However, pursuing this line of thought was impossible for
Whiston.135 To do so, he would have had to accept that both Jesus
and Josephus were in error because they each "saw" something that
could not have happened in 70 C.E. To Whiston, Jesus could not err,
by definition, because he was God. Likewise, to Whiston, as to so
many Christian scholars, Josephus could not be mistaken because
his history records God's handiwork.
This is a demonstration of the power of the combination of the
two works. The belief that they came from two distinct sources creates
the effect that they demonstrate the supernatural, which is to
say, Jesus' power of prophecy. The New Testament reveals the true
"Son of God" because Christ's predictions come true. A "historian"
records them. Josephus' histories must be accurate because they
record the works of God. Jesus predicts the events that Josephus sees.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
CM
Sunday, August 16, 2009
‘Crimes are transformed into moral acts’
Philosopher SN Balagangadhara tells SHOMA CHAUDHURY terrorism is functioning like a multinational firm, with local franchises
Cover Story - Mumbai Terror Attack 2008Could you outline your thesis on the nature of terrorism?
My thesis is that it’s a mistake to think of terrorists as deranged or pathological. Like many of us, they have a high ethical sense and are driven by an acute sense of injustice. For these crimes to become attractive, they are transformed into moral acts. They think of themselves as moral exemplars to be emulated. It is also a mistake to think of terrorism as specific to a particular religious or political doctrine. It moves easily across religions and politics. This is why the West’s discourse on Islamist terrorism is so misleading and ineffective. Also, terrorism horrifies most of us, we think of it as monstrous in size and scale, but the truth is the number of deaths even in an event as momentous as 9/11 is dwarfed by traffic accidents or smoking deaths in any given year. Despite its relatively small impact and lower probability of occurrence, terrorism induces changes incommensurate with the act itself. Reminding ourselves of this might go some way in helping us contain the fallout of these terror attacks.
What framework do you think is more suited to understanding this?
The most troubling aspect is the emergence of terrorism as a kind of multinational firm. Terrorists no longer function in isolated groups with local grievances. The business model is that of an international criminal organisation using small terrorists as links in a supply chain. It is useless to think of it as having a centralised military structure, where you think that killing the general (an Osama Bin Laden figure) will disband the army. It is more appropriate to think of it as an international firm with a Board of Directors and many local franchises. Dismissing the Board will not dissolve the company.
How would you process the attack on Mumbai?
After the series of bombings India has seen, I think this was a demonstration by the firm to its franchises of how such attacks ought to be done for maximum impact. It is easy to get over the deaths of ordinary travellers and bhelpuri wallahs. This was a lesson in how it should be done to get global attention.
Philosopher SN Balagangadhara tells SHOMA CHAUDHURY terrorism is functioning like a multinational firm, with local franchises
Cover Story - Mumbai Terror Attack 2008Could you outline your thesis on the nature of terrorism?
My thesis is that it’s a mistake to think of terrorists as deranged or pathological. Like many of us, they have a high ethical sense and are driven by an acute sense of injustice. For these crimes to become attractive, they are transformed into moral acts. They think of themselves as moral exemplars to be emulated. It is also a mistake to think of terrorism as specific to a particular religious or political doctrine. It moves easily across religions and politics. This is why the West’s discourse on Islamist terrorism is so misleading and ineffective. Also, terrorism horrifies most of us, we think of it as monstrous in size and scale, but the truth is the number of deaths even in an event as momentous as 9/11 is dwarfed by traffic accidents or smoking deaths in any given year. Despite its relatively small impact and lower probability of occurrence, terrorism induces changes incommensurate with the act itself. Reminding ourselves of this might go some way in helping us contain the fallout of these terror attacks.
What framework do you think is more suited to understanding this?
The most troubling aspect is the emergence of terrorism as a kind of multinational firm. Terrorists no longer function in isolated groups with local grievances. The business model is that of an international criminal organisation using small terrorists as links in a supply chain. It is useless to think of it as having a centralised military structure, where you think that killing the general (an Osama Bin Laden figure) will disband the army. It is more appropriate to think of it as an international firm with a Board of Directors and many local franchises. Dismissing the Board will not dissolve the company.
How would you process the attack on Mumbai?
After the series of bombings India has seen, I think this was a demonstration by the firm to its franchises of how such attacks ought to be done for maximum impact. It is easy to get over the deaths of ordinary travellers and bhelpuri wallahs. This was a lesson in how it should be done to get global attention.
The Saint, The Criminal And The Terrorist
SN BALGANGADHARA argues that to fight terrorism and the ideology of crime, politics needs to retain its ethical moorings
Increasingly, the phenomenon of terrorism has begun to occupy the media, politics, and the lives of people in different parts of the world. The more the attention, however, the less the clarity: what kind of a phenomenon is terrorism? What generates it, what sustains it, and what allows it to expand on an ever-increasing scale?
This lack of clarity has to do with the fact that our ideas about terrorism appear as an incoherent set. First, terrorism horrifies most of us; the acts of terrorists are seen as monstrous in scope and size. But the number of deaths or the human suffering, even if we look at an event as momentous as 9/11, is dwarfed by what traffic accidents and smoking do in any given year.
Second, despite its relatively small impact (relative, that is, to the impact of smoking, traffic accidents, etc.) and the lower probability of its occurrence (compared again to such phenomena), terrorism induces massive changes in our societies that are incommensurate with the act itself.
Third, most of us think that terrorists are monsters, lunatics, crazy and evil: they appear as pathological human beings. At the same time, we read in the newspapers that the terrorists not only increasingly draw recruits from the ordinary population, but also that they use ethical considerations like the perceived injustice in the world or attacks on their family, for instance, in their defense. Here, they reason pretty much the same way most of us do.
Fourth, we seem to think that some religion (Islamic fundamentalism) or political doctrine (Marxism) provides the foundation for terrorism. Such political and religious motives are even taken to differentiate it from ordinary crime. Yet, we see terrorism implanting itself in any and every kind of soil: Zionism, deep ecology, Islam, fascism, animal liberation, ethnic self-determination, Christianity, communism, nationalism,… This suggests that no specific religious or political beliefs are required for it to take root and flourish.
Fifth, the only things we see are the acts of crime that terrorists either plan or actually commit. Yet, it is extremely difficult to call them ‘ordinary criminals’, because they seem to do something ‘more’ than just plan or commit criminal acts: they appear more monstrous than thieves or serial killers and the impact of their acts goes far beyond that of other crimes. In short, we entertain what appear as prima facie inconsistent ideas about terrorism.
A hypothesis about terrorism must provide a solution to the above problems without discounting any of them. We propose that terrorism is a unitary phenomenon (despite internal differentiations) and formulate a single hypothesis that illumines these and other known facts about terrorism. Hopefully, the essay thereby functions as an incentive and a heuristic to develop a better hypothesis.
We would like to suggest that terrorism is a particular form taken by crime. In that case, the puzzle is why and how crime takes the form of terrorism. Attempts to characterize terrorism as “(violent) acts that intend to terrorize people for socio-political ends” do not answer this question. They do point out some of its features. However, there are many violent acts that intentionally instill fear in a population and that also have socio-political ends, but which could hardly be terrorism. The difference between murder (even if it is mass murder) and an act of terrorism that also murders (think of 9/11 in this context), we suggest, does not lie in the motives of the actor, the action, the means used, the nature of the victims, the intended goals or its realized effects. Instead, it is located in how the crime is transformed into “something else.” What makes crime into terrorism is this act of transformation.
Actually, the act goes beyond transformation: terrorism is trans-substantiated crime. “Trans-substantiation” refers to the miraculous transformation of some particular substance into another one. (During the Mass, for instance, Roman-Catholics believe that bread and wine are transformed into the body and blood of Christ.) This happens in the case of terrorism as well: crime becomes morally praiseworthy. It does not concern so much a particular crime, but rather the transformation of the entire domain of crime. This trans-substantiation results in the re-presentation of crime as morally praiseworthy. We suggest that what brings about this “miracle” is an ideology, which we would like to call “the ideology of crime.” It is our hypothesis that such an ideology exists today and that acts of crime can become acts of terrorism because of what this ideology does and how it does so.
We propose to expand on this idea in the following way: first, we explicate what the trans-substantiation consists of; second, we show how this “miracle” is possible; third, we analyze the presuppositions and implications of such a process; fourth, we dwell on its relation to the self-description of terrorism; finally, we identify some of the illumined facts and spell out the policy implications of our hypothesis.
The ideology of crime
While terrorism is not itself an ideology, it exists by virtue of an ideology. By presenting criminal actions as morally praiseworthy, this ideology performs the central function of any ideology: it enables one to lend legitimacy to actions that are otherwise considered illegitimate. The ideology itself does not provide the required justification; if it could, it would be an ethical, political, social or economic theory or even a religion. Instead, the ideology of crime merely enables such a justification, where and when necessary.
What does it mean to say that an act of crime is presented as morally praiseworthy? It means that such an act now has the force of a moral exemplar. But some action can have the force of a moral exemplar to an individual, if and only if that person is a member of a moral community and intends to live as a moral subject. Otherwise it cannot. Therefore, a terrorist to whom a crime becomes a moral exemplar must see himself (and must also be seen by others) as an ethical agent, who is a member of a particular moral community sharing its ideas of good and bad, right and wrong, permitted and forbidden and so on.
In so far as an action can have the force of a moral exemplar only to an ethical agent, the ideology of crime makes no further empirical presuppositions about the nature of such an agent. That means to say, the ideology of crime re-describes a criminal act in such a way that such a re-description is indifferent with respect to specific religious and political beliefs that an individual might adhere to. In this sense, it is indifferent to distinctions between cultures, peoples, languages, skin colors, etc. In short, if this ideology of crime has to succeed in presenting some act as a moral exemplar, it has to make the same presuppositions as all our ethical theories. Indeed it does. The ideology of crime is deeply and indissolubly rooted in the ethical domain that all human beings share.
Even though all human beings share the same ethical domain, we are initiated into this domain through the empirical communities we are born into. These empirical communities are many and differentiated: different religions, cultures, languages, philosophies, traditions, etc. mediate us to the ethical domain and mark our distinctions and differences from each other. In this process, each of us acquires notions of crime as well. Mostly, these are associated with moral infringements, even if, depending upon our differential acquaintance with law, further refinement occurs in the course of our lives. For its success, the ideology of crime not only requires that recruits belong to empirical moral communities, but also that they always remain members of some empirical moral community or the other. That means to say, the ideology of crime (a) presupposes of its recruits that they too have notions of crime that their moral communities have and (b) requires that they continue to retain them as well. Why?
The first condition has already been dwelt upon: a morally exemplary action has an ethical force only to a moral subject. As an empirical, moral subject, a person brings with him the notions of right, wrong, good, bad, criminal, legal,... that prevail in his community. The ideology of crime presupposes this fact. It also requires that the recruit continues to be a member of an empirical moral community because this membership enables an access to the reservoir of human actions. Such a reservoir is continuously replenished with new and original actions, undertaken by human beings in their widely differing circumstances. In having access to such a treasure house, the terrorist ideology has access to novelty as well. That is why new terrorist actions are possible.
It is often suggested that terrorists have “other” moral values than those held by the rest of us. Even though we shall suggest later why this appears to be the case, let us state here where we think this view is profoundly wrong: if the terrorist was not a member of the ethical domain we all share, there would be no terrorism to speak of. The very possibility of terrorism depends upon the fact that the terrorists too make distinctions between good, bad, right, wrong, criminal, legal and so on in exactly the same way we do. That is to say, much like most of us in the world, he too would find some actions (like murder, theft, rape, arson, looting, etc) immoral and criminal the way we do.
The evidence is overwhelming that terrorists possess the moral notions we have, and consider the same set of actions which we could call “crimes” also as crimes. When a terrorist confronts the rape of his mother or sister, or the assassination of his beloved leader; or the fact of his pregnant wife blown to pieces and his child maimed for life by a blast; he too reacts with the same moral judgment and moral emotions his victims have. That is to say, he reacts to these immoral acts as a moral subject: with horror and abhorrence.
The terrorist is not a pathological person lacking a moral sense or an alien with utterly strange norms (finding morally good what most of us would find morally abhorrent). He is and has to be similar to us. If he was not, terrorism would not be able to find recruits at all. If there is one thing we have learnt, it is this: the recruiting ground for terrorism is fertile, continually expanding and consists of ordinary people much like us. Unless we assume that the number of pathological people continues to increase because of some evolutionary quirk, which is very improbable, then we have to make sense of how moral subjects very much like us could become terrorists at all.
