Part One: Forgiveness and Atonement: Role in Interpersonal Justice

Key Dilemma for Part One:

• Who decides when forgiveness is justified, and how much is necessary?
• Who decides when atonement is necessary, and how much is necessary?

Review of List of Navigation Strategies for Seemingly Intractable Conflicts, Differences, and Dilemmas:

Introduction:

Given that many people believe that when it comes to either interpersonal justice or social justice, forgiveness is impossible because it is unthinkable to forgive a wrong that has left an individual or group injured, traumatized, and irretrievably stuck in the past. Also, for many people, atonement is impossible because it is unthinkable to accept the full responsibility for creating such a grievous harm that goes beyond an injury, into trauma, and a kind of emotional paralysis. In this context, retributive justice is often sought by individual victims or groups of people who have suffered grievously. Victims want their perpetrator to suffer because they are beyond redemption.

Forgiveness Defined:

A key difficulty in defining it is that it seems to be something beyond justification. If it was justified in every case, then it would merely be mercy, something that is pardoned on the basis of some evidence. Forgiveness goes beyond mercy and a pardon. And it is not merely letting go of something. Forgiveness seems to have an element of hope in it, hope for the moral improvement of the forgiven. Forgiveness also seems to have a welcoming element in it, the belief in bringing the unforgiven back into community through forgiveness. Hope and welcoming can heal individuals and communities. On this view, forgiving is a kind of healing.

The worry that I have about this view of forgiveness arises from the extreme form of individualism that Euro-American society represents. When individualism dominates, community suffers. If there is no community to welcome people into, we lose a key way that forgiveness heals. If forgiveness cannot heal, then it has lost its power. If it has lost its power, then it can transform into a kind of permissiveness.

Permissiveness is a feature of a community that has lost it moral strength and moral solidarity. On my view, morality is a feature reflected back and forth between our interpersonal community and our intrapersonal community—the community outside of us and inside of each of us. These communities mirror each other. When community morality is weak, then each individual’s morality has lost an important mooring. Just as our identity depends on healthy relationships, morality also depends on community health.

If poverty rages in a society where wealth is also evident, and that wealth is often generated at the expense of the middle class and the poor, then how can we expect individual morality to be strong? If we permit our society to have extremes of wealth that depend on poverty, we are permitting the wealthy to base their security on the lack of security for others. This sort of permissiveness creates a predator society, with predatory individuals. Those who believe that the poor will always be with us ensure that the wealth divide will always exist, that we will continue to have dislocated communities, and that our wider culture’s morality will be further degraded.

Sometimes punishment can be transformative, and sometimes atonement can be transformative; how do we know which one will work in a specific case?

As conflict facilitators, we are trying to use conflict and difference to create transformative resolutions that build community and strengthen morality. Can we do this in a society that is structured on reducing community and weakening morality? My worry is that conflict processes are not enough. To be more than a band-aid, conflict facilitation must occur within the context of community builders who are fully aware of the social dynamic that is tearing community apart—fully aware of the social dynamic that is tearing the moral fabric apart.

I ask myself if these reflections are helping me be less mad at myself for my mistakes. Within contemporary mainstream U.S. society, can I be more forgiving towards myself? Given what I have written here, I am concluding that I should be more forgiving of my mistakes if their moral weight is relatively light. On the other hand, I should be less forgiving if their moral weight is heavy. And, it should not be just up to me to determine the moral weight of my mistakes. I must determine the moral weight of my mistakes through dialogue with others. But, as members of this society, we are infected with suspicious moral reasoning because of the corruption of our sense of community. Can we transcend our individualism and our exposure to moral decline of mainstream culture to find authentic moral values? I think we can, but that will take powerful commitment to social, economic, and environmental justice.

Retributive and Restorative Justice: We need to consider ways that retributive justice often falls short of starting the healing process necessary for positive personal or social change. And to consider ways that restorative justice is capable of generating a significant amount of positive interpersonal and social change. Where retributive justice is about punishment, and is not directly about forgiveness and atonement (though it can occur as part of the courtroom process), restorative justice is centered on the dynamics of forgiveness and atonement.

To create a space for effective interpersonal restorative justice processes, I suggest that we map out these concepts along continua, to help victims move from absolute unforgiveness to at least slightly less unforgiveness, not to fully forgive, but to be less stuck in unforgiveness. Likewise, the processes of restorative justice are intended to convince perpetrators to begin the process of atonement, by creating a space, along a continuum, to at least help them begin taking some responsibility for their abuse or harm to another. This is what I mean by navigating spaces on the continua of forgiveness and atonement, as opposed to not being able to move, because it is so easy to get stuck at the polar ends, not knowing there is space for a wider continuum.

Similarly, to create a space for effective social restorative processes, I suggest that we use the same continua-approach to forgiveness and atonement, outlined above. However, with social injustice issues, we need to construct opportunities for members of perpetrator social groups and members of victimized social groups to meet and map out ways that oppressive social groups can begin to find ways to atone, without believing that small atonement gestures, though important, constitute full atonement. And after trust can be established, victim groups can move from unforgiveness to less unforgiveness. It is crucial to remember that full atonement and full forgiveness are multigenerational projects, just as transgenerational transmission of trauma takes many generations to heal.

