The Politics of Official Apologies

ISBN-13: 9780521693851 / Angielski / Miękka / 2008 / 216 str.

Melissa Nobles

Opis

This book examines the political uses of official apologies in the United States, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. Nobles explores why minority groups demand such apologies and why governments do or do not offer them. She argues that apologies can help to alter the terms and meanings of national membership. Minorities demand apologies in order to focus attention on historical injustices, the rectification of which, they argue, should guide changes in present-day government policies. When employed by political actors, apologies play an important, if under appreciated, role in bringing certain views about history and moral obligation to bear in public life.

Recenzje

'Melissa Nobles has written a subtle, nuanced book about a phenomenon that lends itself to extravagant moralising and rhetoric. Clear-headedly and insightfully, Nobles grasps apologies not as magic wands of reconciliation or cheap tokens of sentiment but as political resources for groups seeking broader political change. … The Politics of Official Apologies is an excellent book that stakes out important ground. … [It] is careful and nonpolemical; it does an excellent job of situating the phenomenon of apology in the wider field of redress politics; and it navigates admirably and sensitively through the specific details and histories of the relevant cases. Sophisticated and scholarly, but also suitable for course use with graduate students and senior undergraduates, it should be on the bookshelves of every researcher working on questions of historic injustice.' Journal of Politics

Spis treści

1. Toward a membership theory of apologies; 2. History of national memberships in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States; 3. To apologize or not to apologize: national histories and official apologies; 4. Beyond sentiment? Apologies and their effects; 5. The weight of history and the value of apologies.