In this sense, and because of this reason, we do not define what ‘crime’ is, in order to speak about the ideology of crime. The terrorists already possess this notion (furthermore, it does not vary all that much with our day-to-day intuitions). They know what crime is, but the ideology of crime metamorphoses the actions that the terrorists consider as crimes into morally exemplary actions. If this is the case, how does he reconcile his actions with his own moral judgment and emotions? And how does the ideology transform crime into a moral exemplar? We will begin with the second question first.
The mechanism of a miracle
To answer this question and understand what terrorism is, we must take the hypothesis of the transformation, metamorphosis and trans-substantiation of crime utterly seriously. Because the terrorist is a moral subject too, the ideology of crime can make a criminal act appear ethical to him only if it re-describes and re-presents that act. What kind of change is involved in this process?
In the first place, this representation cannot transform a criminal act into an ethical one by making it morally obligatory. If it did, then the terrorist would either be inconsistent (because one and the same act would continue to be both forbidden and obligatory, since the act would both be a crime and moral at the same time), or would not have the notion of crime (because no act would be forbidden), or he would have another set of moral values than the rest of us (our “crimes” would appear moral to him). We suggest that none of these is the case.
In the second place, this transformation must somehow succeed in doubling: it must leave the domain of crime of the terrorist intact and yet re-describe these acts in such a way that they do not appear to belong to the criminal domain. That is, it must appear as though two descriptions of an act actually describe two different acts – the criminal and the ethical.
In the third place, such a re-description must place the act beyond both the “obligatory” and the “forbidden,” while retaining the distinction between these two sets of actions at the same time. Such must be the transformation that the act appears almost unique (sui generis, one of a kind). This ideology should make his act so unique that the terrorist can neither see nor comprehend it under any other description than the one provided by that ideology. It must trans-substantiate an act, which is neither unique because it belongs to a category of actions, nor moral because it is criminal too in the eyes of the terrorist, into a unique act. That is, the ideology of crime must transform crime by making each criminal action into a unique act, one of a kind. Thereafter, as far as the terrorist is concerned, this act does not have any other description than the one provided by the ideology and he cannot recognize his act under any other description.
Exactly that happens. The ideology trans-substantiates crime into supererogation and, in doing so, meets all the above conditions. “Supererogation” names the sets of actions that have the force of moral exemplars without being obligatory. Heroism, bravery, kindness, love for one’s neighbor, saintly actions, etc. are all examples of supererogation. They are not obligatory, since a failure to perform these actions does not make someone immoral. They have the force of moral exemplars without being obligatory. These actions are “over and beyond the call of duty” and as such are beyond the realm of moral obligation. That is, they are outside the domain of “moral laws,” but yet within the ethical domain.
The domain of crime and the domain of supererogation share this formal property: they are both “beyond the scope of moral laws.” In doubling the description of crime, this is what the ideology of crime does: while leaving the description of a criminal act intact, it also provides a re-description of the act as supererogation. This is possible because of the formal property that both crime and supererogation possess. Consequently, these actions appear both sui generis and ethical at the same time.
However, because such actions belong to the ethical domain, there is a need for moral justification. The ideology of crime, which, as we have said, makes the action neutral (or indifferent) with respect to religious and political beliefs, allows for any kind of defense: one could appeal to injustice in society or to God’s commandments or to oppression and exploitation or to the doctrines of national sovereignty and national interests… The list is both varied and endless. The point to note here is the following: neither religious nor secular doctrines form the intellectual basis of terrorism. They are used in morally justifying an act that has already achieved the status of a supererogatory action. The trans-substantiation of crime into supererogation is not something that these doctrines and beliefs accomplish. The ideology of crime has already done that before either religion or political beliefs are pressed into service. If we fail to see this, we end up conducting sterile and unending debates: such as whether Islam is peace-loving or whether it is antithetical to modern values.
These debates are not merely sterile and interminable. They are pernicious as well because, by conducting such debates, we countenance the self-description of terrorism and accept the legitimacy of the transformation of crime into supererogation. To see why this is so, we need to understand the sense in which the ideology of crime is truly subversive.
Presuppositions and implications
Consider what the ideology of crime does. It appeals to a moral community, to its ethical and moral notions, and presupposes its distinctions between good and bad, right and wrong, moral and immoral, and so on. On the basis of this distinction, it systematically pulls out immoral acts in order to re-present them as supererogatory to the very same community. The community is asked to judge as ‘moral’ precisely that act which is immoral and criminal in its eyes. That is to say, the community should consider one and the same act as both immoral and supererogatory at the same time and on the same intellectual and moral grounds. The ideology of crime trans-substantiates some individual into both a moral criminal and a moral saint (at the same time and on the same grounds) to that very community of which he is a part.
This is impossible: on one and the same substantive grounds, an act cannot be both immoral and supererogatory at the same time and for the same person. While one could (conceivably) think of two rival moral theories making different ethical pronouncements about some particular act, that is not the case here: a moral community is continually forced to judge actions as criminal and supererogatory at the same time and on the same grounds. Should a moral community ever allow for this to happen, it would disintegrate as a moral community and cease to exist. In that sense, while the ideology of crime undercuts its own foundation, it is also truly subversive: that which turns against and destroys the very community of which it is a part. It necessarily bites the hand that feeds it.
How does this situation translate itself in the cognitive world of the terrorist? How does he solve this tension between himself and his moral community? Here is where we see the dynamic nature of the ideology of crime. This ideology allows him to identify differing empirical communities at different times as his “relevant” moral community of the moment. Consider the Taliban in Afghanistan. At one time, both the US administration and the Pakistani government supported the Taliban fighters militarily, financially and morally. In doing so, both nations became a part of the relevant moral community of the Taliban. However, in the post 9/11 world, neither Pakistan nor the US belongs to the relevant moral community of the Taliban. Instead, they are now its enemies.
The internal problem of inconsistency between what the ideology of crime does and the moral foundation on which it rests is transformed into an external opposition between the empirical community that the terrorist momentarily attaches himself to (that community then becomes the “relevant” moral community for him) and the “rest” of the world: the opposition between the “moral us” and the “immoral they.”
The problem does not lie in the “us” and “they” distinction: all of us make such distinctions, which are based on the real differences that exist between different groups of people. Instead, it has to do with how the distinction is made and what it consists of. The “us” and the “they” are ethically hostile forces, each others’ enemies and two polar opposites locked in struggle, from which only one can emerge as the victor. The internal opposition between a moral community and what the ideology of crime does is expressed as an external battle-to-death between two communities: the “moral” community that the terrorist momentarily attaches himself to and the “others.”
The identity of these communities is of no cognitive or moral significance in this battle: it could be the Americans today, Iraqis tomorrow and the Pakistanis the day after. Each was an ally at some stage or another; each was thus once a part of the moral community of the terrorist. The ideology of crime has to necessarily turn against its own foundation; the terrorist does the same too by splitting the world into “us” and “they” in this particular manner.
The self-description of terrorism
Consequently, to say that “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter” does not entail subscribing to ethical relativism. It is worse than that: it is to endorse the self-description of the terrorist and to underwrite the ideology of crime. The same consideration applies to discussions about whether or not some religion or political theory is a harbinger of terrorism. This also covers the case of those who look at terrorists as “lunatics,” and as “deranged” and “pathological” persons. In all these cases, we endorse the description that the ideology of crime provides us with.
If there is something tragic about the current intellectual and political scene, it is this: both the friends and foes of terrorism have accepted the self-description of terrorism. We treat the terrorists as “exceptional” persons, who cannot be understood as “normal” human beings. We go beyond our ethical and legal limits in our opposition to terrorism and, in doing so, endorse their self-description in that we treat them as more than “mere” criminals by according them a special status.
We allow the subversion of terrorism by subverting our own legal and moral codes, and justify such subversions in the name of national security. We accept the legitimacy of the terrorist argument by endlessly debating the issue of whether or not some religion or political theory encourages terrorism or not. We endorse their self-description by identifying some terrorists as “religious” or “fundamentalists,” which is exactly what they claim they are. We act as though one “ought not to be” a fundamentalist forgetting, in the process, that should we give up the fundamental distinction between good and bad, right and wrong, we would only end up all the worse for it. We give up our notions of human rights by making or reinforcing discriminations against people from “other” religions and regions.
We endorse and reproduce the distinction the terrorist makes between the “moral us” and the “immoral they” by speaking about the terrorist as though he is not a member of the ethical domain that all human beings share, or as though he has an alien set of “moral values” when compared to the rest of the human beings. Finally, we succumb to the illusion of the terrorist: he believes that he performs a set of “special actions”; we agree with him and speak about “terrorist acts” all the time. In all these ways and more, we allow terrorism to feed on the success and legitimacy it enjoys by our acceptance of its self-description.
Conclusions
This, then, is our hypothesis: terrorism is the transformation of crime into supererogation. The ideology of crime enables such a trans-substantiation. Let us see how this accounts for some of the facts we already know about terrorism.
1. Terrorism spreads, because it appears imitable. We have seen why terrorism can recruit ordinary moral subjects; that is why it is imitable. Anyone can become a terrorist. It can spread because the ideology of crime is neutral or indifferent with respect to religious, political and other beliefs.
2. Terrorism appears to target its victims both indiscriminately and in a focused manner. As examples of the latter, consider the sustained attempts at assassinating various political dignitaries, heads of states, prominent politicians, UN personnel, etc. during the last decade. It is indifferent as to whom it targets because the “relevant” moral community of the terrorist undergoes changes over time. However, it is also focused because the terrorist is a member of a specific “relevant” moral community confronting a specific ‘other’ at any one time.
3. Terrorism inevitably bites the hand that feeds it, whether the hand that feeds it is a state (Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, for example) or a movement (the Palestinian Liberation Organization). Terrorism has to turn against its own foundation because of the dictates of the ideology of crime.
4. Terrorism inevitably disrupts civil society in multiple ways that are incommensurate with the act itself. For instance, 9/11 changed both the US and the world so much that it is difficult to speak of commensurate effects of the act itself. Terrorism disrupts society (and sows fear) in such disproportionate ways, because its ideology and its mechanism threaten the very existence of a moral community.
5. Terrorism is surrounded by some kind of an ideology, which appears to provide a moral justification for the act. We have seen that the requirement of moral justification arises from the fact that the ideology of crime makes crime supererogatory.
6. Terrorism generates two diametrically opposed ethical reactions. In some circles, the terrorists of today are the embodiments of the highest virtues and, as such, exemplars to imitate. In other circles, they generate moral horror and ethical abhorrence. That is, both make an appeal to ethical considerations. However, it appears as though these considerations are not merely different, but also opposed to each other. Consequently, terrorism and those others who feel moral aversion to it are mutually recognized as enemies-to-death. Each wants to eliminate the other. We explained why ethical responses are enticed by the ideology of crime and why the “moral us” and the “the immoral they” appear as enemies-to-death.
Does this set of considerations generate policy conclusions? Yes, it does. Let us simply list a few of them.
1. Crime cannot be abolished in a society by exterminating the criminal population at any given moment. We have to strike at what generates and sustains crime in a society. Overcoming terrorism, besides requiring a whole series of social, political and economic remedies, needs something extra as well: both public intellectuals and academics must begin dismantling the ideology of crime. This is not the same as identifying some “other” political or religious doctrines and discoursing about them.
2. If we continue to hold “religion,” or even “religious fundamentalism” and “Islamofascism” as the cause of terrorism, not only do we fail in addressing the real issues, but we end up feeding the ideology of crime by accepting the self-description of terrorism. The current craze in the American academy and public debate about Islam reflects how successful the ideology has been here.
3. We need expert jurists, magistrates, and politicians to work on setting up provisions in criminal law that allow us to tackle the nature of this particular form of crime. However, such statutes, like all other legal statutes, should be tested for their admissibility within the moral and constitutional limits that we work under.
4. The “war on terrorism” is sensible only to the extent we can speak about “war on crime.” In the same way criminals are a danger to civil society, terrorists are dangerous as well. But, as commentators have noted, the US government has vacillated between approaching terrorism as a violation of criminal law and as an issue of war. The first approach acknowledges that terrorism is but a form of crime and thus negates its ideology, while the second confirms the ideology and views the terrorists as warriors for a cause. This leads to conflicting policies that fail to respect both criminal law and the law of war.