What is the role of atonement and forgiveness in interpersonal restorative justice?

Justice, as understood as paying the price of misdeeds has, in many modern cultures, entailed going to jail, prison, or paying fines. One pays with the loss of freedom, or money, or both. This view of justice is individualistic in the sense that our justice system assumes that those convicted of crimes had complete autonomy, and therefore full responsible for their actions, admitting to few mitigating circumstances. These are the underpinnings of retributive justice.

Sociologically, these underpinnings are challenged by the dynamics of peer identification and pressure that have so much influence on what people think and choose to do. This is not to say that people don’t make bad choices, it is only to say that many people feel that they do not have much choice because peer identification and pressure do not allow for much choice. If they make too many choices for which their peers disapprove, they may be shunned by that group.

Shunning is an ancient practice of maintaining peer group identification, beliefs, and practices. Just as ancient indigenous people shunned those who broke the taboos of the tribe, we shun those who break the taboos of our family, friends, and coworkers.

For many people—rich or poor—crime, or other misdeeds, are viewed as survival skills in a challenging world. Peer groups determine what behaviors are necessary for the group’s survival. Some of those behaviors may be criminal, but are deemed survival skills for certain groups, whether they are investment brokers, entrepreneurs, or corporate strategists at one end of the wealth spectrum, or gangsters and rip-off artists at the other end of the wealth spectrum. In the middle of the spectrum are the myriads of people who cheat on their taxes, break motor vehicle laws, or avoid building permits for remodeling their homes, etc.

It may sound odd to suppose that everyone is living on a survival level. True, some people’s wealth means that they are not vulnerable in terms of physical survival, though modern society certainly has health, crime, and accident risks. More importantly, people worry about peer group survival; who would they be if their peers rejected them—at home, community, or workplace? Social isolation is potentially lethal in that social acceptance and networking are important aspects of well-being. To survive socially and economically, we must abide by peer group standards and expectations. Those standards and expectations can include dishonesty and crime.

If viewed through the sociological lens, what does this say about individual responsibility, culpability, and the need for punishment?

Gould Essay: What are the five forgiveness assessments recommended for conflict resolution processes?

Forgiveness can mean quite different things to different people, and people behave quite differently depending on what forgiveness means to them in particular cases. Because of this diversity of meaning and behavior, conflict resolution processes face the challenge of accommodating these differences in such a way that the processes fit participants’ sense of forgiveness, without unreflectively forcing participants into processes that presume an overly simplistic definition of forgiveness. In this paper, I examine five different continua of meaning and behavior:

Turning-point to incremental forgiveness;

Proactive to reactive forgiveness;

Transactional to non-transactional forgiveness;

High risk to low-risk forgiveness;

Forgiveness-resistant to overly-forgiving people.

After this examination, I suggest how these continua affect current conflict resolution practice, and I also suggest how certain modifications to practice can better accommodate differences of forgiveness meanings and behavior.

Forgiveness is an issue in a wide array of conflict resolution processes when one, some, or all of the parties feel victimized—and out of that sense of victimization, the need to have an apology and the need to forgive can arise. Forgiveness obviously has a place in reconciliation and restorative justice processes because at least one party has clearly been wronged. However, forgiveness also has a role in many simple neighbor-to-neighbor disputes involving relatively minor issues, such as noise or shared fencing, when at least one party feels they are the victim of, at least, rude behavior.

The motivation for writing this paper is to help disentangle conflicting perceptions about forgiveness. Because forgiveness means different things to different people, we find that this key element of conflict resolution is extraordinarily difficult to define. The challenge of this paper is how conflict resolution processes can be sensitive to this diversity of meanings, and be capable of blending them into a fair and meaningful process. The need for this paper arises from a concern that if conflict resolution processes are not mindful of the various dilemmas concerning forgiveness, then participants might find themselves swept along in a process they find fundamentally unfair and insensitive.

Since forgiveness often plays such a strong role within conflict resolution processes, it is important for those who facilitate these processes to understand that participants enter these processes with radically different understandings of the meaning and role of forgiveness within their individual lives. Some understand forgiveness to be an all or nothing action—we either forgive or not. Others understand forgiveness on a continuum somewhere in between the extremes of absolute unforgiveness to complete forgiveness. Some forgive because it is a lifelong virtue or a religious requirement. Others are prepared to forgive only if it is justified within an exchange for an apology, or a way of reconceiving the offender as deserving a release from punishment or resentment. Some people forgive because of its capacity for self-healing. Others forgive for its capacity to help heal and transform the offender. Some forgive as a way to build community, as well as address social evils and morally transform those shaped by those evils. Others forgive only when the offense was a result of an intentional choice. Some people cannot forgive because it is a threat to their pride—others forgive too easily because if flows from their servility. Some forgive only in low-risk situations when it seems likely to be a successful means to an end. Others forgive even is high-risk situations because it is a life-guiding principle to be practiced regardless of risk.

