Why We Harm (Critical Issues in Crime and Society)

In this book the author scrutinizes accounts of acts as diverse as genocide, environmental degradation, war, torture, terrorism, homicide, rape, and meat-eating in order to develop an original theoretical framework with which to consider harmful actions and their causes. In doing so, this book presents a general theory of harm, revealing the commonalities between actions that impose suffering and cause destruction. Harm is built on stories in which the targets of harm are reduced to one-dimensional characters, sometimes a dangerous foe, sometimes much more benign, but still a projection of our own concerns and interests. In our stories of harm, we are licensed to do the harmful deed and, at the same time, are powerless to act differently. Chapter by chapter, the author examines statements made by perpetrators of a wide variety of harmful actions. Appearing vastly different from one another at first glance, she identifies the logics they share that motivate, legitimize, and sustain them. From that point, she maps out strategies for reducing harm. -- Publisher's description.