5. We feed the ideology of crime and terrorism when we treat the terrorists as “exceptional” individuals and, therefore, stray outside the established framework of law to bring them to justice. By setting up special military tribunals, by denying them their status as moral subjects, one concedes to the claims that the ideology of crime makes. One needs the framework of law and justice (why set up courts otherwise?) and, at the same time, denies both the requirements of law and justice (because they appear as “kangaroo courts” to the outside world). This is exactly what the ideology of crime does. In this sense, in bringing both the Guantanamo Bay and subsequent developments into existence, the ideology of crime has already begun to acquire moral legitimacy.
6. Ethical considerations, which should provide the foundations for any kind of politics, have become subordinated to petty political and party considerations in the US. To stray away from ethical foundations, in pursuit of the requirements of “national interests” or “geo-political situations,” feeds the ideology of crime. Surely, Ronald Reagan’s statement that the Taliban are “freedom fighters” rather than terrorists, has come back to haunt us today. Any institution, community, organization, or movement that feeds or nurtures terrorism (directly or indirectly) will become its victim sooner or later. That is so, because such a bond allows the ideology of crime to become dynamic by transforming many different empirical communities into possible moral communities for the terrorists. If it is to fight terrorism and the ideology of crime, politics cannot afford to lose its moorings from an ethical foundation.
Prof. S. N. Balagangadhara is director of the Research Centre Vergelijkende Cultuurwetenschap (Comparative Science of Cultures) in Ghent University, Belgium. He has authored many pieces, including a book titled, "The Heathen in His Blindness" on the nature of religion.
SN BALGANGADHARA argues that to fight terrorism and the ideology of crime, politics needs to retain its ethical moorings
Increasingly, the phenomenon of terrorism has begun to occupy the media, politics, and the lives of people in different parts of the world. The more the attention, however, the less the clarity: what kind of a phenomenon is terrorism? What generates it, what sustains it, and what allows it to expand on an ever-increasing scale?
This lack of clarity has to do with the fact that our ideas about terrorism appear as an incoherent set. First, terrorism horrifies most of us; the acts of terrorists are seen as monstrous in scope and size. But the number of deaths or the human suffering, even if we look at an event as momentous as 9/11, is dwarfed by what traffic accidents and smoking do in any given year.
Second, despite its relatively small impact (relative, that is, to the impact of smoking, traffic accidents, etc.) and the lower probability of its occurrence (compared again to such phenomena), terrorism induces massive changes in our societies that are incommensurate with the act itself.
Third, most of us think that terrorists are monsters, lunatics, crazy and evil: they appear as pathological human beings. At the same time, we read in the newspapers that the terrorists not only increasingly draw recruits from the ordinary population, but also that they use ethical considerations like the perceived injustice in the world or attacks on their family, for instance, in their defense. Here, they reason pretty much the same way most of us do.
Fourth, we seem to think that some religion (Islamic fundamentalism) or political doctrine (Marxism) provides the foundation for terrorism. Such political and religious motives are even taken to differentiate it from ordinary crime. Yet, we see terrorism implanting itself in any and every kind of soil: Zionism, deep ecology, Islam, fascism, animal liberation, ethnic self-determination, Christianity, communism, nationalism,… This suggests that no specific religious or political beliefs are required for it to take root and flourish.
Fifth, the only things we see are the acts of crime that terrorists either plan or actually commit. Yet, it is extremely difficult to call them ‘ordinary criminals’, because they seem to do something ‘more’ than just plan or commit criminal acts: they appear more monstrous than thieves or serial killers and the impact of their acts goes far beyond that of other crimes. In short, we entertain what appear as prima facie inconsistent ideas about terrorism.
A hypothesis about terrorism must provide a solution to the above problems without discounting any of them. We propose that terrorism is a unitary phenomenon (despite internal differentiations) and formulate a single hypothesis that illumines these and other known facts about terrorism. Hopefully, the essay thereby functions as an incentive and a heuristic to develop a better hypothesis.
We would like to suggest that terrorism is a particular form taken by crime. In that case, the puzzle is why and how crime takes the form of terrorism. Attempts to characterize terrorism as “(violent) acts that intend to terrorize people for socio-political ends” do not answer this question. They do point out some of its features. However, there are many violent acts that intentionally instill fear in a population and that also have socio-political ends, but which could hardly be terrorism. The difference between murder (even if it is mass murder) and an act of terrorism that also murders (think of 9/11 in this context), we suggest, does not lie in the motives of the actor, the action, the means used, the nature of the victims, the intended goals or its realized effects. Instead, it is located in how the crime is transformed into “something else.” What makes crime into terrorism is this act of transformation.
Actually, the act goes beyond transformation: terrorism is trans-substantiated crime. “Trans-substantiation” refers to the miraculous transformation of some particular substance into another one. (During the Mass, for instance, Roman-Catholics believe that bread and wine are transformed into the body and blood of Christ.) This happens in the case of terrorism as well: crime becomes morally praiseworthy. It does not concern so much a particular crime, but rather the transformation of the entire domain of crime. This trans-substantiation results in the re-presentation of crime as morally praiseworthy. We suggest that what brings about this “miracle” is an ideology, which we would like to call “the ideology of crime.” It is our hypothesis that such an ideology exists today and that acts of crime can become acts of terrorism because of what this ideology does and how it does so.
We propose to expand on this idea in the following way: first, we explicate what the trans-substantiation consists of; second, we show how this “miracle” is possible; third, we analyze the presuppositions and implications of such a process; fourth, we dwell on its relation to the self-description of terrorism; finally, we identify some of the illumined facts and spell out the policy implications of our hypothesis.
The ideology of crime
While terrorism is not itself an ideology, it exists by virtue of an ideology. By presenting criminal actions as morally praiseworthy, this ideology performs the central function of any ideology: it enables one to lend legitimacy to actions that are otherwise considered illegitimate. The ideology itself does not provide the required justification; if it could, it would be an ethical, political, social or economic theory or even a religion. Instead, the ideology of crime merely enables such a justification, where and when necessary.
What does it mean to say that an act of crime is presented as morally praiseworthy? It means that such an act now has the force of a moral exemplar. But some action can have the force of a moral exemplar to an individual, if and only if that person is a member of a moral community and intends to live as a moral subject. Otherwise it cannot. Therefore, a terrorist to whom a crime becomes a moral exemplar must see himself (and must also be seen by others) as an ethical agent, who is a member of a particular moral community sharing its ideas of good and bad, right and wrong, permitted and forbidden and so on.
In so far as an action can have the force of a moral exemplar only to an ethical agent, the ideology of crime makes no further empirical presuppositions about the nature of such an agent. That means to say, the ideology of crime re-describes a criminal act in such a way that such a re-description is indifferent with respect to specific religious and political beliefs that an individual might adhere to. In this sense, it is indifferent to distinctions between cultures, peoples, languages, skin colors, etc. In short, if this ideology of crime has to succeed in presenting some act as a moral exemplar, it has to make the same presuppositions as all our ethical theories. Indeed it does. The ideology of crime is deeply and indissolubly rooted in the ethical domain that all human beings share.
Even though all human beings share the same ethical domain, we are initiated into this domain through the empirical communities we are born into. These empirical communities are many and differentiated: different religions, cultures, languages, philosophies, traditions, etc. mediate us to the ethical domain and mark our distinctions and differences from each other. In this process, each of us acquires notions of crime as well. Mostly, these are associated with moral infringements, even if, depending upon our differential acquaintance with law, further refinement occurs in the course of our lives. For its success, the ideology of crime not only requires that recruits belong to empirical moral communities, but also that they always remain members of some empirical moral community or the other. That means to say, the ideology of crime (a) presupposes of its recruits that they too have notions of crime that their moral communities have and (b) requires that they continue to retain them as well. Why?
The first condition has already been dwelt upon: a morally exemplary action has an ethical force only to a moral subject. As an empirical, moral subject, a person brings with him the notions of right, wrong, good, bad, criminal, legal,... that prevail in his community. The ideology of crime presupposes this fact. It also requires that the recruit continues to be a member of an empirical moral community because this membership enables an access to the reservoir of human actions. Such a reservoir is continuously replenished with new and original actions, undertaken by human beings in their widely differing circumstances. In having access to such a treasure house, the terrorist ideology has access to novelty as well. That is why new terrorist actions are possible.
It is often suggested that terrorists have “other” moral values than those held by the rest of us. Even though we shall suggest later why this appears to be the case, let us state here where we think this view is profoundly wrong: if the terrorist was not a member of the ethical domain we all share, there would be no terrorism to speak of. The very possibility of terrorism depends upon the fact that the terrorists too make distinctions between good, bad, right, wrong, criminal, legal and so on in exactly the same way we do. That is to say, much like most of us in the world, he too would find some actions (like murder, theft, rape, arson, looting, etc) immoral and criminal the way we do.
The evidence is overwhelming that terrorists possess the moral notions we have, and consider the same set of actions which we could call “crimes” also as crimes. When a terrorist confronts the rape of his mother or sister, or the assassination of his beloved leader; or the fact of his pregnant wife blown to pieces and his child maimed for life by a blast; he too reacts with the same moral judgment and moral emotions his victims have. That is to say, he reacts to these immoral acts as a moral subject: with horror and abhorrence.
The terrorist is not a pathological person lacking a moral sense or an alien with utterly strange norms (finding morally good what most of us would find morally abhorrent). He is and has to be similar to us. If he was not, terrorism would not be able to find recruits at all. If there is one thing we have learnt, it is this: the recruiting ground for terrorism is fertile, continually expanding and consists of ordinary people much like us. Unless we assume that the number of pathological people continues to increase because of some evolutionary quirk, which is very improbable, then we have to make sense of how moral subjects very much like us could become terrorists at all.
In this sense, and because of this reason, we do not define what ‘crime’ is, in order to speak about the ideology of crime. The terrorists already possess this notion (furthermore, it does not vary all that much with our day-to-day intuitions). They know what crime is, but the ideology of crime metamorphoses the actions that the terrorists consider as crimes into morally exemplary actions. If this is the case, how does he reconcile his actions with his own moral judgment and emotions? And how does the ideology transform crime into a moral exemplar? We will begin with the second question first.
The mechanism of a miracle
To answer this question and understand what terrorism is, we must take the hypothesis of the transformation, metamorphosis and trans-substantiation of crime utterly seriously. Because the terrorist is a moral subject too, the ideology of crime can make a criminal act appear ethical to him only if it re-describes and re-presents that act. What kind of change is involved in this process?
In the first place, this representation cannot transform a criminal act into an ethical one by making it morally obligatory. If it did, then the terrorist would either be inconsistent (because one and the same act would continue to be both forbidden and obligatory, since the act would both be a crime and moral at the same time), or would not have the notion of crime (because no act would be forbidden), or he would have another set of moral values than the rest of us (our “crimes” would appear moral to him). We suggest that none of these is the case.
In the second place, this transformation must somehow succeed in doubling: it must leave the domain of crime of the terrorist intact and yet re-describe these acts in such a way that they do not appear to belong to the criminal domain. That is, it must appear as though two descriptions of an act actually describe two different acts – the criminal and the ethical.
In the third place, such a re-description must place the act beyond both the “obligatory” and the “forbidden,” while retaining the distinction between these two sets of actions at the same time. Such must be the transformation that the act appears almost unique (sui generis, one of a kind). This ideology should make his act so unique that the terrorist can neither see nor comprehend it under any other description than the one provided by that ideology. It must trans-substantiate an act, which is neither unique because it belongs to a category of actions, nor moral because it is criminal too in the eyes of the terrorist, into a unique act. That is, the ideology of crime must transform crime by making each criminal action into a unique act, one of a kind. Thereafter, as far as the terrorist is concerned, this act does not have any other description than the one provided by the ideology and he cannot recognize his act under any other description.
Exactly that happens. The ideology trans-substantiates crime into supererogation and, in doing so, meets all the above conditions. “Supererogation” names the sets of actions that have the force of moral exemplars without being obligatory. Heroism, bravery, kindness, love for one’s neighbor, saintly actions, etc. are all examples of supererogation. They are not obligatory, since a failure to perform these actions does not make someone immoral. They have the force of moral exemplars without being obligatory. These actions are “over and beyond the call of duty” and as such are beyond the realm of moral obligation. That is, they are outside the domain of “moral laws,” but yet within the ethical domain.
The domain of crime and the domain of supererogation share this formal property: they are both “beyond the scope of moral laws.” In doubling the description of crime, this is what the ideology of crime does: while leaving the description of a criminal act intact, it also provides a re-description of the act as supererogation. This is possible because of the formal property that both crime and supererogation possess. Consequently, these actions appear both sui generis and ethical at the same time.