To further complicate this problem, forgiveness may not be as simple as following from a goal, principle or a personality trait, as above. Some people find they are deeply conflicted about forgiveness because there are other values, feelings or worries that compel, oppose or mitigate its use.

It is not surprising for a mediator to encounter a victim presenting the following dilemmas during a caucus: “Forgiveness is too big a risk for me.” “I can only forgive a little bit, but never as much as he wants.” “I would be happy to forgive him, if only he would apologize.” Or, “I feel like my pastor wants me to forgive, but I feel like I’m not holding my spouse accountable.” Or, “I know it would be easier on me if I just forgave him, but it just doesn’t seem right to let him off the hook.” Or, “I shouldn’t be so angry with her, she is only a victim of a larger unfair system—but I continue to be furious with her.” Or, “I know I should forgive, but I can’t because I would be lowering myself to his level—I’ve worked hard to feel good about myself.” Or, “I probably shouldn’t be so forgiving, but I’m happy to forgive because I’m in no position to demand any respect from this person.” Each one of these responses suggest quite different internal conflicts about forgiving that, in turn, can have a profound influence on conflict resolution processes.

Forgiveness in Conflict Resolution Assessments

At this point, it is important to remind the reader that the five dimensions of forgiveness being discussed here represent five different directions for our consideration—no two directions can be reduced or collapsed into each other. Each of these directions imply different sorts of assessments within conflict resolution processes. In the following, I outline how these assessments function; later, I will elaborate each of these assessments in greater detail. Immediately below, I diagram the five dimensions of forgiveness addressed by these assessments.

1. Turning-Point Forgiveness———————————————–Incremental Forgiveness

2. Proactive Forgiveness———————————————————-Reactive Forgiveness

3. Transactional Forgiveness—————————————Non-Transactional Forgiveness

4. High-Risk Forgiveness———————————- ———————Low-Risk Forgiveness

5. Forgiveness Resistant ——Forgiveness from Healthy Self-Respect—– Overly Forgiving

Turning Point/Incremental Forgiveness Assessment: Conflict resolvers need to assess where victims views of forgiveness fit on the continuum between the extremes of turning-point forgiveness (where one shifts from unforgiveness to full forgiveness) and incremental forgiveness (where one move slowly away from unforgiveness through incremental steps of forgiveness. Those in the middle of this continuum may see the value of both turning point and incremental forgiveness, depending on the situation.

Proactive/ Reactive Assessment: This next assessment requires that conflict resolvers examine where victims views of forgiveness fit on the proactive and reactive forgiveness continuum. Proactive forgivers tend to view forgiveness as community reconciliation and support for moral improvement. Whereas, reactive forgivers tend to view forgiveness as one of many responses to injustice and victimization. Those in the middle of this continuum hold both of these values to varying degrees.

Transactional/Non-Transactional Assessment: This assessment involves the determination of where victim’s views of forgiveness fall on the transactional/non-transactional forgiveness continuum. Those tending toward the transactional understand forgiveness as a transaction between victim and offender. Those tending toward non-transactional forgiveness understand forgiveness as a personal healing process that does not require an engagement with the offender. Those in the middle of this continuum hold both values to varying degrees, depending on the situation.

High-Risk and Low-Risk Assessment: Victims who understand forgiveness as a lifelong principle are likely to take risks forgiving, even in seemingly unreasonable situations. Victims who do not want to forgive without a high level of justification do not tend to understand forgiveness as a lifelong commitment, but rather as a practice limited to low-risk situations. Those in the middle of this continuum will forgive in low- to moderate-risk situations, but avoid high-risk forgiving.

Forgiveness-Resistant/Overly-Forgiving Assessment: Forgiveness-resistant or prideful victims resist forgiveness because it is perceived as lowering the victim to the level of the offender. Overly forgiving or servile victims forgive too easily because they perceive the offender as having a higher or intimidating status. Those in the middle of this continuum have a healthy amount of self-respect, neither too inflated, nor too deflated.

As can be seen above, each of these assessments engage forgiveness in a different way. Victims’ views of, and dispositions toward, forgiveness pull them in at least these five directions. Being pulled in these different directions creates conflicts for victims that must be sensitively handled by conflict resolvers. Otherwise, victims will view conflict resolution processes as a bad match with their values and/or their temperaments.

Now I turn to a more detailed account of the ten poles of these five dimensions. In the first dimension, people who tend toward a notion of turning-point forgiveness understand a forgiveness process as trying to achieve this turning point. Flanigan describes forgiveness as a turning point in the following way:

Forgiveness is the accomplishment of mastery over a wound. It is the process through which an injured person first fights off, then embraces, then conquers a situation that has nearly destroyed him. Forgiveness is also a gift given to the self. Once received, the gift of forgiveness releases an injured person from the burdens and shackles of hate. In a way, forgiveness is only for the brave. It is for those people who are willing to confront their pain, accept themselves as permanently changed, and make difficult choices. (p. 71)

Shriver also characterizes forgiveness as a turning point: “Forgiveness begins when victims abandon revenge and perpetrators abandon professions of innocence.” (p. 156) People on this side of the continuum may have concerns like: Do I have enough justification to turn toward complete forgiveness? Do I have a duty to completely forgive? Must I forgive all at once?

