveness in International Politics' is hardly known at all, much less accepted. It is that, with the right actors doing the right things, forgivenes and reconciliation are a viable formula for conflict resolution without violence...It's no mystery why South Africa is the chief real-life example in the Bole-Christiansen-Hennemeyer book. There aren't that many others. Northern Ireland, perhaps, which has been creeping toward Protestant-Catholic peace for years but isn't there yet. A handful of other places -- possibly. Pickings otherwise are slim...Why did the formula work in South Africa? Exceptional leaders had everything to do with it: Mandela, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, certain white politicians who, whatever their faults, recognized that apartheid's day had passed. These people had the moral imagination to make reconciliation work."
By: Edward Grosek, Catholic Library World - March 1, 2005
"The central idea of
Forgiveness in International Politics is that a process of forgiveness can and should be substituted for revenge. Forgiveness is commonly thought of as a local action. The authors propose that it be universalized and made a step in conflict management between hostility and settlement.
Forgiveness in International Politics is the culmination of seven years of thought, dialog, and revision. Reading it leaves no doubt of those seven years of work: the central topic is exhausted on its pages. All of the libraries listed on OCLC as owing Forgiveness in International Politics are libraries of religious institutes; and all such libraries, regardless of religious affiliation, ought to acquire this book. Other potential buyers are non-governmental organizations concerned with peace efforts, university libraries having United Nations publications collections, and libraries of colleges offering courses in political science, international affairs, or conflict management."
By: Nathan Schlueter, Cistercian Studies Quarterly - January 1, 2005
"In it the others draw deeply upon both theoretical research (Douglas Johnston, Donald Shriver, and Olga Botcharova are three names that appear often) and practical experience in conflict resolution and international relations to make a convincing case for why "societal forgiveness" in political diplomacy is not merely a moral or religious ideal but also a pragmatic strategic consideration of global realities in the post-Cold War world...The authors give a sober but hopeful analysis of the difficulties in translating the therapeutic dimension of interpersonal forgiveness into collective communal and political expressions. They take pains to point out that "social forgiveness" is not a single action but a complex and often difficult process involving four distinct elements...acknowledgment of the truth, empathy, forbearance of revenge, and a commitment to repair fractured relationships. They also wrestle with other difficult issues like Who can legitimately speak for a community? Who can apologize on its behalf? Who can forgive? How does forgiveness relate to punishment? In what ways can amnesty both help and hurt the cause of forgiveness? Forgiveness in International Politicsis a refreshing reminder that a truly effective Realpolitk must be based upon a true understanding of human nature, in which human beings are not simply individualistic utility maximizers but are complex persons who long for truth, meaning, community, and transcendence."
By: Guillermo Kerber, The Ecumenical Review - April 1, 2005
"The book will provide a relevant insight to all those interested in deepening on the possibilities of forgivenvess at international politics...aims at gleaning lessons relating to forgiveness from and for the field of conflict-resolution and of peace-building. The authors' reflections are based on philosophical, theological and political considerations as well as on lessons learned from concrete situations, for example South Africa, the Balkans and Northern Ireland. While stressing the importance of forgiveness, the authors pay special attention to other aspects such as truth-telling, justice, the healing of memories and victims' rights."