However, because such actions belong to the ethical domain, there is a need for moral justification. The ideology of crime, which, as we have said, makes the action neutral (or indifferent) with respect to religious and political beliefs, allows for any kind of defense: one could appeal to injustice in society or to God’s commandments or to oppression and exploitation or to the doctrines of national sovereignty and national interests… The list is both varied and endless. The point to note here is the following: neither religious nor secular doctrines form the intellectual basis of terrorism. They are used in morally justifying an act that has already achieved the status of a supererogatory action. The trans-substantiation of crime into supererogation is not something that these doctrines and beliefs accomplish. The ideology of crime has already done that before either religion or political beliefs are pressed into service. If we fail to see this, we end up conducting sterile and unending debates: such as whether Islam is peace-loving or whether it is antithetical to modern values.
These debates are not merely sterile and interminable. They are pernicious as well because, by conducting such debates, we countenance the self-description of terrorism and accept the legitimacy of the transformation of crime into supererogation. To see why this is so, we need to understand the sense in which the ideology of crime is truly subversive.
Presuppositions and implications
Consider what the ideology of crime does. It appeals to a moral community, to its ethical and moral notions, and presupposes its distinctions between good and bad, right and wrong, moral and immoral, and so on. On the basis of this distinction, it systematically pulls out immoral acts in order to re-present them as supererogatory to the very same community. The community is asked to judge as ‘moral’ precisely that act which is immoral and criminal in its eyes. That is to say, the community should consider one and the same act as both immoral and supererogatory at the same time and on the same intellectual and moral grounds. The ideology of crime trans-substantiates some individual into both a moral criminal and a moral saint (at the same time and on the same grounds) to that very community of which he is a part.
This is impossible: on one and the same substantive grounds, an act cannot be both immoral and supererogatory at the same time and for the same person. While one could (conceivably) think of two rival moral theories making different ethical pronouncements about some particular act, that is not the case here: a moral community is continually forced to judge actions as criminal and supererogatory at the same time and on the same grounds. Should a moral community ever allow for this to happen, it would disintegrate as a moral community and cease to exist. In that sense, while the ideology of crime undercuts its own foundation, it is also truly subversive: that which turns against and destroys the very community of which it is a part. It necessarily bites the hand that feeds it.
How does this situation translate itself in the cognitive world of the terrorist? How does he solve this tension between himself and his moral community? Here is where we see the dynamic nature of the ideology of crime. This ideology allows him to identify differing empirical communities at different times as his “relevant” moral community of the moment. Consider the Taliban in Afghanistan. At one time, both the US administration and the Pakistani government supported the Taliban fighters militarily, financially and morally. In doing so, both nations became a part of the relevant moral community of the Taliban. However, in the post 9/11 world, neither Pakistan nor the US belongs to the relevant moral community of the Taliban. Instead, they are now its enemies.
The internal problem of inconsistency between what the ideology of crime does and the moral foundation on which it rests is transformed into an external opposition between the empirical community that the terrorist momentarily attaches himself to (that community then becomes the “relevant” moral community for him) and the “rest” of the world: the opposition between the “moral us” and the “immoral they.”
The problem does not lie in the “us” and “they” distinction: all of us make such distinctions, which are based on the real differences that exist between different groups of people. Instead, it has to do with how the distinction is made and what it consists of. The “us” and the “they” are ethically hostile forces, each others’ enemies and two polar opposites locked in struggle, from which only one can emerge as the victor. The internal opposition between a moral community and what the ideology of crime does is expressed as an external battle-to-death between two communities: the “moral” community that the terrorist momentarily attaches himself to and the “others.”
The identity of these communities is of no cognitive or moral significance in this battle: it could be the Americans today, Iraqis tomorrow and the Pakistanis the day after. Each was an ally at some stage or another; each was thus once a part of the moral community of the terrorist. The ideology of crime has to necessarily turn against its own foundation; the terrorist does the same too by splitting the world into “us” and “they” in this particular manner.
The self-description of terrorism
Consequently, to say that “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter” does not entail subscribing to ethical relativism. It is worse than that: it is to endorse the self-description of the terrorist and to underwrite the ideology of crime. The same consideration applies to discussions about whether or not some religion or political theory is a harbinger of terrorism. This also covers the case of those who look at terrorists as “lunatics,” and as “deranged” and “pathological” persons. In all these cases, we endorse the description that the ideology of crime provides us with.
If there is something tragic about the current intellectual and political scene, it is this: both the friends and foes of terrorism have accepted the self-description of terrorism. We treat the terrorists as “exceptional” persons, who cannot be understood as “normal” human beings. We go beyond our ethical and legal limits in our opposition to terrorism and, in doing so, endorse their self-description in that we treat them as more than “mere” criminals by according them a special status.
We allow the subversion of terrorism by subverting our own legal and moral codes, and justify such subversions in the name of national security. We accept the legitimacy of the terrorist argument by endlessly debating the issue of whether or not some religion or political theory encourages terrorism or not. We endorse their self-description by identifying some terrorists as “religious” or “fundamentalists,” which is exactly what they claim they are. We act as though one “ought not to be” a fundamentalist forgetting, in the process, that should we give up the fundamental distinction between good and bad, right and wrong, we would only end up all the worse for it. We give up our notions of human rights by making or reinforcing discriminations against people from “other” religions and regions.
We endorse and reproduce the distinction the terrorist makes between the “moral us” and the “immoral they” by speaking about the terrorist as though he is not a member of the ethical domain that all human beings share, or as though he has an alien set of “moral values” when compared to the rest of the human beings. Finally, we succumb to the illusion of the terrorist: he believes that he performs a set of “special actions”; we agree with him and speak about “terrorist acts” all the time. In all these ways and more, we allow terrorism to feed on the success and legitimacy it enjoys by our acceptance of its self-description.
Conclusions
This, then, is our hypothesis: terrorism is the transformation of crime into supererogation. The ideology of crime enables such a trans-substantiation. Let us see how this accounts for some of the facts we already know about terrorism.
1. Terrorism spreads, because it appears imitable. We have seen why terrorism can recruit ordinary moral subjects; that is why it is imitable. Anyone can become a terrorist. It can spread because the ideology of crime is neutral or indifferent with respect to religious, political and other beliefs.
2. Terrorism appears to target its victims both indiscriminately and in a focused manner. As examples of the latter, consider the sustained attempts at assassinating various political dignitaries, heads of states, prominent politicians, UN personnel, etc. during the last decade. It is indifferent as to whom it targets because the “relevant” moral community of the terrorist undergoes changes over time. However, it is also focused because the terrorist is a member of a specific “relevant” moral community confronting a specific ‘other’ at any one time.
3. Terrorism inevitably bites the hand that feeds it, whether the hand that feeds it is a state (Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, for example) or a movement (the Palestinian Liberation Organization). Terrorism has to turn against its own foundation because of the dictates of the ideology of crime.
4. Terrorism inevitably disrupts civil society in multiple ways that are incommensurate with the act itself. For instance, 9/11 changed both the US and the world so much that it is difficult to speak of commensurate effects of the act itself. Terrorism disrupts society (and sows fear) in such disproportionate ways, because its ideology and its mechanism threaten the very existence of a moral community.
5. Terrorism is surrounded by some kind of an ideology, which appears to provide a moral justification for the act. We have seen that the requirement of moral justification arises from the fact that the ideology of crime makes crime supererogatory.
6. Terrorism generates two diametrically opposed ethical reactions. In some circles, the terrorists of today are the embodiments of the highest virtues and, as such, exemplars to imitate. In other circles, they generate moral horror and ethical abhorrence. That is, both make an appeal to ethical considerations. However, it appears as though these considerations are not merely different, but also opposed to each other. Consequently, terrorism and those others who feel moral aversion to it are mutually recognized as enemies-to-death. Each wants to eliminate the other. We explained why ethical responses are enticed by the ideology of crime and why the “moral us” and the “the immoral they” appear as enemies-to-death.
Does this set of considerations generate policy conclusions? Yes, it does. Let us simply list a few of them.
1. Crime cannot be abolished in a society by exterminating the criminal population at any given moment. We have to strike at what generates and sustains crime in a society. Overcoming terrorism, besides requiring a whole series of social, political and economic remedies, needs something extra as well: both public intellectuals and academics must begin dismantling the ideology of crime. This is not the same as identifying some “other” political or religious doctrines and discoursing about them.
2. If we continue to hold “religion,” or even “religious fundamentalism” and “Islamofascism” as the cause of terrorism, not only do we fail in addressing the real issues, but we end up feeding the ideology of crime by accepting the self-description of terrorism. The current craze in the American academy and public debate about Islam reflects how successful the ideology has been here.
3. We need expert jurists, magistrates, and politicians to work on setting up provisions in criminal law that allow us to tackle the nature of this particular form of crime. However, such statutes, like all other legal statutes, should be tested for their admissibility within the moral and constitutional limits that we work under.
4. The “war on terrorism” is sensible only to the extent we can speak about “war on crime.” In the same way criminals are a danger to civil society, terrorists are dangerous as well. But, as commentators have noted, the US government has vacillated between approaching terrorism as a violation of criminal law and as an issue of war. The first approach acknowledges that terrorism is but a form of crime and thus negates its ideology, while the second confirms the ideology and views the terrorists as warriors for a cause. This leads to conflicting policies that fail to respect both criminal law and the law of war.
5. We feed the ideology of crime and terrorism when we treat the terrorists as “exceptional” individuals and, therefore, stray outside the established framework of law to bring them to justice. By setting up special military tribunals, by denying them their status as moral subjects, one concedes to the claims that the ideology of crime makes. One needs the framework of law and justice (why set up courts otherwise?) and, at the same time, denies both the requirements of law and justice (because they appear as “kangaroo courts” to the outside world). This is exactly what the ideology of crime does. In this sense, in bringing both the Guantanamo Bay and subsequent developments into existence, the ideology of crime has already begun to acquire moral legitimacy.
6. Ethical considerations, which should provide the foundations for any kind of politics, have become subordinated to petty political and party considerations in the US. To stray away from ethical foundations, in pursuit of the requirements of “national interests” or “geo-political situations,” feeds the ideology of crime. Surely, Ronald Reagan’s statement that the Taliban are “freedom fighters” rather than terrorists, has come back to haunt us today. Any institution, community, organization, or movement that feeds or nurtures terrorism (directly or indirectly) will become its victim sooner or later. That is so, because such a bond allows the ideology of crime to become dynamic by transforming many different empirical communities into possible moral communities for the terrorists. If it is to fight terrorism and the ideology of crime, politics cannot afford to lose its moorings from an ethical foundation.
Prof. S. N. Balagangadhara is director of the Research Centre Vergelijkende Cultuurwetenschap (Comparative Science of Cultures) in Ghent University, Belgium. He has authored many pieces, including a book titled, "The Heathen in His Blindness" on the nature of religion.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
For God, for country, and … for China?
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Jessica Feinstein and Philip Rucker
Published Friday, November 7, 2003
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Months before he was beheaded, Horace Tracy Pitkin must have sensed the coming disaster.
Whispers of unrest probably arrived by train from Peking, at the other end of the line. In Shandong province, flood and then drought had destroyed the crops, and the countryside bristled with discontent. Citizens were tired of famine.
Lured by the vision of a land unmarred by Western corruption and a people ready for Christian enlightenment, Pitkin, Yale Class of 1892, had left with his young bride shortly after graduation for the farthest reaches of the Western world -- Paotingfu, China.
But before long he sent his wife and child back home to the United States -- at the dawn of the new century, China was a powder keg ready to explode. The weakened Qing dynasty was desperately trying to regain power from the hungry "foreign devils" carving the land into sections. "The Fists of Righteous Harmony," a superhuman band of roving martial artists, were preparing to crush the foreign, Christian imperialists and their Chinese supporters.
Foreign missionaries were the primary targets. Pitkin, however, decided to remain in China after his family left. He was, after all, a Yale man and a missionary of God.
By January 1900, the 20th century had already become violent. The Boxers moved through the northern provinces, unleashing a wave of fire and murder. On their way to the capital, they burned the rail station in Paotingfu, slaughtering around 200 missionaries and Chinese converts.
Word would later reach New Haven that Pitkin had been murdered while attempting to save two women missionaries. His death was the first disheartening episode in Yale's relationship with China, and a bloody way to start the new century.
At the time, the shocked Yale community could hardly have imagined that only a century later, Yale would be a preeminent American influence in China, and Beijing would welcome a Yale president "like a rock star."