On the other hand, those who tend toward incremental forgiveness understand forgiveness work as helping them gradually move along the continuum toward being a bit more forgiving, without the commitment to completely forgive. The concerns of this group may revolve around questions like: Have I gone far enough toward forgiveness? Have I gone too far in my forgiveness? Has my level of forgiveness done anyone any good? Do I have an obligation to forgive more than I have?

In the second dimension, people who tend towards reactive forgiveness have the prime consideration of how one should respond to an injustice. Dillon explains forgiveness as a temperamental reactivity as follows:

As a laminate kitchen countertop is forgiving, while granite is unforgiving—a dropped glass might bounce on the former but will shatter on the latter—so one can be a forgiving person, of oneself or of others: less likely to condemn in the first place and so less likely to need to overcome it. (p. 72)

People on this side of the continuum might have questions like: Is forgiveness too passive in the face of injustice? Are there limits to retribution? Will forgiveness undermine accountability? Should one forgive what one cannot see punished? Should one forgive because it is a religious requirement? For these people, reactive forgiveness is defined as a measured forgoing of a response to wrongdoing that is hostile, resentful, angry, vindictive, or punitive. For reactive forgivers, forgiveness must be justified by some way to reconceive the offender as deserving forgiveness.

Those who tend towards proactive forgiveness see that they have a duty to reach out to others and forgive. Their considerations might revolve around the following: Will my forgiveness help recreate a sense of community? Will my forgiveness stimulate a kind of renewal that we give to ourselves, as well as offenders? Will my forgiveness motivate the offender’s ethical self-discipline by a release from the negative aspects of punishment, resentment, and clinging to the past?

In the third dimension, people who tend to understand forgiveness as a transaction see the need to interact with the offender. Shriver describes the transaction of forgiveness as follows: “Interchanges of forbearance, repentance, and truth-telling advance a process of forgiveness when they produce new empathy between former enemies.” (p. 160) Those on this side of the continuum may have worries like: Am I justified in forgiving? Is her apology sincere? Am I ready to forgive?

On the other hand, people who tend to understand forgiveness as non-transactional do not see the need to interact with the offender. Benn describes the non-transaction of forgiveness as follows: “Repentance is not a requirement for forgiveness, as forgiveness doesn’t entail the restoration of relationships.” (p. 373) People on this side of the continuum may have the following concerns: What if my forgiveness does not feel like it is helping me heal? What if my forgiveness does not appear to help the offender heal or become a better person?

In the fourth dimension, people, who forgive even in high-risk circumstances, occupy one end of a continuum. They tend to see forgiveness as a lifelong principle, whose goodness is not undermined by being risky or hard to justify. Bishop Tutu describes the risk-taking aspect of forgiveness as follows:

We have been blessed with leaders who were ready to take risks—when you embark on the business of asking for and granting forgiveness, you are taking a risk. In relations between individuals, if you ask another person for forgiveness you may be spurned; the one you have injured may refuse to forgive you. The risk is even greater if you are the injured party, wanting to offer forgiveness. The culprit may be arrogant, obdurate, or blind; not ready or willing to apologize or to ask for forgiveness. (p. 269)

Gregory L. Jones places this risk-taking dimension within the Christian context:

Christian forgiveness involves a high cost, both for God and for those who embody it. It requires the disciplines of dying and rising with Christ, disciplines for which there are no shortcuts, no handy techniques to replace the risk and vulnerability of giving up ‘possession’ of one’s self, which is done through the practices of forgiveness and repentance. (p. 5)

However, those on this side of the continuum may have questions like: Am I going to be perceived as servile if I forgive in an unjustifiable situation? Should I balance my principle with more concern for the consequences of my action?

On the other end of the continuum, people lean toward taking the least amount of risk in forgiving by demanding the strongest justification. Calhoun describes this reduction of risk as follows: “Repentance makes forgiveness risk-free and rational.” (p. 62) Those on this side of the continuum might have the following worries: Am I going to be perceived as hard-hearted or prideful in my reluctance to forgive without adequate justification? Why am I not willing to take more risks on an offender’s moral improvement?

In the fifth dimension, those who tend toward being forgiveness-resistant might have the following worries: Won’t my forgiveness make me vulnerable? How can I live with myself if I let this offense go? On the other hand, those who tend toward being overly-forgiving have a different set of concerns: How can I demand justice when I am hardly a perfect person? Won’t forgiveness be easier on everyone?

