Cultural Violence by Johan Galtung - Summary and Notes
Cultural Violence
Definition of Cultural Violence
Cultural violence refers to aspects of culture that legitimize direct or structural violence, thus making violence seem acceptable or even right.
These aspects are part of the symbolic sphere, including:
Religion and ideology, which provide frameworks for interpreting events and justifying actions.
Language and art, which shape perceptions and normalize certain behaviors.
Empirical science, which can be used to create tools for violence or to justify harmful practices.
Formal science (logic, mathematics), which provides systems for rationalizing decisions and actions.
Examples include: stars, crosses, crescents, flags, anthems, military parades, portraits of leaders, inflammatory speeches, and posters that evoke strong emotional responses and can be used to promote violent agendas.
Cultural violence does not directly kill or maim but is used to justify direct and/or structural violence, creating an environment where such violence is tolerated or encouraged.
The expression 'Aspect A of culture C is an example of cultural violence' is preferred over cultural stereotypes such as 'culture C is violent' to avoid generalizations and focus on specific elements.
The opposite of cultural violence is 'cultural peace,' which justifies direct and structural peace. A culture with many diverse aspects of this kind can be called a 'peace culture'.
Cultural violence makes direct and structural violence seem right or acceptable by changing perceptions and values.
Violence studies involve the use of violence and the legitimation of that use, examining how violence is justified and perpetuated within a culture.
Cultural violence changes the moral color of an act (e.g., murder on behalf of the country), making actions that would otherwise be seen as wrong seem justified.
Cultural violence can make reality opaque, obscuring the violent act or fact by distorting information or promoting misinformation.
Typology of Direct and Structural Violence
Violence is defined as avoidable insults to basic human needs and life, lowering the level of needs satisfaction. This includes physical, emotional, and psychological harm.
Threats of violence are also considered violence, as they create fear and insecurity.
Basic human needs:
Survival needs (negation: death, mortality), essential for physical existence.
Well-being needs (negation: misery, morbidity), necessary for a healthy and fulfilling life.
Identity, meaning needs (negation: alienation), important for a sense of belonging and purpose.
Freedom needs (negation: repression), required for autonomy and self-determination.
Table 1 (summarized): Typology of Violence
Direct Violence:
Survival Needs: Killing, the ultimate denial of survival needs.
Well-being Needs: Maiming, causing physical harm and suffering.
Identity Needs: Desocialization, disrupting social connections and cultural identity.
Freedom Needs: Repression, suppressing autonomy and self-expression.
Structural Violence:
Survival Needs: Exploitation A, systemic denial of resources leading to death.
Well-being Needs: Exploitation B, systemic deprivation causing misery.
Identity Needs: Penetration, Segmentation, undermining cultural identity through external influence and division.
Freedom Needs: Marginalization, Fragmentation, excluding groups from full participation in society, leading to division.
Ecological Balance:
A fifth column could be added for the rest of Nature, essential for human existence, recognizing the interdependence between humans and the environment.
Ecological balance relates to survival, well-being, freedom, and identity for human maintenance, highlighting the role of a healthy environment in supporting human needs.
Failure to satisfy this results in ecological and human degradation, leading to environmental destruction and harm to human populations.
Mega-versions of violence:
Killing: Extermination, holocaust, genocide, the systematic destruction of entire groups.
Misery: Silent holocaust, widespread suffering and deprivation.
Alienation: Spiritual death, loss of meaning and connection.
Repression: Gulag, KZ, extreme forms of oppression and confinement.
Ecological degradation: Ecocide, the destruction of ecosystems.
All together: Omnicide, the total destruction of all life.
War is a specific form of orchestrated violence involving governments and is characterized by organized armed conflict.
It's crucial to consider the interconnections among types of violence, as reducing one type may increase another. For example, reducing direct violence might lead to increased structural violence if underlying inequalities are not addressed.
Included under maiming are sieges, blockades, and sanctions, which are strategies that inflict harm on populations.
These can lead to slow killing through malnutrition and lack of medical attention, illustrating the indirect but deadly effects of such measures.
The actor avoids direct violence but still threatens livelihood, highlighting the use of indirect violence to achieve political or economic goals.
Alienation involves desocialization away from one's own culture and resocialization into another, leading to a loss of cultural identity.
Second-class citizenship forces the subjected group to express the dominant culture, suppressing their own cultural expression.
Socialization of a child can be seen as forced, but non-violent socialization could give the child a choice of cultural idioms, promoting cultural diversity and autonomy.
Repression includes 'freedom from' and 'freedom to' as per the International Bill of Human Rights, which encompasses both the absence of coercion and the ability to exercise one's rights.