This Saturday, Yale President Richard Levin will lead a convoy to China, underscoring the administration's decade-long commitment to making Yale a global university. As Yale steams ahead with its globalization efforts, the University's three-century long relationship with China also figures prominently in its plans for the next century.
"We've had nothing but warm relations," Levin said. "I think the Chinese are interested in sustaining a long-term relationship with Yale."
As Pitkin's gruesome beheading shows, the Yale-China connection has not always been so warm. From its missionary roots, Yale's involvement in China has grown in fits and spurts with the roller coaster politics of the 20th century. At times tenuous, at times strong, the connection has managed to survive to this day.
"Our history has definitely been affected by events on the world stage," Yale-China Association Executive Director Nancy Chapman said. "We've definitely felt the impact of ups and downs."
For God, for China, and for Yale
But the current nature of Yale's relationship with China differs drastically from its original incarnation. Although today it is a reciprocal relationship of intellectual exchange, the Yale-China interaction began primarily as a series of a monetary and missionary endeavors.
The Yale-China connection can be traced back nearly two hundred years before Pitkin lost his head at the hands of the Boxers. University namesake Elihu Yale, whose donations allowed the school to move to New Haven from Saybrook, earned his fortune through his work with the East India Company, and some of his money from the China-Trade probably helped found Yale.
But the University's involvement in the vast, relatively uncharted land of China did not truly begin until the Second Great Awakening of the 1830s, when a revival of American Christian sentiment invigorated missionaries to seek work outside of American soil. A steady stream of Yale men left New Haven for the other side of the world to convert Chinese citizens.
"I think we forget that Yale was a very religious school, and very prominent in the Great Awakening," Chinese historian and Sterling Professor of History Jonathan Spence said. "China was such a huge country of 'heathens,' and yet seemed ready for an enlightenment."
Growing interest in China resulted in a mid-century renaissance of Chinese studies at Yale. In 1854, Yale produced the first Chinese graduate of an American university, Yung Wing. Soon after, Yale also became the first university in the United States to hire a professor of Chinese language and history. Samuel Wells Williams set about educating Yale students, eventually inspiring Yale to lobby Congress to rescind the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, a law that limited Asian immigration to the United States.
During the latter part of the century, China's borders were more penetrable than ever before due to the disastrous Opium Wars of the 1840s and the inroads of the imperial foreign powers. Pitkin was one of the new wave of missionaries who lost their lives when frustration with foreign encroachment reached a boiling point during the Boxer Rebellion. Several colleges, including Bryn Mawr, Oberlin and Grinnell, also lost graduates during the rebellions.
Back at Yale, Pitkin's dismayed friends were not satisfied with the monument erected to the University's first "missionary martyr" in Woolsey Rotunda. They wanted to make sure that "Pitkin's sacrifice was atoned for somehow by us Yale men."
So the group of friends -- Lawrence Thurston, Arthur Williams, Warren Seabury and Brownell Gage -- decided to create a permanent Yale missionary presence in China dedicated to the memory of the their fallen comrade. Despite the recent violence, China still seemed like one of the areas most accessible to western influence.
"China presents itself as unquestionably the most promising field in the world for the kind of work which a university mission is fitted to undertake," professor Harlan Beach wrote at the time.
In 1901, these four men founded the Yale Foreign Missionary Society -- which would later become the present-day Yale-China Association -- and set to work establishing a school and hospital in Hunan, a province in Central China.
Opening doors
The Yale Foreign Missionary Society, called Yale-in-China throughout most of the 1900s, would become Yale's primary connection with China for the greater part of the century, suffering the ups and downs of China's foreign affairs as politics and policy changed through the years.
The creation of Yale's campus in China was a long and difficult process, interrupted by upheavals and constantly threatened by Chinese distrust of foreign influence. Seabury and Thurston would eventually both have plaques in Woolsey Rotunda next to Pitkin's: Thurston contracted tuberculosis in 1903 while attempting to find land for the program, and Seabury drowned in a swimming accident in China four years later.
The Yali Academy -- later known as the Yali Middle School -- opened its doors to Chinese students in 1906 in the ancient walled city of Changsha. There, students were instructed in both Western and Chinese subject matter. Soon, recent Yale graduates began to be recruited as short-term instructors, known as the "Bachelors." By 1918, due to the generosity of Edward Harkness, construction was completed on a new, state-of-the-art medical college, hospital and middle school campus.
Era of 'enlightenment'
Relations between the local Chinese government and students and the Yale staff members were delicate from the start. Although Yale-in-China almost immediately reduced the religious nature of its work, the original missionary causes and attitudes remained a campus presence, and a source of tension, through the years.
"Right from the start, the Chinese felt real caution about linking education with Christian training," Spence said. "If you wanted to become a nurse or doctor, why did you need Christian training?"
During the rice riot of 1910, and again in 1927 when Chiang Kai-shek and the Nationalist Party took over the Chinese government, rising anti-foreign sentiment forced the Yale administrators to evacuate.
"We have been made aware of the almost bottomless gulf of pride, prejudice, and misunderstanding between the east and west," Gage wrote in a letter home.
Even during times without overt political strife, the students and Changsha residents resisted American control. Yale-in-China, which was "manned and controlled by Yale men," was not intended to be a reciprocal program: Americans were in Changsha to educate and "enlighten" the Chinese.
Even in the 1950s, 20 years after the program had transitioned to minimal American oversight, many at Yale still viewed the Chinese as the primary beneficiaries of the arrangement.
"[Yale-in-China's] enlightening effect on a new generation of Chinese may be of as great significance as its contributions to a past generation," the Yale Daily News reported in 1951, during Yale-in-China's 50th anniversary.
Many at Yale remained hopeful even after the outbreak of the Korean War in 1950, when the United States became the enemy of China. The News reported on Feb. 12, 1951 that Anson Stokes, one of the original members of the program, expressed his hope that Yale-in-China would "save for China the strong institutions based on Christian faith and idealism of Yale."
Leaving the mainland
But after surviving the horrors and privations of World War II, as well as Mao Zedong's Cultural Revolution and the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949, most of Yale-in-China's staff were evacuated from the country by 1951.
With the expulsion of the last staff member, Yale's involvement in mainland China ended for nearly 30 years. Only in1980, after China had opened its doors to the West once more, did Yale return to Changsha.
Deprived of a campus in China, the Association turned to the British colony Hong Kong, and in 1954 began cooperating with New Asia College. Funding from Yale allowed the recently-founded college to construct institutional buildings, and soon the Yale Bachelor program began once more sending graduates to teach English.
The Yale-in-China Association's new role also necessitated a change of mission. In contrast to the Yale-in-China organization, with its Christian missionary roots, New Asia college had been founded by refugee scholars from mainland China, with Confucianism as its guiding principle.
"The aim of this group of scholars was to preserve traditional Chinese culture and to balance it with Western training," Peter Man, the current secretary of New Asia College, said in an e-mail.
Former U.S. President Richard Nixon's diplomatic visit to China in 1972 ushered in a new era of cooperation and intellectual exchange. Gone were the days of "enlightening the heathens."
"The shift [of outlook] began in the early 1970s, when we expanded our mission from educating Chinese people to [include] educating Americans about China," Chapman said. "People here realized that Americans didn't know as much about China as they should have."
With the change in mission came a change in name, the "Yale-China Association." In 1980, contacts with Hunan Medical College -- Yale's original medical school -- were established, and the Bachelor program in the mainland resumed once more.
Return of the 'rock star'
The reestablishment of diplomatic ties with China allowed Yale to embark on a new stage of its relationship with the country as Levin launched the University's globalization initiative for Yale's fourth century.
"It really was about six years ago that we started thinking seriously about a major commitment to internationalism," Levin said. "Pretty early on, we realized that China should be a major focus. I believe it's destined to be the number two economic power. It's an immense pool of creative talent."
In celebration of the University's 2001 tercentennial, Levin led a Yale convoy to China. He told the Yale Daily News in 2001 he was treated "like a rock star."
On his trip next week, Levin will be honored by three major Chinese universities: Fudan in Shanghai, as well as Peking and Tsinghua Universities in Beijing.
Levin will receive an honorary degree at Peking University, and he will deliver the keynote speech at a Shanghai conference commemorating the 25th anniversary of of China's "Open Door" policy -- when Chinese students were first allowed to leave the country to study. During the week-long trip, Levin and the rest of the Yale delegation will have briefings with senior Chinese government officials and scholars.
"China's opening has come at a great time because [the Chinese] can have access to an awful lot of knowledge and intellectual partnership at Yale," said Yale-China Association Chairman David Jones Jr. '80 LAW '88, who accompanied Levin on his 2001 trip.
Opportunities flourish
The decade preceding Levin's first trip to China witnessed a flowering of new China-affiliated programs at Yale. The Richard U. Light Fellowship began funding Yale students to study East Asian languages in long-term immersion programs in 1996. Light, a Yale graduate, donated a "substantial sum" for the creation of a foundation that would encourage Yale students to become more informed about Asia.
"This put Yale at the forefront of study abroad [and] intensive language study in Korea, China, Taiwan and Japan," Yale Center for International and Area Studies Associate Director Nancy Ruther said.
The large number of students studying Chinese language, culture and history at Yale, as well as the approximately 300 Chinese students at Yale yearly, prompted undergraduates to found the Yale College Chinese Partnership Program, or YCCP, in 2001. The organization pairs language students with native speakers and hosting forums on modern China.
"It provides a venue for Yale people who are interested in Chinese culture to be able to interact with one another," YCCP President Alexander Millman '06 said.
And a century after the Boxer Rebellion inspired its foundation, the Yale-China Association also has expanded its programs. In addition to a two-year English Teaching Fellowship for recent Yale graduates (the descendant of the Bachelor program), the Yale-China Association currently organizes an annual exchange between New Asia College and Yale students. The Legal Education Fellowship program also sends U.S.-trained lawyers to China to teach law in their Chinese universities.
Chapman said she believes the future of the organization's interactions with China ought to focus on the development of China's non-governmental, not-for-profit sector. Already, the association sends students to China for summer internships with non-governmental organizations, and has begun training Chinese health care professionals to deal with China's burgeoning AIDS epidemic.
"China is only now beginning to realize the extent of its AIDS crisis," Chapman said. "This is a totally non-political issue -- between the [United States] and China."
Legal wrangling
Yale has also become involved in China's political arena, with Yale Law School's 1999 founding of the China Law Center. The center aims to assist the legal reform process within China and to increase outside understanding of China's legal system. China Law Center Associate Director Jamie Horsley said this initiative complements the United States' policy regarding China.
"What we and others at Yale are doing [complements] U.S. foreign policy goals in helping China build rule of law," Horsley said. "[It] includes governance and a more open governing style and building respect for citizens' rights and the importance of law in helping to cure arbitrary government action."
The China Law Center, led by Yale law professor and former U.S. State Department official Paul Gewirtz, has established Yale as a leading force in China and Chinese law. At the State Department, Gewirtz spearheaded the U.S.-China legal cooperation initiative, which was agreed to by then-U.S. President Bill Clinton LAW '73 and Chinese President Jiang Zemin at summit meetings from 1997-98.
China, now an emerging global force, has drawn attention in the Law School community.
"China is now a force in the international world -- the universities see China as a great source of talent and as a potential partner," Horsley said.
The China Law Center is often invited by Chinese leaders to undertake initiatives in the Chinese legal system. The China Law Center frequently sends a team of leading experts in the U.S. legal community. The center also conducts research and teaching while promoting academic exchanges with Chinese educational institutions.
Yale's long-standing and currently strong reputation in China makes the University's legal convoy a welcome force in the Chinese legal community.
"It's clear that Yale University has a wonderful reputation in China," Horsley said. "Our ability to capitalize on the world-renowned reputation of Yale University has definitely helped us to gain access and acceptance very quickly in China for our programs."
While other colleges and universities have legal programs in China, Yale's program is a leading one.
In a letter from Woodbridge Hall dated Nov. 19, 1912, former Yale President Arthur Hadley said the University's partnership with China complements Yale's intellectual mission.
"The more a university reaches out into new fields, whether of thought or of action, the more surely does it keep itself alive at heart," Hadley said.
As Levin embarks on yet another Chinese trip, Yale's once-bloody history in the Far East seems like the distant past. Few people stop to notice Pitkin's dusty bronze monument in a gloomy alcove of Woolsey Rotunda, or the cluster of China-related memorials that have joined it since its creation.
