1.Journal article review
"Political violence, ethnic conflict, and contemporary wars: broad implications for health and social well-being" shows that the historical memory of a specific community exists along with individual memory. It acts as a mechanism of social experience translation so D.Pedersen presents “psychosocial consequences of the various forms of political violence against individuals, communities, or specific ethnic groups” (Pedersen, 2002, p.175). Individual memory is based on the historical virtue because any person borrows the national memory. Further, these memories are selected, collated and categorized on the basis of personal experience, ideas, values and attitudes.
The historical memory includes social consciousness spiritual culture (language, identity, norms of behavior, traditions, customs), monuments of culture (documents, artifacts), as well as the unconscious culture where archetypes are included and ethnic gene pool, which formed the features of the national character. Historical memory is extremely important factor to overcome ethnic tensions and can help in prevention of ethnic conflict. This phenomenon needs to be studied interdisciplinary, considering both sociologists and political scientists, psychologists, and conflict resolution. D.Pedersen concludes that members of the persecuted the group cannot cope with shame, humiliation, helplessness. They do not have the opportunity to mourn their losses so they are forced through transgenerational transmission injury to complete these unfinished psychological processes. As a result, there is such a thing as ancestors injury, that may be updated later, hundreds and even thousands of years later (the so-called "collapse of the times").
This article focuses on the collective, regulatory, cultural and semiotic aspects of the memory of the past. Indeed, in the most general terms, psychologists typically define memory as a reflection of the knowledge that was in the past experience, by storing, playing and learning. Historical memory is often in the modern world becomes an object of manipulation of the political elites in their own interests (especially evident in ethnocratic societies) and mobilization of ethnicity. The main interests of the elite include political (the redistribution of power, access to power and its consolidation, denigration of the political enemy) and economic (sub-gap or establish economic relations with other countries). Historical memory implies an election, which is facilitated by actions such as rewriting the history books, the promotion of the historical events covered in a favorable perspective, securing the "new" facts on the state level (state awards, awards, memorials "new" or well-forgotten heroes).
The main factor of protective conflict resorting to ethnic violence is a "security dilemma" group, manifesting itself in the case when the government is unable to control the law and order and the initiator of ethnic repression. The fear of violence causes members of ethnic groups to self-defense, and as a result the group competing in a natural way and striving to survive in the absence of a strong government. So they are beginning to arm themselves to protect their own security. The desire for security has certain limits related to external groups, which react to the threat response mobilization and armament. Security dilemma is thus the following possible options: either to rely on the support of a weak government, or to increase its security response complex.
Protective ethnic conflicts may be the forerunner of a protracted phase of violent ethnic conflict. Security dilemma situations often occur under the influence of rapid social changes that upset the balance in the relationship between the state and ethnic groups. This balance is maintained with the help of ethnic groups loyalty to the constitutional order or by the state security of existence for all members of society. Thus, the protective ethno-national conflict based on the security dilemma, motivated by fear for the physical survival of members of ethnic groups in the absence of strong government opposition and preservation of ethnocentrism in intergroup relations, where opponents seek to prevent mobilization of response by:
- the militarization of ethnic groups;
- criminalization of ethnic groups;
- expansion of the ethnic homogenous territory.
The original cause of the security dilemma means that the security of the ethnic conflict is a concern due to the lack of stability and certainty as to the intentions of the enemy (in this case a rival ethnic group). It should be noted that each new generation is drawn to the past, not only for the purpose of understanding of the links with the past, but also on the basis of their current interests. Presentation of the historical past is the first component of national identity and national political culture.
The interest in the past is part of the public consciousness, large events and changes in social conditions, the accumulation and interpretation of new experiences give rise to a change of consciousness and re-evaluate the past. Online interactive communication is a constant selection of events, with the result that some of them are subject to oblivion, while others are exposed to rethink and become symbols of group identity. The historical experience of the society includes events that have left an imprint on the "collective memory" of people. These events include war, economic and political crises that have left bright traces in society that are relevant to political behavior.