Hopeful Future Orientation of Forgiveness

Given all of the questions that I have raised about the uncertainties concerning forgiving, it is important to observe that, in addition to quite natural values conflicts, these uncertainties are largely a function of the hopeful future orientation of forgiveness. In serious offenses, where a perpetrator may offend again, uncertainty arises because we have no way to predict whether the future will confirm the hopes that we have when we forgive. Forgiveness is hopeful future-oriented, even as it is intended to come to grips with the past. For people who feel their forgiveness needs to be fully justified, they are sobered by the observation that only a partial justification can be achieved through the evidence of a perpetrator’s apology, remorse, restitution, or commitment to moral improvement. Only a partial justification can be achieved because forgiveness can never be fully justified when the goodness that comes from it, to a large extent, depends on some, currently inaccessible, future healing, moral improvement or transformation.

In contrast, punishment does not entail this future-contingent risk. When the evidence is sufficiently convincing to show that one has done the crime, then the law determines that one must do the time. The determination of a punishment is justified by evidence that can be examined. Even mercy can be justified by the evidence of the measure of suffering experienced by the perpetrator or his family. There is no such available evidence for the goodness that might come from forgiveness because that goodness is necessarily in the future, where it cannot be examined—it can only be hoped for.

Given the hopeful future-orientation of forgiveness, one’s consideration of forgiveness must necessarily be mapped onto a context of personal and social vulnerability. Such vulnerability arises from the risk, entailed in forgiveness, that it will perceived by an offender as permission to continue offending, rather than an opportunity for a fresh start with a renewed sense of moral improvement. This risk has both personal and social dimensions in that both the victim and society are vulnerable.

The hopeful future orientation of forgiveness means that, in certain cases, we forgive with the faith that it will be for the good, regardless of the lack of evidence to support it, and regardless of the personal and social vulnerability that forgiveness can create. The vulnerability involved in the future efficacy of forgiveness can be mitigated by the justifying power of one’s faith, one’s sense of human perfectibility, and the power of goodness itself. On this account, an extraordinarily strong faith is required to make a leap towards forgiveness when there is insufficient evidence to support that leap and when it entails significant personal and/or social vulnerability.

Interestingly, one considering such forgiveness is pulled in three different directions: Does the evidence justify a leap towards forgiveness? Is the risk low enough to make a leap towards forgiveness justifiable? Is my faith strong enough for such a leap towards forgiveness? There will certainly be times when the evidence is so insufficient or contrary, and the personal and social risks are too high, to support forgiveness that it would seem foolish to forgive. There will be other times when the strength of one’s faith overcomes these worries, and the results are seemingly miraculous. However, judging the efficacy of forgiveness on its positive consequences alone may be missing the point of forgiveness.

It may be that forgiveness offers hope in the future, regardless if that hope is realized in positive consequences.

Forgiveness may be divine precisely because if offers hope without the guarantee of good consequences, with the risk that it may be perceived as permission or license. However, we must be mindful of the cases where forgiveness facilitates unending, inescapably hopeless, patterns of abuse and oppression. We might answer this concern by suggesting that such “forgiveness” is not really hope-filled forgiveness because such “forgiveness” denies the victim’s hope. (Ryan) Therefore, the hopeful future orientation of forgiveness requires that our forgiveness be committed to a future that affirms the hopes of both victim and perpetrator and, in turn, also commits us to a future free of all hopeless patterns of abuse and oppression. Our faith in hope-filled forgiveness is also our faith in a possible world free of hope-destroying patterns of abuse and oppression.

The Forgiveness Commitments Common to Conflict Resolution Practice

Furthering our concern for being sensitive to the function of forgiveness within conflict resolution processes, it is important to observe that conflict resolution processes, themselves, tend to embody turning point, proactive and transactional forgiveness, and may be guilty of exploiting tendencies toward being overly forgiving and overly risk-taking. I am suggesting that conflict resolution processes are not necessarily neutral in these five dimensions.

Let me explain. First, conflict resolution process, such as reconciliation and victim-offender reconciliation, tend to orchestrate a turning point between parties on the basis of a dramatic sense of forgiveness. Victims, whose sense of forgiveness is more incremental, may find themselves uncomfortably pulled into the drama of a fuller forgiveness. The unsettling gravity of this kind of drama is illustrated by South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, where some victims were re-traumatized by the process. (Stein, et al)

Second, conflict resolution processes are proactive because the existence of these processes asserts the importance of actively resolving conflict by entering a dialogic process, as opposed to passively letting some third party determine a conflict’s outcome. This pro-activity toward conflict can easily entail pro-activity toward forgiveness—believing that forgiveness helps recreate community, stimulate renewal, and motivate an offender’s ethical self-discipline.

Thirdly, conflict resolution processes are also transactional because they are necessarily relational; they engage disputants in dialogue, not keeping them privately disengaged. This bias toward addressing conflict relationally easily translates to encouraging relational forgiveness. Conflict resolution processes may seem optional for people who believe more in the notion of non-relational forgiveness. As an example, they may have already forgiven their perpetrator, so why enter a dialogic process? From these considerations, the relational activism inherent within conflict resolution processes assures some degree of bias toward being both proactively and transactionally forgiving.

