In contrast to most, perhaps all, other species, human aggression and predation (e.g., interpersonal violence, slavery, war, genocide, torture for political purposes, and the treatment of "inmates" in nursing homes and institutions for persons with disabilites) are often done with full knowledge of, and sometimes with the intention of, inflicting pain and injury. This is what distinguishes cruelty from mere aggression and predation. This course examines the social origins and social organization of cruelty. Our mission is twofold:

1. To develop a general theory of cruelty.

2. To better understand cruelty as an ongoing social achievement, and not simply a "breakdown" in personal or societal controls, or the "expression" of individual or collective psychopathology.

Our course draws on poetry and plays; moral philosophy; social-psychological experiments on obedience; and historical, socio-anthropological and autobiographical accounts of genocidal movements, concentration and slave labor camps, societies during plagues and famines, institutions for persons considered mad, mentally retarded or emotionally disturbed, and nursing homes. The literature provides several guidelines around which our course is organized.

1. As is true of love and protectiveness, cruelty is found in all times and in most (perhaps all) cultures. Therefore, we seek the conditions in which cruelty is and is not likely to occur and the methods by which it is accomplished.

2. When we think of cruelty, especially to persons in the category "innocent" (e.g., children, nonpartisans, elderly) we are tempted to see perpetrators as mad, drug-deranged, staggeringly inept, or sociopathic. However, as argued by Hannah Arendt in Eichmann in Jerusalem,, and as shown by the research of Stanley Milgram and Phillip Zimbardo, cruelty is more often and more chillingly practiced by ordinary persons, who in other circumstances have the capacity for anxiety and shame regarding their deeds. Therefore, it seems that there must be a transformation in how individuals and groups understand what they are doing and in their relationship to others. We seek to determine what instigates and guides this transformation.

3. In retrospect, even what appears to be an "outbreak" of cruelty, is generally quite organized and has a history. Therefore, we seek the conditions that initialize and organize an "apparatus" for identifying, "testing," categorizing, excluding, and "treating" persons who are no longer deemed part of the circle of "those who are one of us."

4. Even at local levels (e.g., families, nursing homes), cruelty must be understood as embedded in larger social contexts. Therefore, we seek to determine how factors at the societal level (e.g., historical, social-institutional, cultural) shape social phenomena at the community level (e.g., attitudes towards certain groups), and how this affects activities at the local level (e.g., the actual selection of victims and the training of victimizers).

Our course is organized into the following units of study.

Unit 1. Outlines of an Apparatus of Socal Control and/or Victimization

In this unit we will attempt to identify stages in the development of an apparatus of victimization and the functions such an apparatus might serve; the activities that are involved; and the forms of social interaction by which activities are accomplished.

Required Readings

1. Arthur Miller. The crucible.

2. Goffman, E. (1963). Stigma: Notes on the management of spoiled identity. New York: Simon & Schuster.

Supplementary Readings

1. McDermott, R.P. (1993). "The acquisition of a child by a learning disability." In S. Chaiklin & J. Lave (Eds), Understanding practice: Perspectives on activity and context (pp. 269-305). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

2. Mehan, H. (1993). "Beneath the skin and between the ears: A case study of the politics of representation." In S. Chaiklin & J. Lave (Eds.), Understanding practice: Perspectives on activity and context (pp. 241-267). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

3. Gamson, W.A. (1995) "Hiroshima, the holocaust, and the politics of exclusion." American Sociological Review, 60, 1-20.

4. Garfinkel, H. (1956). "Conditions for a successful degradation ceremony." American Journal of Sociology, 61, 420-424.

5. Murphy, R.F., Scheer, J., Murphy, Y., & Mack, R. (1988). "Physical disability and social liminality: A study in the rituals of adversity." Social Science and Medicine, 26, 235.

6. Henry, J. (1966). "Personality and aging--with special reference to hospitals for the aged poor." In J.C. McKinney & F.T. DeVyver (Eds.), Aging and social policy (pp. 281-301). New York: Meredith.

7. Kozloff, M.A. (1997). "Personalization and depersonalization." (See Personalization and Depersonalization.)

8. Rowitz, L., & Gunn, J.E. (1984). "The labeling of educable mentally-retarded children." In L. Barton & S. Tomlinson (Eds.). Special education and social interests (pp. 149-172). New York: Nichols Publishing Company.

Unit 2. Good People (?) and Dirty Work

Perpetrators of genocidal massacres do not call themselves "perpetrators of genocidal massacres" or "international criminals." Rather, they call themselves "Generals," "good soldiers," or individuals who were "merely doing their duty." How is it that individuals and groups that ordinarily do not have the stomach for cruelty, and who are capable of experiencing shame and guilt, can practice cruelty with good conscience? Is there some sort of shaping process? Is there a social process by which settings for cruelty are "bracketed" from settings where "ordinary" morality and inhibitions apply? What are the cultural resources for legitimizing or valoring aggression and predation?

