Transformative Pacifism: Critical Theory and Practice

ISBN-13: 9781350151338 / Angielski / Miękka / 2020 / 272 str.

Andrew Fiala (California State Universit

Opis

Defending pacifism against the charge that it is naively utopian, Transformative Pacifism offers a critical theory of the existing world order, and points in the direction of concrete ethical and political action. Pacifism is a transformative philosophy with wide ranging implications. It aims to transform political, social, and psychological structures. Its focus is deep and wide. It is similar to other transformative social theories: feminism, ecology, animal welfare, cosmopolitanism, human rights theory. Indeed, behind those theories is often the pacifist idea that violence, power, and domination are wrong. Pacifist theory raises consciousness about unjustifiable violence. This in turn leads to transformations in practical life. Many other books defend nonviolence and pacifism by focusing on failed justifications of war, as well as on the strategic value of nonviolence. This book begins by reviewing and accepting those sort of arguments. It then focuses on what a commitment to pacifism and nonviolence means in terms of a variety of practical issues. Pacifists reject the violent presuppositions of a society based upon power, strength, nationalism, and the system of militarized nation-states. Pacifism transforms psychological, social, political, and economic life. This book will be of interest to those who are disenchanted with ongoing violence, violent rhetoric, terrorism, wars, and the war industry. It gives anyone with pacifist sympathies reassurance: pacifists are not wrong to think that violence and war are immoral, irrational, and insane and that there is always an alternative.

Spis treści

Introduction Part 1: Theory Chapter 1: Defending the Indefensible a) The (Understandable) Failure of Just War Theory b) The Just War Myth Revisited c) The Problem of Moral Rationalization Chapter 2: Gandhi, Buber, and the Dream of a Great and Lasting Peace a) The Challenge of Nazism b) Fighting Fire with Fire C) Quenching and Preventing Violence Chapter 3: Applied Ethics, Normative Theory, and Critical Social Theory a) The Limits of Applied Ethics b) A Critique of the Pacifism-Realism Continuum c) Pacifism as Normative Theory d) Analogies: Feminism, Race Theory, Animal Welfare, Ecology, Human Rights e) The Pacific Virtues Chapter 4: On Seeing Structures of Violence a) Structural Violence b) Cultural Violence c) The Frankfurt School d) Theory as a Way of Seeing Chapter 5: Pacifism, Utopia, and Human Rights a) Critique of Pacifism I: Inconsistent b) Critique of Pacifism II: Immoral c) Critique of Pacifism III: Bourgeois and Reactionary d) The Human Rights Analogy e) A Modest Defense of Utopian Social Theory and Practice Part 2: Practice Chapter 6: The Peaceful Self a) The Soft Nonsense of Spiritual Nonviolence b) The Strenuous Work of the Peaceful Self c) Stoicism, Christianity, Buddhism d) Positive Psychology Chapter 7: Domestic Tranquility a) Domestic violence and family relations b) Care Ethics and Maternal Thinking c) The Masculinity Problem d) Peace Begins in the Home Chapter 8: Nonviolent Culture, Cultural Causation, and the Media a) Thug Cultures b) The Online Trolls c) Violence and Video Games d) Cultural Violence and Causation Chapter 9: Nonviolent politics and the economics of peace a) Civility, Hospitality, and Democracy b) Beyond the Profit Motive c) Leadership, Management, and Community Chapter 10: Beyond War a) Nonviolent Policing and Weaponry b) The Problem of Military-Industrial-Carceral Complexes c) On a Moral Equivalent of War d) Pacifism, Anarchism, and Cosmopolitanism Chapter 11: Eco-pacifism a) Deep Ecology and Nonviolence b) Toward a Nonviolent Diet c) The Taoist-Epicurean Sage d) The Wisdom of Letting Be Conclusion: Philosophy as a Practice of Nonviolence a) The Example of Socrates b) Socratic Teaching c) Dialogue d) Peace Education e) Peace Philosophy Bibliography Index