Detention (locking people in) and expulsion (locking people out) are significant concomitants of other violence types, representing physical and social exclusion.
Violent structures often have exploitation as a centerpiece, where resources and opportunities are unequally distributed.
Topdogs benefit more than underdogs, measured in needs currency, highlighting the systemic advantages enjoyed by dominant groups.
Exploitation A: underdogs die from it, extreme deprivation leading to death.
Exploitation B: underdogs are left in misery, chronic deprivation and suffering.
Violent structures affect the mind and spirit, leading to psychological and emotional harm.
Penetration and segmentation impede consciousness formation, disrupting the ability to form a cohesive understanding of the world.
Marginalization and fragmentation impede mobilization, hindering collective action and resistance.
These four terms can be seen as structural violence and built-in repression, highlighting the ways in which social structures perpetuate violence and oppression.
Violence against nature:
Direct violence: slashing, burning, actions that directly harm the environment.
Structural violence: pollution and depletion from industry, systemic practices that degrade the environment.
Commercialization makes consequences non-visible to perpetrators, distancing actors from the harm they cause.
'Sustainable economic growth' may be a form of cultural violence if it promotes unsustainable practices.
Relating Three Types of Violence
'Cultural violence' is added as the third super-type in a violence triangle along with direct and structural violence, creating a comprehensive framework for understanding violence.
Cultural violence legitimizes direct and structural violence by providing justifications and rationalizations.
Triangle orientations invoke different perspectives, allowing for a multifaceted analysis of violence.
Direct violence is an event; structural violence is a process; cultural violence is a 'permanence', illustrating the different temporal dimensions of each type of violence.
Three-strata image: violence strata image (complementing the triangle image) of the phenomenology of violence, providing a visual representation of the layers of violence.
Bottom: Cultural violence (steady flow), the underlying foundation that sustains other forms of violence.
Middle: Structural violence (rhythms of exploitation), the patterns of inequality that perpetuate violence.
Top: Direct violence (visible cruelty), the overt acts of harm and aggression.
Causal flow: cultural → structural → direct violence, showing how cultural norms influence structural arrangements, leading to direct violence.
Culture normalizes exploitation/repression, leading to eruptions of direct violence, illustrating the link between cultural beliefs and violent actions.
Criminal activity redistributes wealth or maintains topdog status, perpetuating cycles of violence and inequality.
Both direct and structural violence create needs-deficits (trauma), with lasting psychological and social consequences.
Collective trauma can sediment into the collective subconscious, influencing future behavior and attitudes.
Violence breeds violence; needs-deprivation leads to direct violence or hopelessness, showing the self-perpetuating nature of violence.
Ruling elites blame victims of structural violence, an act of cultural violence, justifying inequality and oppression.
There are causal flows in all six directions of the triangle, and cycles connecting all three, highlighting the complex interrelationships among different forms of violence.
Example: Africans captured, enslaved (direct violence) → structural violence (whites as masters) → cultural violence (racist ideas), illustrating the historical roots and lasting impact of violence.
Social differentiation leads to unequal exchange and cultural justification, perpetuating cycles of violence and inequality.
Combined direct/structural violence leads to cultural rationale, normalizing and justifying violence.
Attacking, cheating and killing leads to the justification that those attacked are dangerous, rationalizing aggression and violence.
Human nature: potential for both violence and peace, but high variability suggests structure and culture are more important determinants, underscoring the role of social and cultural factors in shaping behavior.
Militarization involves inclination toward direct violence, production/deployment, structural and cultural aspects, illustrating the multifaceted nature of militarization.
Examples of Cultural Violence
Religion
The sacred ('god') can be transcendental (outside us) or immanent (inside us), influencing attitudes towards hierarchy and community.
Judaism's transcendental God has implications for hierarchy and chosenness, potentially leading to exclusion and discrimination.
Transcendental God and Satan lead to ideas of Chosen Ones and Unchosen Ones, with implications for social and political relations.
Heaven and Hell can be reproduced on earth, justifying social stratification and inequality.
Immanent God makes dichotomy an act against God, promoting inclusivity and challenging hierarchical structures.
Chosenness can translate into direct and structural violence, justifying domination and oppression.
Policies of Israel toward Palestinians can be seen as cultural violence, translating chosenness into all eight types of direct and structural violence, illustrating the real-world consequences of cultural beliefs.
Ideology
Political ideologies can replace religion, with the state replacing God, imbuing political systems with quasi-religious significance.
Sharp dichotomies persist (Self vs. Other), fueling conflict and division.