A country on the verge of rebellion and revolution a century ago, China today is emerging as a global power. And Yale, one hundred years later, has a deeply-rooted stake in its future.
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Jessica Feinstein and Philip Rucker
Published Friday, November 7, 2003
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Months before he was beheaded, Horace Tracy Pitkin must have sensed the coming disaster.
Whispers of unrest probably arrived by train from Peking, at the other end of the line. In Shandong province, flood and then drought had destroyed the crops, and the countryside bristled with discontent. Citizens were tired of famine.
Lured by the vision of a land unmarred by Western corruption and a people ready for Christian enlightenment, Pitkin, Yale Class of 1892, had left with his young bride shortly after graduation for the farthest reaches of the Western world -- Paotingfu, China.
But before long he sent his wife and child back home to the United States -- at the dawn of the new century, China was a powder keg ready to explode. The weakened Qing dynasty was desperately trying to regain power from the hungry "foreign devils" carving the land into sections. "The Fists of Righteous Harmony," a superhuman band of roving martial artists, were preparing to crush the foreign, Christian imperialists and their Chinese supporters.
Foreign missionaries were the primary targets. Pitkin, however, decided to remain in China after his family left. He was, after all, a Yale man and a missionary of God.
By January 1900, the 20th century had already become violent. The Boxers moved through the northern provinces, unleashing a wave of fire and murder. On their way to the capital, they burned the rail station in Paotingfu, slaughtering around 200 missionaries and Chinese converts.
Word would later reach New Haven that Pitkin had been murdered while attempting to save two women missionaries. His death was the first disheartening episode in Yale's relationship with China, and a bloody way to start the new century.
At the time, the shocked Yale community could hardly have imagined that only a century later, Yale would be a preeminent American influence in China, and Beijing would welcome a Yale president "like a rock star."
This Saturday, Yale President Richard Levin will lead a convoy to China, underscoring the administration's decade-long commitment to making Yale a global university. As Yale steams ahead with its globalization efforts, the University's three-century long relationship with China also figures prominently in its plans for the next century.
"We've had nothing but warm relations," Levin said. "I think the Chinese are interested in sustaining a long-term relationship with Yale."
As Pitkin's gruesome beheading shows, the Yale-China connection has not always been so warm. From its missionary roots, Yale's involvement in China has grown in fits and spurts with the roller coaster politics of the 20th century. At times tenuous, at times strong, the connection has managed to survive to this day.
"Our history has definitely been affected by events on the world stage," Yale-China Association Executive Director Nancy Chapman said. "We've definitely felt the impact of ups and downs."
For God, for China, and for Yale
But the current nature of Yale's relationship with China differs drastically from its original incarnation. Although today it is a reciprocal relationship of intellectual exchange, the Yale-China interaction began primarily as a series of a monetary and missionary endeavors.
The Yale-China connection can be traced back nearly two hundred years before Pitkin lost his head at the hands of the Boxers. University namesake Elihu Yale, whose donations allowed the school to move to New Haven from Saybrook, earned his fortune through his work with the East India Company, and some of his money from the China-Trade probably helped found Yale.
But the University's involvement in the vast, relatively uncharted land of China did not truly begin until the Second Great Awakening of the 1830s, when a revival of American Christian sentiment invigorated missionaries to seek work outside of American soil. A steady stream of Yale men left New Haven for the other side of the world to convert Chinese citizens.
"I think we forget that Yale was a very religious school, and very prominent in the Great Awakening," Chinese historian and Sterling Professor of History Jonathan Spence said. "China was such a huge country of 'heathens,' and yet seemed ready for an enlightenment."
Growing interest in China resulted in a mid-century renaissance of Chinese studies at Yale. In 1854, Yale produced the first Chinese graduate of an American university, Yung Wing. Soon after, Yale also became the first university in the United States to hire a professor of Chinese language and history. Samuel Wells Williams set about educating Yale students, eventually inspiring Yale to lobby Congress to rescind the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, a law that limited Asian immigration to the United States.
During the latter part of the century, China's borders were more penetrable than ever before due to the disastrous Opium Wars of the 1840s and the inroads of the imperial foreign powers. Pitkin was one of the new wave of missionaries who lost their lives when frustration with foreign encroachment reached a boiling point during the Boxer Rebellion. Several colleges, including Bryn Mawr, Oberlin and Grinnell, also lost graduates during the rebellions.
Back at Yale, Pitkin's dismayed friends were not satisfied with the monument erected to the University's first "missionary martyr" in Woolsey Rotunda. They wanted to make sure that "Pitkin's sacrifice was atoned for somehow by us Yale men."
So the group of friends -- Lawrence Thurston, Arthur Williams, Warren Seabury and Brownell Gage -- decided to create a permanent Yale missionary presence in China dedicated to the memory of the their fallen comrade. Despite the recent violence, China still seemed like one of the areas most accessible to western influence.
"China presents itself as unquestionably the most promising field in the world for the kind of work which a university mission is fitted to undertake," professor Harlan Beach wrote at the time.
In 1901, these four men founded the Yale Foreign Missionary Society -- which would later become the present-day Yale-China Association -- and set to work establishing a school and hospital in Hunan, a province in Central China.
Opening doors
The Yale Foreign Missionary Society, called Yale-in-China throughout most of the 1900s, would become Yale's primary connection with China for the greater part of the century, suffering the ups and downs of China's foreign affairs as politics and policy changed through the years.
The creation of Yale's campus in China was a long and difficult process, interrupted by upheavals and constantly threatened by Chinese distrust of foreign influence. Seabury and Thurston would eventually both have plaques in Woolsey Rotunda next to Pitkin's: Thurston contracted tuberculosis in 1903 while attempting to find land for the program, and Seabury drowned in a swimming accident in China four years later.
The Yali Academy -- later known as the Yali Middle School -- opened its doors to Chinese students in 1906 in the ancient walled city of Changsha. There, students were instructed in both Western and Chinese subject matter. Soon, recent Yale graduates began to be recruited as short-term instructors, known as the "Bachelors." By 1918, due to the generosity of Edward Harkness, construction was completed on a new, state-of-the-art medical college, hospital and middle school campus.
Era of 'enlightenment'
Relations between the local Chinese government and students and the Yale staff members were delicate from the start. Although Yale-in-China almost immediately reduced the religious nature of its work, the original missionary causes and attitudes remained a campus presence, and a source of tension, through the years.
"Right from the start, the Chinese felt real caution about linking education with Christian training," Spence said. "If you wanted to become a nurse or doctor, why did you need Christian training?"
During the rice riot of 1910, and again in 1927 when Chiang Kai-shek and the Nationalist Party took over the Chinese government, rising anti-foreign sentiment forced the Yale administrators to evacuate.
"We have been made aware of the almost bottomless gulf of pride, prejudice, and misunderstanding between the east and west," Gage wrote in a letter home.
Even during times without overt political strife, the students and Changsha residents resisted American control. Yale-in-China, which was "manned and controlled by Yale men," was not intended to be a reciprocal program: Americans were in Changsha to educate and "enlighten" the Chinese.
Even in the 1950s, 20 years after the program had transitioned to minimal American oversight, many at Yale still viewed the Chinese as the primary beneficiaries of the arrangement.
"[Yale-in-China's] enlightening effect on a new generation of Chinese may be of as great significance as its contributions to a past generation," the Yale Daily News reported in 1951, during Yale-in-China's 50th anniversary.
Many at Yale remained hopeful even after the outbreak of the Korean War in 1950, when the United States became the enemy of China. The News reported on Feb. 12, 1951 that Anson Stokes, one of the original members of the program, expressed his hope that Yale-in-China would "save for China the strong institutions based on Christian faith and idealism of Yale."
Leaving the mainland
But after surviving the horrors and privations of World War II, as well as Mao Zedong's Cultural Revolution and the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949, most of Yale-in-China's staff were evacuated from the country by 1951.
With the expulsion of the last staff member, Yale's involvement in mainland China ended for nearly 30 years. Only in1980, after China had opened its doors to the West once more, did Yale return to Changsha.
Deprived of a campus in China, the Association turned to the British colony Hong Kong, and in 1954 began cooperating with New Asia College. Funding from Yale allowed the recently-founded college to construct institutional buildings, and soon the Yale Bachelor program began once more sending graduates to teach English.
The Yale-in-China Association's new role also necessitated a change of mission. In contrast to the Yale-in-China organization, with its Christian missionary roots, New Asia college had been founded by refugee scholars from mainland China, with Confucianism as its guiding principle.
"The aim of this group of scholars was to preserve traditional Chinese culture and to balance it with Western training," Peter Man, the current secretary of New Asia College, said in an e-mail.
Former U.S. President Richard Nixon's diplomatic visit to China in 1972 ushered in a new era of cooperation and intellectual exchange. Gone were the days of "enlightening the heathens."
"The shift [of outlook] began in the early 1970s, when we expanded our mission from educating Chinese people to [include] educating Americans about China," Chapman said. "People here realized that Americans didn't know as much about China as they should have."
With the change in mission came a change in name, the "Yale-China Association." In 1980, contacts with Hunan Medical College -- Yale's original medical school -- were established, and the Bachelor program in the mainland resumed once more.
Return of the 'rock star'
The reestablishment of diplomatic ties with China allowed Yale to embark on a new stage of its relationship with the country as Levin launched the University's globalization initiative for Yale's fourth century.
"It really was about six years ago that we started thinking seriously about a major commitment to internationalism," Levin said. "Pretty early on, we realized that China should be a major focus. I believe it's destined to be the number two economic power. It's an immense pool of creative talent."
In celebration of the University's 2001 tercentennial, Levin led a Yale convoy to China. He told the Yale Daily News in 2001 he was treated "like a rock star."
On his trip next week, Levin will be honored by three major Chinese universities: Fudan in Shanghai, as well as Peking and Tsinghua Universities in Beijing.
Levin will receive an honorary degree at Peking University, and he will deliver the keynote speech at a Shanghai conference commemorating the 25th anniversary of of China's "Open Door" policy -- when Chinese students were first allowed to leave the country to study. During the week-long trip, Levin and the rest of the Yale delegation will have briefings with senior Chinese government officials and scholars.
"China's opening has come at a great time because [the Chinese] can have access to an awful lot of knowledge and intellectual partnership at Yale," said Yale-China Association Chairman David Jones Jr. '80 LAW '88, who accompanied Levin on his 2001 trip.
Opportunities flourish
The decade preceding Levin's first trip to China witnessed a flowering of new China-affiliated programs at Yale. The Richard U. Light Fellowship began funding Yale students to study East Asian languages in long-term immersion programs in 1996. Light, a Yale graduate, donated a "substantial sum" for the creation of a foundation that would encourage Yale students to become more informed about Asia.
"This put Yale at the forefront of study abroad [and] intensive language study in Korea, China, Taiwan and Japan," Yale Center for International and Area Studies Associate Director Nancy Ruther said.
The large number of students studying Chinese language, culture and history at Yale, as well as the approximately 300 Chinese students at Yale yearly, prompted undergraduates to found the Yale College Chinese Partnership Program, or YCCP, in 2001. The organization pairs language students with native speakers and hosting forums on modern China.
"It provides a venue for Yale people who are interested in Chinese culture to be able to interact with one another," YCCP President Alexander Millman '06 said.
And a century after the Boxer Rebellion inspired its foundation, the Yale-China Association also has expanded its programs. In addition to a two-year English Teaching Fellowship for recent Yale graduates (the descendant of the Bachelor program), the Yale-China Association currently organizes an annual exchange between New Asia College and Yale students. The Legal Education Fellowship program also sends U.S.-trained lawyers to China to teach law in their Chinese universities.
Chapman said she believes the future of the organization's interactions with China ought to focus on the development of China's non-governmental, not-for-profit sector. Already, the association sends students to China for summer internships with non-governmental organizations, and has begun training Chinese health care professionals to deal with China's burgeoning AIDS epidemic.
"China is only now beginning to realize the extent of its AIDS crisis," Chapman said. "This is a totally non-political issue -- between the [United States] and China."
Legal wrangling
Yale has also become involved in China's political arena, with Yale Law School's 1999 founding of the China Law Center. The center aims to assist the legal reform process within China and to increase outside understanding of China's legal system. China Law Center Associate Director Jamie Horsley said this initiative complements the United States' policy regarding China.
"What we and others at Yale are doing [complements] U.S. foreign policy goals in helping China build rule of law," Horsley said. "[It] includes governance and a more open governing style and building respect for citizens' rights and the importance of law in helping to cure arbitrary government action."