Fourth, the momentum toward forgiveness, created by the pro-activity and relationality of conflict resolution processes (detailed above), easily creates an expectation that forgiveness is necessary for resolution. Within this context, disputants or victims who tend toward being overly forgiving may experience some pressure to forgive, when this may be the opposite of what they should be doing to escape patterns of oppression and abuse.

Fifth, time limitations of most conflict resolution processes prevent more gradual forms of trust-building. Therefore, these processes tend to push victims to take a risk on their offenders, without overly demanding justification. Some victims might easily feel some reluctance to forgive without sufficient justification, unless they are already predisposed toward this kind of risk-taking.

A Balance Between Therapeutic and Conflict Resolution Work

Now that I have positioned conflict resolution processes within five dimensions of forgiveness, I recommend certain adaptations necessary to avoid unfairly pressuring victims. My first consideration in this adaptive process is for conflict resolvers to embrace healing as the overriding context for forgiveness. For some people, healing is quick—for others, it is slow. For some people, healing is private and personal—for others, it more public and communal. For some, healing requires therapeutic work—for others, it requires spiritual or ethical work.

Within this context, I suggest that (when forgiveness is an issue) we accept that conflict resolution processes are committed toward turning point, proactive, and transactional forgiveness—a more community-centric form of healing—while also accepting that private therapy may be needed for successful incremental, reactive, and non-transactional forgiveness. Next, I suggest that we accept that conflict resolution processes tend to proactively encourage forgiveness rather than avoiding it. Again, private therapy can mitigate potential negative impact that this pro-activity has on the forgiveness-resistant or the overly-forgiving. Finally, I take up the problematic process commitment towards risk-taking forgiveness.

To begin this discussion, it seems helpful to remember that, by forgiving, we are attempting to heal ourselves, our perpetrators, and our community. However, while some people feel that this kind of healing should engage a dramatic turning point, others feel that such healing should involve gradual, incremental steps toward more forgiveness, avoiding any dramatic turning point. This more gradual approach might best occur in a private, therapeutic setting. However, conflict resolution processes could be adapted to more incremental forgiveness by validating incremental steps of forgiveness, and not expecting or scripting a dramatic turning point.

Similarly, some victims find healing within a process of direct engagement with the offender, where there is an interaction of apology and forgiveness. On the other hand, others feel that such healing should be more private and disengaged from the perpetrator. Within this context, transactional forgiveness is a kind of public, dialogic healing; whereas, non-transactional falls more on the private, mono-logic side of healing. For those whose notion of forgiveness is transactional, conflict resolution processes are a nice fit. However, for those whose notion of forgiveness is more non-transactional, conflict resolution processes may seem ill-fitting as currently designed.

Key to this distinction of dialogic vs. mono-logic healing is that, on the one hand, dialogic healing fits conflict resolution processes; on the other hand, mono-logic healing fits the therapeutic setting, where a victim can work privately with a therapist. Given this way of viewing forgiveness processes, it seems that conflict resolvers must be sensitive to the balance between more public, transactional processes between victim and offender, in contrast to non-transactional processes where the victim can heal in private.

This balance is demonstrated within the counseling profession, where couples work is balanced with individual work. In this way, conflict resolvers must be advocates for healing in the same way as therapists. Therefore, it seems to follow that conflict resolution processes that engage forgiveness must be designed to balance transactional and non-transactional healing. This balance might be achieved when victims are encouraged to take up personal healing in a private setting to prevent them from being re-traumatized during any interaction with perpetrators.

Turning to the forgiveness-resistant/overly-forgiving continuum, it is important to note that key concerns, within this dimension of forgiveness, are identity, self-respect, and self-contempt. These are complex notions in themselves. Identities can be driven by healthy self-respect, highly-defended unhealthy self-respect, self-contempt, or combinations of these. Interestingly, people tend to maintain identities, even if they are unhealthy or unpleasant, because a loss of identity threatens important social connections, as well as psychological equilibrium.

Therefore, fundamental identities are not likely to change within the limitations of conflict resolution processes. Consequently, when people are victimized, those identities with highly defended forms of self-respect can feel extremely threatened or unsettled. These people may resist forgiving because such an action is perceived to further undermine one’s identity. People with this kind of defended pride feel a need to separate themselves from perpetrators that are perceived as having a lower status—a status that they desperately do not want to share.

At the other extreme, those people who are victimized, and whose identity is driven by a lack of self-respect or self-contempt, may already perceive themselves as victims; therefore, further victimizing may fit this victim identity all too well. With this dynamic, people who tend toward servility may forgive too easily, without concern for the moral transformation of the perpetrator. They forgive because they perceive their perpetrators as better, more powerful, or both.

