ENGLISH

Evil and Human Agency: Understanding Collective Evildoing

By Arne Johan Vetlesen

Book information

Publisher
Cambridge University Press
Year
2005
ISBN
0521856949, 9780521856942, 9780511137723
Language
english
Format
PDF
Filesize
4 MB (4151649 bytes)
Series
Cambridge Cultural Social Studies
Pages
326\328
Topic
Education
Scanned
yes
Time added
2011-06-04 13:46:07

Description

Arne Johan Vetlesen argues that to do evil is to intentionally inflict pain on another human being, against his or her will, and cause serious and foreseeable harm. Vetlesen investigates why and in what sort of circumstances such a desire arises, and how it is channeled, or exploited, into collective evildoing. He argues that such evildoing, pitting whole groups against each other, springs from a combination of character, situation, and social structure. Vetlesen shows how closely perpetrators, victims, and bystanders interact, and how aspects of human agency are recognized, denied, and projected by different agents.

Similar books