The China Law Center, led by Yale law professor and former U.S. State Department official Paul Gewirtz, has established Yale as a leading force in China and Chinese law. At the State Department, Gewirtz spearheaded the U.S.-China legal cooperation initiative, which was agreed to by then-U.S. President Bill Clinton LAW '73 and Chinese President Jiang Zemin at summit meetings from 1997-98.
China, now an emerging global force, has drawn attention in the Law School community.
"China is now a force in the international world -- the universities see China as a great source of talent and as a potential partner," Horsley said.
The China Law Center is often invited by Chinese leaders to undertake initiatives in the Chinese legal system. The China Law Center frequently sends a team of leading experts in the U.S. legal community. The center also conducts research and teaching while promoting academic exchanges with Chinese educational institutions.
Yale's long-standing and currently strong reputation in China makes the University's legal convoy a welcome force in the Chinese legal community.
"It's clear that Yale University has a wonderful reputation in China," Horsley said. "Our ability to capitalize on the world-renowned reputation of Yale University has definitely helped us to gain access and acceptance very quickly in China for our programs."
While other colleges and universities have legal programs in China, Yale's program is a leading one.
In a letter from Woodbridge Hall dated Nov. 19, 1912, former Yale President Arthur Hadley said the University's partnership with China complements Yale's intellectual mission.
"The more a university reaches out into new fields, whether of thought or of action, the more surely does it keep itself alive at heart," Hadley said.
As Levin embarks on yet another Chinese trip, Yale's once-bloody history in the Far East seems like the distant past. Few people stop to notice Pitkin's dusty bronze monument in a gloomy alcove of Woolsey Rotunda, or the cluster of China-related memorials that have joined it since its creation.
A country on the verge of rebellion and revolution a century ago, China today is emerging as a global power. And Yale, one hundred years later, has a deeply-rooted stake in its future.
Monday, August 10, 2009
‘Crimes are transformed into moral acts’
Philosopher SN Balagangadhara tells SHOMA CHAUDHURY terrorism is functioning like a multinational firm, with local franchises
Cover Story - Mumbai Terror Attack 2008Could you outline your thesis on the nature of terrorism?
My thesis is that it’s a mistake to think of terrorists as deranged or pathological. Like many of us, they have a high ethical sense and are driven by an acute sense of injustice. For these crimes to become attractive, they are transformed into moral acts. They think of themselves as moral exemplars to be emulated. It is also a mistake to think of terrorism as specific to a particular religious or political doctrine. It moves easily across religions and politics. This is why the West’s discourse on Islamist terrorism is so misleading and ineffective. Also, terrorism horrifies most of us, we think of it as monstrous in size and scale, but the truth is the number of deaths even in an event as momentous as 9/11 is dwarfed by traffic accidents or smoking deaths in any given year. Despite its relatively small impact and lower probability of occurrence, terrorism induces changes incommensurate with the act itself. Reminding ourselves of this might go some way in helping us contain the fallout of these terror attacks.
What framework do you think is more suited to understanding this?
The most troubling aspect is the emergence of terrorism as a kind of multinational firm. Terrorists no longer function in isolated groups with local grievances. The business model is that of an international criminal organisation using small terrorists as links in a supply chain. It is useless to think of it as having a centralised military structure, where you think that killing the general (an Osama Bin Laden figure) will disband the army. It is more appropriate to think of it as an international firm with a Board of Directors and many local franchises. Dismissing the Board will not dissolve the company.
How would you process the attack on Mumbai?
After the series of bombings India has seen, I think this was a demonstration by the firm to its franchises of how such attacks ought to be done for maximum impact. It is easy to get over the deaths of ordinary travellers and bhelpuri wallahs. This was a lesson in how it should be done to get global attention.
Philosopher SN Balagangadhara tells SHOMA CHAUDHURY terrorism is functioning like a multinational firm, with local franchises
Cover Story - Mumbai Terror Attack 2008Could you outline your thesis on the nature of terrorism?
My thesis is that it’s a mistake to think of terrorists as deranged or pathological. Like many of us, they have a high ethical sense and are driven by an acute sense of injustice. For these crimes to become attractive, they are transformed into moral acts. They think of themselves as moral exemplars to be emulated. It is also a mistake to think of terrorism as specific to a particular religious or political doctrine. It moves easily across religions and politics. This is why the West’s discourse on Islamist terrorism is so misleading and ineffective. Also, terrorism horrifies most of us, we think of it as monstrous in size and scale, but the truth is the number of deaths even in an event as momentous as 9/11 is dwarfed by traffic accidents or smoking deaths in any given year. Despite its relatively small impact and lower probability of occurrence, terrorism induces changes incommensurate with the act itself. Reminding ourselves of this might go some way in helping us contain the fallout of these terror attacks.
What framework do you think is more suited to understanding this?
The most troubling aspect is the emergence of terrorism as a kind of multinational firm. Terrorists no longer function in isolated groups with local grievances. The business model is that of an international criminal organisation using small terrorists as links in a supply chain. It is useless to think of it as having a centralised military structure, where you think that killing the general (an Osama Bin Laden figure) will disband the army. It is more appropriate to think of it as an international firm with a Board of Directors and many local franchises. Dismissing the Board will not dissolve the company.
How would you process the attack on Mumbai?
After the series of bombings India has seen, I think this was a demonstration by the firm to its franchises of how such attacks ought to be done for maximum impact. It is easy to get over the deaths of ordinary travellers and bhelpuri wallahs. This was a lesson in how it should be done to get global attention.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
The Jewish Diaspora in the Hellenistic Period
A Jewish Synagogue
The word Diaspora has become as much a part of Jewish vocabulary as pogrom and the Shoah. Yet the Jewish Diaspora of the Hellenistic period should not be confused with either the Babylonian or the later Roman Diasporas. The Jewish Diaspora during the Hellenistic period, unlike the earlier Babylonian Diaspora, did not originate because of forced expulsion. Most of the Jews expelled from Judea by Nebuchadnezzar had returned to the land of Zion. The Hellenistic Diaspora was, for the most part, a voluntary movement of Jews into the Hellenistic kingdoms that created the Jewish presence outside Judea, especially in Ptolemaic Egypt (Collins, 3). This Diaspora was wedged between two worlds, on the one side were the Hellenistic values of the Greeks and on the other was the Mosaic law. The various ways the Jews of the Diaspora, especially the Jews in Alexandria, balanced these two extremes, through the emphasis of common values and loyalty to the monarch, dictated its existence in the Hellenistic World.
By looking closer at the position of the Jews of Ptolemaic Egypt, their successes and struggles, we can gain a much better perspective on the status of the Jews in the Diaspora during the Hellenistic Period.
The connection of Jews to the land of Egypt is almost as old as Israel itself, the story of the Exodus is retold every year at Passover. Judea is strategically located as the only place from which Egypt can be invaded. In the North the Mediterranean Sea offers perfect cover, the West is protected by the Libyan desert, and the South is secured by the Ethiopian desert. It is therefore natural that whoever governed Egypt would maintain a direct interest in Judea throughout the Hellenistic period and beyond.
Some of the Jews came to Egypt voluntarily as mercenaries, and they were subsequently used by the Ptolemaic rulers to defend the throne against the local population (Kasher 3). Some came because they were attracted by Hellenistic culture, a few were coerced into coming to Egypt by false promises of riches. Jews, as Greek speaking non-Egyptians having the official rank of Hellene, could attain practically all positions under the Ptolemies. Some Jewish communities existed in other kingdoms and cities, such as the city of Antioch, in Syria under the Seleucids, and the Jews in Babylon who chose not to return from exile. It was especially in the city of Alexandria that Judaism and the Diaspora flourished.
Like all subjects to authoritarian monarchs, Egyptian Jews had to conform to the changes that came with the differing rulers. There was a marked difference in the attitudes of different Ptolemaic kings to the presence of Jews in Egypt. The varying levels of toleration towards Jews shown by the Egyptian kings illustrate the difficult situation that the Jewish Diaspora occasionally found itself in. Ptolemy I conquered Jerusalem, tricking the Jewish defenders by attacking on the Sabbath, and took 100,000 prisoners (an exaggerated figure) to Egypt, many as slaves (Kasher, 3).
Ptolemy II Philadelphos was much more favorably inclined towards Egyptian Jews, going so far as to free many of the remaining Hebrew slaves, who had been brought to Egypt by his father. It was also during his rule that the Books of Moses were translated into Greek (Bartlett, 11). This fact shows the influence of the Jews of the Diaspora had on the polytheistic Greek culture. This event is significant also because it shows the interest of the Hellenistic Greeks in Jewish laws and customs. Ptolemy IV Philopator persecuted Egyptian Jews and those in Alexandria in particular (Kasher 7). According to 3 Maccabees, the monarch, being highly devoted to the cult of Dionysus attempted to have the Jews branded with the emblem of Dionysus (3 Macc. 2:29-30). This was an obvious insult to Jews since the worship of any G-d other than Yahweh constituted a breach of the Mosaic law. (Collins, 67).
Little is known about the relationship of the Jews with Ptolemy V, however, there is information about Ptolemy VI Philometor. It was during the rule of Ptolemy VI that upheaval and rebellion against the Seleucids spread through Judea. It was during this unrest that a new wave of Jewish immigrants came to Egypt. The refugees were welcomed by Ptolemy VI. Among the refugees was Onias IV who claimed to be the rightful successor to the high priesthood. Onias attained important and trusted status in Egypt (Collins, 68-69). This shows that there was a time in Egypt when even the most traditional Jews, one of which the High Priest undoubtedly was, could attain high status in Greek society. It is also worth noting that Onias built a Jewish Temple at Leontopolis. Some historians have suggested that the Temple at Leontopolis was meant to rival the one in Jerusalem, since Onias claimed to be the rightful heir to the post of the High Priest. Its location, however, suggests that it was only meant to be a sanctuary for Jewish soldiers in the region, as Jewish soldiers played a vital part in the succession disputes that followed the death of Ptolemy Philometor (Collins 70-71).
The situation in Judea itself also had an effect on the Diaspora. In 198 BCE Judea was conquered by the Seleucids, yet when the relations between the Hebrews and Seleucid king, Antiochus III, deteriorated and Jews launched the Maccabeean revolt, a wave of Hebrew refugees streamed to Egypt (Collins, 68). The Maccabees, after their victory, began a policy of persecution of Hellenized Jews in Judea and this policy also contributed to the numbers of Jews in Egypt.
For the most part, despite occasional persecution, Jews in Ptolemaic Egypt were left alone to practice their religion. The vast majority of the Jewish Diaspora under the Ptolemies was loyal to the monarchy, and attempted to participate in the society as much as Jewish law and traditions would permit (Collins, 151). While large Jewish communities were usually organized as separate bodies in Egypt, they did retain a very close connection with Jerusalem, as evident by the fact that several High Priests of Judea came for visits to Alexandria (Kasher, 346). The cooperation also benefited Judea, as Alexandrian artists were commissioned to repair the Jerusalem Temples damaged accessories (Kasher, 347). The Jews of Egypt also made pilgrimages to Jerusalem, bringing with them sacrificial gifts and gifts for the priests of the Temple (Kasher, 346).
Large Jewish communities in Egypt were classified by the Egyptian authorities as Politai, and as such enjoyed the protection of civil laws. The Jews were a distinct group, they were below the Greeks, however, they were above the native Egyptian population. This classification does not include Jewish slaves, however, most of them were freed by Ptolemy II. Jews of Alexandria were not citizens of the Greek polis, nor did they strive to attain citizenship alongside Greeks. The Alexandrian Jews struggled to maintain their current status, since becoming full citizens would have meant giving up their Jewish identity. As previously stated, however, the situation and the social position of the Jews would change from monarch to monarch.
Jewish identity in the Hellenistic Diaspora was maintained largely through ethics and piety. While most gentiles thought of Judaism as a strange phenomenon, some Greeks admired many of the codes in the Mosaic law. Several aspects of the law, in particular, found a receptive audience among the gentiles. Throughout the Hellenistic period there had been a growing movement in some Greek philosophical circles towards monotheism. In addition, the Stoic and the Cynic movements both criticized idolatry. Therefore Jewish writers in the Diaspora could draw a connection between Judaism and the Greek world. The ancient Hellenistic historian Hecataeus of Abdera in his account of Judaism, written in the beginning of the Hellenistic Period, characterized the Jewish religion rather favorably. He noted the humanitarian aspects of the Mosaic law and the vital role of the priesthood (Collins, 156). The strictness of the Mosaic law on the issue of adultery and homosexuality agreed with many Greek philosophers and movements of the contemporary and yesteryear. By emphasizing common values, and downplaying practices exclusive to Judaism, such as circumcision, Hellenistic Jewish writers attempted to present their religion as a universal one (Collins, 160).