Nationalism constructs a steep gradient, exalting Self and debasing Other, fostering hostility and aggression.
Other is dehumanized, leading to direct violence blamed on the victim, justifying violence against marginalized groups.
The 'dangerous it' (vermin, bacteria, mad dog, cranky criminals) leads to extermination, rationalizing genocide and other forms of mass violence.
Chosen ones can remain chosen based on human capabilities, gender, national superiority, race, or merit, reinforcing social hierarchies and inequalities.
Belief in modernization and progress is seen as apodictic, with potential for justifying exploitation and environmental destruction.
Speciesism, 'classism,' and 'meritism' persist, reinforcing social hierarchies and inequalities.
Statism gives the state the right to destroy life, empowering governments to engage in violence and oppression.
Nation-state ideology combines nationalism and statism, creating a powerful force for violence and conflict.
Combine the nation-state with the Chosen People complex for disaster:
killing in war is done in the name of the nation, legitimizing warfare and military aggression.
Execution is also done in the name of 'the people of the state X', asserting the state's authority over life and death.
Anti-abortion sentiment is rooted in a feeling that abortion on the decision of the mother erodes the power monopoly of the state over life, reflecting state control over reproduction.
France has a superiority complex - France chose herself, un peuple klu, mais par lui-mime, exemplified by the archetypal act when Napoleon was to be crowned by the Pope in 1804. He took the crown from his hands and crowned himself.
Language
Languages with Latin base (Italian, Spanish, French and modern English) make women invisible by using the same word for the male gender as for the entire human species, perpetuating gender inequality.
Non-sexist writing is a deliberate cultural transformation away from cultural violence, promoting gender equality and inclusivity.
Indo-European languages impose space/time rigidities and a rigid logical structure, potentially limiting creativity and flexibility.
They distinguish between essence and apparition, legitimizing destruction of the apparition, with implications for attitudes towards nature and the environment.
Art
Europe understands itself by negating the non-European environment, especially the Ottoman Empire, reinforcing Eurocentric biases and stereotypes.
'Oriental despotism' involves callousness, arbitrariness, and sexual access, perpetuating negative stereotypes about non-Western cultures.
Russia is also seen in terms of oriental despotism, highlighting the pervasive nature of these stereotypes.
Oriental despotism is represented in painting displaying sex, violence, callous and arbitrary actions, reinforcing negative perceptions.
Empirical Science
Neoclassical economics studies the system prescribed by its own doctrines, confirming self-fulfilling prophecies, limiting alternative perspectives.
Trade theory based on comparative advantages prescribes that countries specialize in products based on production factors, perpetuating global inequalities.
Countries with raw materials extract them, while those with capital process them, reinforcing economic dependencies.
The doctrine of comparative advantages justifies a rough division of the world, with implications for social and economic justice.
Formal Science
Mathematics has a violent aspect: One basic rule--a theorem T and its negation -T cannot both be valid--may have violent consequences, promoting binary thinking.
Mathematics disciplines us into black-white thinking and polarization, limiting nuanced understanding.
The either-or character of mathematical thought makes it an exciting game: but as a model for a highly dialectic human, social and world reality it is far from adequate, highlighting the limitations of formal logic.
Cosmology
Cosmology harbors deeper assumptions about reality, defining what is normal and natural, with implications for social and political norms.
Occidental culture shows many violent features: chosenness, gradients, urgency, atomistic/dichotomous thought, arrogance toward nature, individualism, and a transcendental God, highlighting the cultural roots of violence.
Changing the cultural genetic code is difficult, but essential for creating a more peaceful and just world.
Gandhi and Cultural Violence
Gandhi's axioms: unity-of-life and unity-of-means-and-ends, providing a framework for ethical action.
Unity-of-life: closeness against separation, promoting interconnectedness and empathy.
Unity-of-means-and-ends: acts and facts should be close together, emphasizing the importance of ethical means.
Violent/exploitative means are not justified by distant goals, challenging consequentialist ethics.
Gandhi was skeptical of Marxist and liberal/conservative ideas sacrificing people for future gains, prioritizing immediate ethical concerns.
He advocated respect for the sacredness of all life and taking care of the means so the ends will take care of themselves, emphasizing the importance of ethical conduct.
Conclusion
Violence starts at any corner of the triangle (direct, structural, cultural) and is transmitted to other corners, highlighting the interconnectedness of violence.
This can be contrasted with a virtuous triangle of peace (cultural, structural, direct), providing a positive vision for social change.
Virtuous triangle is self-reinforcing and obtained by working on all three corners, emphasizing the need for holistic approaches.
Inclusion of culture broadens the agenda for peace studies, highlighting the importance