Required Reading

Kelman, H.C., & Hamilton, V.L. (1989). Crimes of obedience. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Supplementary Readings

1. Everett C. Hughes. "Good people and dirty work."

2. Solomon Asche. (1951). "Effects of group pressure upon the modification and distortion of judgments. In H. Guetzkow (Ed.), Groups, leadership and men. Pittsburgh: Carnegie Press.

3. Milgram, S. (1974). Obedience to authority. New York: Harper & Row.

4. Duster, Troy. (1971). "Conditions for a guilt-free massacre." In N. Sanford & C. Comstack (Eds.), Sanctions for evil. Boston: Beacon Press, pp. 25-36.

5. Gibson, J.T., & Haritos-Fatouros, M. (1986) "The education of a torturer." Psychology Today, 20, 50-58.

6. Haney, C., Banks, C., & Zimbardo, P. (1973). "Interpersonal dynamics in a simulated prison." International Journal of Criminology and Penology, 1, 69-97.

7. Schutz, A. (1970). On phenomenology and social relations. (H.R. Wagner, Ed). Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.

8. Arendt, H. (1965). Eichmann in Jerusalem. New York: Viking.

Unit 3. Predisposing and Initializing Conditions

Ordinary forms of aggression and predation include insults, job discrimination, and manipulation. Under certain circumstances, the rates of these activities increase and their form becomes more injurious (e.g., ethnic slurs becomes ethnic bashing and then, perhaps, "ethnic cleansing"). In this unit we will try to identify the conditions that initialize and guide a trajectory of victimization.

Required Reading

Turnbull, C. The mountain people.

Supplementary Readings

1. Fein, H. (1979). Accounting for genocide. New York: Free Press.

2. Wolfensberger. (1994). "A personal interpetation of the mental retardation scene in light of the "signs of the times." Mental Retardation, 32(1), 19-33.

3. Georg Simmel. "The metropolis and mental life."

4. Weber, M. "Politics as a vocation."

5. Thucydides. The Peloponnesian wars. (Section on the plague at Athens.)

6. Canetti, E. (1960). Crowds and power. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux.

7. Tronto, J.C. (1993). Moral boundaries. New York: Routledge, Chapman, and Hall, Inc.

8. Oliver, M. (1996). Understanding disability. New York: St. Martin's Press.

9. Lifton, R.J., & Markusen, E. (1990). The genocidal mentality: Nazi holocaust and nuclear threat. New York: Basic Books.

10. Hirsch, H. (1995). Genocide and the politics of memory. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press.

11. Glasser, I. (1978). "Prisoners of benevolence: Power versus liberty in the welfare state." In W. Gaylin, I. Glasser, S. Marcus, & D.J. Rothman (Eds.), Doing good: The limits of benevolence (pp. 99-168). New York: Pantheon Books.

12. Durkheim, E. (1951). Suicide. New York: Free Press.

13. Emberely, P. (1995) Values education and technology: The ideology of dispossession. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

Unit 4. The Formal and Informal Organization of Cruelty

Sometimes aggression and predation are fostered by and accelerated within social movements, the existence and outcomes of which (e.g., final solutions) its members are quite aware. However, aggression and predation may be routine, frequent and understood features of a social system without members having a plan to injure others (e.g., abuse of residents in nursing homes, family violence). In this unit we will examine the ways cruelty is organized. Are there divisions of labor (e.g., persons who find victims, persons who deliver pain, and persons who disguise what is going on)? How are new members (perpetrators and victims) socialized?

Required Reading

1. Sobsey, D. (1994). Violence and abuse in the lives of people with disabilities. Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Company.

2. Chalk, F., & Jonassohn, F. (1990). The history and sociology of genocide. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Supplementary Readings

1. Kogan, E. (1958).The theory and practice of hell. New York: Berkley Publishing Corporation.

2. Goffman, E. (1961). Asylums. New York: Anchor Books.

3. Solzhenitsyn. A. (1974).The gulag archipelago, Two. New York: Harper & Row.

4. Weber, M. (1947). The theory of social and economic organization. New York: Free Press.

5. Gubrium, J. (1975). Living and dying at Murray Manor. New York: St. Martin's Press.

6. Simmel, G. (1903-4). "The sociology of conflict." American Journal of Sociology, IX, 505-508.

7. Lifton, R.J. (1986). The Nazi doctors. New York: Basic Books.

8. Levi, P. (1986). Survival in Auschwitz. New York: Simmit Books

9. Henry, J. (1971). Pathways to madness. New York: Random House.

10. Des Pres, T. (1976).The survivor. New York: Pocket Books.