There was, however, also negative reaction to the presence of Jews in Greek kingdoms, and to the Jewish religion as a whole. Many Greeks, during the Hellenistic period, saw certain Jewish customs, such as the attention to diet and cleanliness and, as a result of these, the refusal to interact with and marry non-Jews, as going squarely against Greek ideals. Much of the evidence of the anti-Jewish feeling at the time can be found in the surviving literature. An Egyptian priest, Manetho, in a book about the history of Egypt, rewrote the story of the Exodus, as the expulsion of a leper colony (the Jews). It is also at this time that fables (later known as blood libel, a reference to Jews allegedly using the blood of gentiles for human sacrifices) began to appear, among them that Jews worshipped an ass, and that Jews offered human sacrifices in the Jerusalem Temple (Johnson, 135). The result of these claims was a sort of Hellenistic anti-Semitism. In every culture there is distrust of foreigners, especially ones who pride themselves on being different. The presence of anti-Jewish themes in literature, however, suggests an attempt by some Greeks to ferment anti-Jewish sentiment in the ruling class of Egypt. Because the Mosaic law discouraged contact with gentiles many Hellenistic Greeks thought that Jews were a selfish people. As a result many attempts of the Greeks to outlaw the Mosaic law were based on the idea that the Jews had to be made a more social people, like the Greeks.
Throughout the Hellenistic period the Jewish Diaspora was caught between two extremes. One being the strict Mosaic law and Jewish traditions, and the other, Hellenistic values. While the Jews of the Diaspora attempted to maintain close links with Jerusalem their primary concern was the relation with the current Ptolemaic monarch. Combined with the constant disputes within Judea itself and the nature of the Jewish religion, the task of the Jews of the Diaspora to blend in while maintaining their Jewish identity was extremely hard, and ultimately the choice became complete assimilation or exile into ghettos.
A Jewish Synagogue
The word Diaspora has become as much a part of Jewish vocabulary as pogrom and the Shoah. Yet the Jewish Diaspora of the Hellenistic period should not be confused with either the Babylonian or the later Roman Diasporas. The Jewish Diaspora during the Hellenistic period, unlike the earlier Babylonian Diaspora, did not originate because of forced expulsion. Most of the Jews expelled from Judea by Nebuchadnezzar had returned to the land of Zion. The Hellenistic Diaspora was, for the most part, a voluntary movement of Jews into the Hellenistic kingdoms that created the Jewish presence outside Judea, especially in Ptolemaic Egypt (Collins, 3). This Diaspora was wedged between two worlds, on the one side were the Hellenistic values of the Greeks and on the other was the Mosaic law. The various ways the Jews of the Diaspora, especially the Jews in Alexandria, balanced these two extremes, through the emphasis of common values and loyalty to the monarch, dictated its existence in the Hellenistic World.
By looking closer at the position of the Jews of Ptolemaic Egypt, their successes and struggles, we can gain a much better perspective on the status of the Jews in the Diaspora during the Hellenistic Period.
The connection of Jews to the land of Egypt is almost as old as Israel itself, the story of the Exodus is retold every year at Passover. Judea is strategically located as the only place from which Egypt can be invaded. In the North the Mediterranean Sea offers perfect cover, the West is protected by the Libyan desert, and the South is secured by the Ethiopian desert. It is therefore natural that whoever governed Egypt would maintain a direct interest in Judea throughout the Hellenistic period and beyond.
Some of the Jews came to Egypt voluntarily as mercenaries, and they were subsequently used by the Ptolemaic rulers to defend the throne against the local population (Kasher 3). Some came because they were attracted by Hellenistic culture, a few were coerced into coming to Egypt by false promises of riches. Jews, as Greek speaking non-Egyptians having the official rank of Hellene, could attain practically all positions under the Ptolemies. Some Jewish communities existed in other kingdoms and cities, such as the city of Antioch, in Syria under the Seleucids, and the Jews in Babylon who chose not to return from exile. It was especially in the city of Alexandria that Judaism and the Diaspora flourished.
Like all subjects to authoritarian monarchs, Egyptian Jews had to conform to the changes that came with the differing rulers. There was a marked difference in the attitudes of different Ptolemaic kings to the presence of Jews in Egypt. The varying levels of toleration towards Jews shown by the Egyptian kings illustrate the difficult situation that the Jewish Diaspora occasionally found itself in. Ptolemy I conquered Jerusalem, tricking the Jewish defenders by attacking on the Sabbath, and took 100,000 prisoners (an exaggerated figure) to Egypt, many as slaves (Kasher, 3).
Ptolemy II Philadelphos was much more favorably inclined towards Egyptian Jews, going so far as to free many of the remaining Hebrew slaves, who had been brought to Egypt by his father. It was also during his rule that the Books of Moses were translated into Greek (Bartlett, 11). This fact shows the influence of the Jews of the Diaspora had on the polytheistic Greek culture. This event is significant also because it shows the interest of the Hellenistic Greeks in Jewish laws and customs. Ptolemy IV Philopator persecuted Egyptian Jews and those in Alexandria in particular (Kasher 7). According to 3 Maccabees, the monarch, being highly devoted to the cult of Dionysus attempted to have the Jews branded with the emblem of Dionysus (3 Macc. 2:29-30). This was an obvious insult to Jews since the worship of any G-d other than Yahweh constituted a breach of the Mosaic law. (Collins, 67).
Little is known about the relationship of the Jews with Ptolemy V, however, there is information about Ptolemy VI Philometor. It was during the rule of Ptolemy VI that upheaval and rebellion against the Seleucids spread through Judea. It was during this unrest that a new wave of Jewish immigrants came to Egypt. The refugees were welcomed by Ptolemy VI. Among the refugees was Onias IV who claimed to be the rightful successor to the high priesthood. Onias attained important and trusted status in Egypt (Collins, 68-69). This shows that there was a time in Egypt when even the most traditional Jews, one of which the High Priest undoubtedly was, could attain high status in Greek society. It is also worth noting that Onias built a Jewish Temple at Leontopolis. Some historians have suggested that the Temple at Leontopolis was meant to rival the one in Jerusalem, since Onias claimed to be the rightful heir to the post of the High Priest. Its location, however, suggests that it was only meant to be a sanctuary for Jewish soldiers in the region, as Jewish soldiers played a vital part in the succession disputes that followed the death of Ptolemy Philometor (Collins 70-71).
The situation in Judea itself also had an effect on the Diaspora. In 198 BCE Judea was conquered by the Seleucids, yet when the relations between the Hebrews and Seleucid king, Antiochus III, deteriorated and Jews launched the Maccabeean revolt, a wave of Hebrew refugees streamed to Egypt (Collins, 68). The Maccabees, after their victory, began a policy of persecution of Hellenized Jews in Judea and this policy also contributed to the numbers of Jews in Egypt.
For the most part, despite occasional persecution, Jews in Ptolemaic Egypt were left alone to practice their religion. The vast majority of the Jewish Diaspora under the Ptolemies was loyal to the monarchy, and attempted to participate in the society as much as Jewish law and traditions would permit (Collins, 151). While large Jewish communities were usually organized as separate bodies in Egypt, they did retain a very close connection with Jerusalem, as evident by the fact that several High Priests of Judea came for visits to Alexandria (Kasher, 346). The cooperation also benefited Judea, as Alexandrian artists were commissioned to repair the Jerusalem Temples damaged accessories (Kasher, 347). The Jews of Egypt also made pilgrimages to Jerusalem, bringing with them sacrificial gifts and gifts for the priests of the Temple (Kasher, 346).
Large Jewish communities in Egypt were classified by the Egyptian authorities as Politai, and as such enjoyed the protection of civil laws. The Jews were a distinct group, they were below the Greeks, however, they were above the native Egyptian population. This classification does not include Jewish slaves, however, most of them were freed by Ptolemy II. Jews of Alexandria were not citizens of the Greek polis, nor did they strive to attain citizenship alongside Greeks. The Alexandrian Jews struggled to maintain their current status, since becoming full citizens would have meant giving up their Jewish identity. As previously stated, however, the situation and the social position of the Jews would change from monarch to monarch.
Jewish identity in the Hellenistic Diaspora was maintained largely through ethics and piety. While most gentiles thought of Judaism as a strange phenomenon, some Greeks admired many of the codes in the Mosaic law. Several aspects of the law, in particular, found a receptive audience among the gentiles. Throughout the Hellenistic period there had been a growing movement in some Greek philosophical circles towards monotheism. In addition, the Stoic and the Cynic movements both criticized idolatry. Therefore Jewish writers in the Diaspora could draw a connection between Judaism and the Greek world. The ancient Hellenistic historian Hecataeus of Abdera in his account of Judaism, written in the beginning of the Hellenistic Period, characterized the Jewish religion rather favorably. He noted the humanitarian aspects of the Mosaic law and the vital role of the priesthood (Collins, 156). The strictness of the Mosaic law on the issue of adultery and homosexuality agreed with many Greek philosophers and movements of the contemporary and yesteryear. By emphasizing common values, and downplaying practices exclusive to Judaism, such as circumcision, Hellenistic Jewish writers attempted to present their religion as a universal one (Collins, 160).
There was, however, also negative reaction to the presence of Jews in Greek kingdoms, and to the Jewish religion as a whole. Many Greeks, during the Hellenistic period, saw certain Jewish customs, such as the attention to diet and cleanliness and, as a result of these, the refusal to interact with and marry non-Jews, as going squarely against Greek ideals. Much of the evidence of the anti-Jewish feeling at the time can be found in the surviving literature. An Egyptian priest, Manetho, in a book about the history of Egypt, rewrote the story of the Exodus, as the expulsion of a leper colony (the Jews). It is also at this time that fables (later known as blood libel, a reference to Jews allegedly using the blood of gentiles for human sacrifices) began to appear, among them that Jews worshipped an ass, and that Jews offered human sacrifices in the Jerusalem Temple (Johnson, 135). The result of these claims was a sort of Hellenistic anti-Semitism. In every culture there is distrust of foreigners, especially ones who pride themselves on being different. The presence of anti-Jewish themes in literature, however, suggests an attempt by some Greeks to ferment anti-Jewish sentiment in the ruling class of Egypt. Because the Mosaic law discouraged contact with gentiles many Hellenistic Greeks thought that Jews were a selfish people. As a result many attempts of the Greeks to outlaw the Mosaic law were based on the idea that the Jews had to be made a more social people, like the Greeks.
Throughout the Hellenistic period the Jewish Diaspora was caught between two extremes. One being the strict Mosaic law and Jewish traditions, and the other, Hellenistic values. While the Jews of the Diaspora attempted to maintain close links with Jerusalem their primary concern was the relation with the current Ptolemaic monarch. Combined with the constant disputes within Judea itself and the nature of the Jewish religion, the task of the Jews of the Diaspora to blend in while maintaining their Jewish identity was extremely hard, and ultimately the choice became complete assimilation or exile into ghettos.
Saturday, August 1, 2009
4 A.Moron at 19:08 Today :
All reports shows that Maoists terrorists never attach any Congress or Trinamul Congress party activists; they just like the fake Naxals in 1970"s West Bengal kill the communists.
So, it should be very clear who are the Maoists. Daniel Monihan, former Ambassador of USA to India said that CIA had created the Naxals in West Bengal during 1970s. Who has created the Maoists?
Of course, Yachury, Karat, Balakrishnan, etc etc are all on the payroll of China. That is the explanation of Rs.4000 Crores asset of the CPI(M) and the lefe-style of these JNU gang who are now controlling CPI(M).
They are born and brought up in New Delhi; never got elected into any post in their life, but control everything from New Delhi.
All reports shows that Maoists terrorists never attach any Congress or Trinamul Congress party activists; they just like the fake Naxals in 1970"s West Bengal kill the communists.
So, it should be very clear who are the Maoists. Daniel Monihan, former Ambassador of USA to India said that CIA had created the Naxals in West Bengal during 1970s. Who has created the Maoists?
Of course, Yachury, Karat, Balakrishnan, etc etc are all on the payroll of China. That is the explanation of Rs.4000 Crores asset of the CPI(M) and the lefe-style of these JNU gang who are now controlling CPI(M).
They are born and brought up in New Delhi; never got elected into any post in their life, but control everything from New Delhi.
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