Reducing Political Violence: Narrative Accounts of Crime and Harm

Reducing Political Violence: Narrative, Critique, and Criminology demonstrates the significance of complex narrative representations to the criminological concern with the control, reduction, and prevention of ideologically motivated violence. Drawing on the philosophical tradition of aesthetic education, which began in the Romantic era and diversified into Marxist, pragmatic, analytic, and poststructural strands at the end of the 20th century, the author sets out a compelling theory of the relationships among the aesthetic, the ethical, and the political.

Aesthetic education is then applied to a selection of literary and documentary narratives, which range from military memoirs to political polemics, late modern novels, journalistic exposés, and academic biographies, and include the notorious Devil’s Guard (1971), Islamic State propaganda, a Nobel laureate’s novel, and the most comprehensive account of literary theorist Paul De Man’s controversial life. The conclusion is that complex narratives can serve at least four criminological purposes: revealing techniques of neutralisation, performing their own fictionality, and providing both partial and complete solutions to contemporary social problems.

Written in an accessible and engaging style, this book is for everyone interested in crimes against humanity, terrorism, insurgency, war, and the question of why healthy societies need good narratives.