Thus, the main reason is caused by the appearance of the security dilemma is incomplete or distorted information about the intentions of the ethnic groups. Permanent outdoor intergroup communication reduce mutual suspicion and fear and prevent potential violent conflict. It is necessary to emphasize that the permanence due to the fact that the information tends to be constantly updated and distorted. Historical memory is particularly important in the protective mechanism because it become a major factor in the construction of "enemy image" and the formation of the fears that lead to the appearance of the security dilemma, leading to a protective ethnic conflict.
2. Review of a book
Triumph and Trauma written by Bernhard Giesen devoted to the analysis of cultural trauma in Germany. The author shows how national identity in post-Nazi Germany formed around the war evetns. At the same time, the guilt associated with the Holocaust becomes an iconic expression of evil. The author claims that the memory constitutes identity, it is a stable basis for solidarity in today's volatile situation. In the Triumph and Trauma author proposes an example of cultural-sociological approach to the study of collective memory.
The first variable is the fact of who is a person to a greater extent - subject or object. The author refers to the classical philosophical problem of the relation between subject and object, tracing this opposition to Descartes and Kant to Derrida. Bernhard Giesen says that we define ourselves as subjects, but the fact that we have a body makes us vulnerable to the influences of the environment. Each person is both subject and object, and the ratio of these characteristics is variable. The second variable is associated with the ability to overcome the obstacles faced by people because of the imperfection of the world.
At the intersection of the two parameters there are four basic shapes in which the author conducts his analysis: triumphant hero, tragic hero, victim and perpetrator. The appearance of these figures is only possible within the community. The concept of heroes and victims, their symbolic representations in the culture of the communities go beyond the everyday world, it is the essence of the world of the sacred. “The concentration of the sacred in the person of triumphant hero comes at the price of desacralizing others” (Giesen, 2015, p.55). Due to the symbolic representations of the key figures in the community defines themselves. Bernhard Giesen described theoretical logic, considering all four figures, especially their occurrence and impact on the community. Criminals, in contrast to the heroes, are not perceived by people as subjects endowed with sanctification: the hero inspires the whole world, the defeat of the vanquished hero confirmed his status of a subject. At the same time criminal who belongs to others as things rather than as subject viewed as a figure who has lost the status of the subject.
Formation of key figures is due to events that are perceived as traumatic or triumphant. What a triumph and trauma? The author draws the reader's attention to the fact that each person has a limit event of his existence: birth and death. The idea of these events a person can learn, only to see the birth or death of other people. But although these limit points very far removed from everyday experience, sometimes events occur that allow to go through something similar to the death or birth. Such memories are called "trauma". In turn, the disasters that we are able to overcome, we perceive as moments of triumph: they remind us of the birth. Author notes that in this case we can speak only about the memory of these events. In the actual moment of experience people are not aware of the meaning of this experience, they can designate the event as a triumph of injury or only at a distance. Triumph injury allow us to understand how the formation of the four key figures in the community. That is the figure of the criminal and his traumatic memory seems for Giesen basis for a new definition of the national identity of Germans after 1945. He shared the memory of real criminals who took part in the events of the Holocaust and the memory of onlookers. The first group is usually silent about the traumatic memories. The latter group is located in an intermediate position: they have not committed anything criminal, but on the other hand, their inaction is criminal. And the way in which they cope with it, forms their identity.
Conceptualizations of the author are built on the distinction between the sacred and profane, traumatic and triumphant so they allow to make a model that deals with the current politics of memory in Germany without involving external explanations (economic or related to power relations). This conceptualization makes it possible to explore the collective memory not as a secondary product that dependent on external factors, but as a phenomenon that is included in the culture, including political, and thus requiring its own logic studies.
References
Giesen, B. (2015). Triumph and trauma. Routledge.
Pedersen, D. (2002). Political violence, ethnic conflict, and contemporary wars: broad implications for health and social well-being. Social science & medicine, 55(2), 175-190.