In between these two extremes are those with a healthy kind of self-respect. Their attitude about forgiveness is not driven by pride or servility. For them, forgiveness is neither too difficult nor too easy. In contrast to this, victims without healthy self-respect are in particular need of personal therapy; otherwise, their forgiveness, or lack of same, undermines the positive reconciliation sought by conflict resolution processes.

The risk-taking continuum also presents a challenge to the current practice of conflict resolution. Though principled risk-taking, even in unreasonable circumstances, may be ethically laudable, it places the victim at a risk of being too soft-hearted, and being re-traumatized or re-victimized. At the other end of the continuum, those who demand that forgiveness be held to a high standard of reasonability run the risk of being hard-hearted. Again, these concerns seem best addressed by therapists, or ethical or spiritual advisors.

After this review of four of five dimensions of forgiveness, we can conclude that a balance between therapeutic work and conflict resolution work is a key to addressing the diversity of views and needs of victims. From this review, it seems evident that the commitments of conflict resolution processes need to be balanced with therapeutic options.

An Obligation to Forgive?

In the following, I address the proactive/reactive dimension and how it is problematized by the turning point/incremental forgiveness dimension. Additionally, reactive forgiveness presents conflict resolvers with an ethical dilemma: are victims shirking their responsibility to rebuild community by not being more proactive? These explorations raise additional concerns for conflict resolvers beyond the problem of providing a careful therapy/resolution balance.

Just as proactive forgiveness processes can place undue pressure on servile victims to forgive, proactive forgiveness processes can place too much pressure on incremental forgivers to become turning-point forgivers. It seems to me that the solution to this dilemma is for conflict resolution processes to become more flexible, so that they can embrace both turning-point forgivers and incremental forgivers. This adaptation would require that different expectations be built into the conflict resolution process. As it is now, these processes tend to embody the turning-point drama, where after a set of conditions are met (typically including apologies), forgiveness becomes the turning point away from resentment and towards reconciliation.

Therefore, a change in forgiveness expectations would require the drama of these processes to be re-scripted, so that there is no necessary turning point, but rather an acceptance of the incremental level of forgiveness that the victim is able to reasonably achieve. In addition to this adaptation towards incremental forgiveness, conflict resolution processes should also be balanced with therapeutic processes (as in the other dimensions), so that victims can heal, and consequently, be able to forgive at the highest reasonable level.

Just as proactive conflict resolution processes tend to be committed to turning point forgiveness, it is also important to recognize that such processes have a commitment to proactive forgiveness because they are essentially reconciliation processes whose goal is to recreate community. As Bishop Tutu says:

True forgiveness deals with the past (all of the past) to make the future possible. We have to accept that what we do for generations past, present, and yet to come. That is what makes a community a community or a people a people—for better or worse. (278)

As reconciliation processes, they often depend on a reconciling forgiveness, avoiding the reconciling-avoidant aspects of reactive forgiveness. If we think of these proactive conflict resolution processes as being, at least partly, motivated by an aspiration to recreate a sense of community through a kind of renewal that we give to ourselves and/or others, and that can motivate improved ethical self-discipline by releasing us from the negative aspects of punishment, resentment, and clinging to the past, and if we think of proactive forgiveness as having this exact definition, then we can easily see how such proactive forgiveness is integral to reconciliation processes. However, there is a difficulty with this line of thought: forgiveness can mean such different things to different people, how can we base important processes upon one single definition of it?

A key illustration of this difficulty is to focus on victims who do not aspire to the communitarian goals of proactive forgiveness. These victims may consider forgiveness as one of a set of possible reactions to injustice. Alternatively, they might choose litigation, personal vengeance, passive aggression, or choose to ignore the situation completely. If these people somehow become engaged in the reconciliation work of a conflict resolution process, they may feel that such work violates the role that they see forgiveness playing within their lives. How should conflict resolvers address this disjunction?

To answer this question, I suggest that the first step is to accept reconciliation as the normal and proper role for most conflict resolution processes. This commitment enables these processes to do important community-building work. However, these processes also need to accommodate victims with differing conceptions of forgiveness. One way to characterize such difference is the proactive/reactive continuum.

I suggest that conflict resolvers carefully screen their clients to understand where they fall on this continuum. Reactive forgivers must not feel overly pressured into reconciliation processes; otherwise their autonomy and mental health may be compromised. Another way to ensure that their autonomy is being respected is to occasionally check to see how they are adapting to a reconciliation process, and that they are afforded a reasonably easy exit from that process, if desired.

Where therapy is an alternative to help those who lean toward non-transactional forgiveness or the extremes of pride and servility (as well as the extremes of risk-taking), those who lean toward reactive forgiveness may have ethical issues that need to be attended to, in addition to therapeutic issues. Their anger and reluctance to reconcile may be driven by a lack of moral strength. As social creatures, we have a certain moral obligation to nurture and recreate community. Reconciliation, following conflict, victimization, and the misuse of power, is a prime opportunity to do this kind of ethical work. Certainly, it is not just up to victims to carry this burden; perpetrators should always bear the heaviest burden. In addition, we should not expect victims or perpetrators to carry their respective burdens alone. Conflict resolvers, therapists, ethicists, and other supporters also play crucial roles to enable all parties to productively reconcile.

