Book cover for Wrońska & Stern (eds.) (2024). Taken from the Routledge catalogue.

Routledge, 2024.

ISBN: 9781032471693, Hbk.

ISBN: 9781003386100, eBook. 

RRP: £145.00 / £39.99, 238pp.

(This article is part of a series of blog posts from authors in a collection, Defending the value of education as a public good [2024], edited by Katarzyna Wrońska & Julian Stern). 

My chapter, ‘The Educational Dimension of Acts of Political Forgiveness’, published in Defending the Value of Education as a Public Good (edited by Wrońska & Stern), explores the meaning of acts of political forgiveness. The most famous words in this realm – ‘No future without forgiveness’ – were spoken by Desmond Tutu, encapsulating the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Throughout history, every nation and society has faced great atrocities and injustices. There have been attempts to overcome such crises with acts of political forgiveness. For instance, after the Second World War, the bishops of the Catholic Church in Poland addressed their German counterparts with the words, ‘We forgive and ask for forgiveness’. This line was interpreted as being spoken on behalf of the entire Polish nation (over 95 percent of the population identified as Catholic) and directed towards the German people, who were responsible for the war’s atrocities. Reflecting on the phenomenon of political forgiveness in my chapter, I argue that it represents a kind of victim-oriented education. Several considerations lead me to this conclusion.

Firstly, even though acts of political forgiveness are termed ‘forgiveness’, they should not be understood in the same sense as personal forgiveness. To forgive is a personal decision. It involves the inner transformation of victims who, rather than harbouring grief, anger, and hatred, adopt an attitude of goodwill towards perpetrators. The utterance of forgiveness by a representative of the victims does not necessarily bring about such a transformation in all members of the affected group. Thus, acts of political forgiveness are sometimes more akin to a pardon; perpetrators are relieved of the need to face punishment by those in positions of authority, even if individual victims continue to carry negative attitudes for them.

Secondly, the harm experienced by victims has a dimension that is often overlooked but crucial for their lives and well-being. It is commonly emphasised that victims lose something valuable and that the perpetrators’ actions violate their dignity. However, less attention is paid to the intrinsic effects of the evil experienced, such as the emergence of feelings that foster a desire for revenge and hinder cooperation between victims and perpetrators in building a shared future. This may lead victims to adopt perspectives they would not otherwise wish to embrace, ultimately transforming them into individuals they do not want to become. Therefore, forgiveness is essential for victims to overcome these internal consequences of experiencing harm.

Thirdly, analysing the content of acts of political forgiveness reveals that their authors (the wronged) ‘speak’ to those who have endured similar experiences. They aim to encourage fellow victims to look to the future with hope and adopt attitudes that will facilitate the construction of a world better than the one in which they have experienced death, violence, pain, and suffering. For these authors or individuals in positions of authority, forgiveness is not about forgetting or renouncing emotions related to past events. Rather, it is about relinquishing the desire for revenge and embarking on the difficult journey of cooperating with the perpetrators to build a more peaceful future for their children and grandchildren. The authors of acts of political forgiveness seek to redirect the gaze of those who have suffered away from the past and towards the future. Sometimes, they focus on next generations; in other cases, they employ different points of reference. For example, Desmond Tutu encouraged black South Africans to commit forgiveness in order to realise Nelson Mandela’s vision of a state built by people of all colours.

After analysing these acts, my chapter argues that their primary audience is not the perpetrators but the victims, who are encouraged to face the challenge of forgiveness. Paradoxically, it is they, as the wronged, who can lay the foundations for a just society.

In exploring the educational dimension of acts of political forgiveness, my thesis contradicts the central argument of the book. While other authors contend that education, as a public good, should remain free from political influence, I argue that political authorities should recognise the educational implications of their decisions and consider how those decisions can contribute to the development of the members of the social groups they represent.

Reference:

Wrońska, K., and Stern, J. (eds) (2024) Defending the Value of Education as a Public Good: Philosophical Dialogues on Education and the State.  London and New York: Routledge.