However, it seems that, when victims and perpetrators have the emotional and moral strength, their participation is crucial for community-building to proceed. Authentic community-building cannot be done entirely by proxy—by those not directly involved in a victimization or traumatic conflict—though there are times when community-building and forgiveness processes may be powerfully done by proxy. To attend to the moral obligation to at least incrementally forgive for the sake of community-building, victims need the support, encouragement and advice of ethicists or spiritual counselors, as long as such activity does not put the victim in further harm’s way.

Underlying this thinking is the supposition that we are obliged to forgive. The problem of whether forgiveness is an obligation, or purely voluntary, is greatly debated. I think that it is much easier to conceive of an obligation to forgive if it is not considered to be an absolute moral obligation, where one must turn from unforgiveness to complete forgiveness in one dramatic leap. Ironically, the dramatic turning-point conception of forgiveness makes it impossible to pose it as any kind of obligation because this kind of drama does not fit many instances of injustice and abuse. Under the turning-point conception, forgiveness becomes a dramatic gift that is more of a grand display of an enormous generosity than an obligation that could be thought as obligatory, to some degree, in most every case of injustice and abuse. Rather, I suggest that the incremental conception of forgiveness is one that is, in most cases, obligatory because it usually fits cases appropriately.

To be clear about this sort of obligation, it can be compared to other obligatory virtues. Just as we are obliged to have a certain measure of courage, temperance, modesty, etc., we are not obliged to act in ways beyond our capacities. In other words, in any given situation, we do not have to be absolutely forgiving, just as in any given situation; we do not have to be absolutely courageous, temperate, or modest. As an illustration, all that is possible is that we be courageous enough to call 911, temperate enough to avoid panic, while giving directions to emergency personnel, and modest enough to avoid taking undue credit for our role in a rescue. If we are the victims of a heinous crime, perhaps it is enough to expect that we be sufficiently forgiving enough to resist violent revenge and debilitating resentment—but never forgiving enough to reconcile with our abuser, rapist or torturer.

Using the incremental conception of forgiveness as our base, we can construct an obligation to rebuild community by whatever measures of forgiveness that victims can manage, with support from family, friends, therapists, ethicists, and spiritual advisors. Given such an obligation for victims to engage in community-building by proactively forgiving within their capacity, we have a justification for a kind of forgiveness that is much less dramatic than usually conceived.

To summarize the work of this paper, I have suggested five different assessments so that conflict resolvers can ensure that their processes are sensitive to victims varying conceptions of forgiveness. I have also examined the commitments that conflict resolution processes tend to have when they engage forgiveness. These commitments seem reasonable for victims when appropriately balanced with personal therapeutic, ethical, or spiritual work. I suggest that the key commitment of conflict resolution practices is their pro-activity, where an incremental conception of forgiveness is understood as obligatory because victims are in a unique and powerful position to help restore and rebuild community.

Questions:

1. What is the mediation bias regarding forgiveness?

The mainstream practice of mediation expects that people be proactive in coming to mediation to resolve conflicts. This assumed proactivity seems to rule out a process where forgiveness and atonement could occur in a more reactive way, such as having the court system impose a process on the wrongdoer.

Also, this style of mediation assumes that there will be a measure of turning-point forgiveness, so that the construction of a restorative agreement can be made. Turning-point forgiveness seems to rule out a longer form of incremental forgiveness.

2. How do forgiveness and atonement help self-reinvention?

Both victims and victimizers can easily get stuck in these identities. A forgiveness/atonement process can help people get unstuck from these roles, and help them move forward with more positive identities.

3. How do forgiveness and atonement help with trauma and moral injury recovery?

Victims can experience ongoing trauma (post-traumatic stress disorder). Victimizers can experience ongoing moral injury (believing their identity most always remain as a morally bad person. The potential for starting reinvention through the forgiveness/atonement process can help both victims and victimizers begin to recover from trauma and moral injury.

References

Benn, P. (1996). Forgiveness and loyalty. Philosophy, 71, 277.

Calhoun, C. (1992). Changing one’s heart. Ethics, 103.

Dillon, R.S. (2001). Self-forgiveness and self-respect. Ethics, 112, 53-83.

Flanigan, B. (1992). Forgiving the unforgivable. New York: Collier Books.

Jones, G.L. (1995). Embodying forgiveness: a theological analysis. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans.

Ryan, C. (n.d.) Thinking about the unforgivable. Unpublished.

Shriver Jr., D. (2002). Forgiveness: a bridge across abysses of revenge. In R.G. Helmick, & R.L. Petersen, Forgiveness and reconciliation: religion, public policy and conflict transformation. Radnor, Pennsylvania: Templeton Foundation.

Stein, D.J. (2008). The impact of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission on psychological distress and forgiveness in South Africa. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 43, 462-468.

Tutu, D. (2000). No future without forgiveness. New York: Doubleday.