Loss is a fundamental human condition that often leads both individuals and groups to seek redress in the form of violence. But are there possible modes of redress to reckon with loss that might lead to a departure from the violence of collective and individual revenge? This book focuses on the redress of political crime in Germany and Lebanon, extending its analysis to questions of accountability and democratization in the United States and elsewhere. To understand the proposed modes of redress, John Borneman links the way the actors define their injuries to the cultural forms of redress these injuries assume and to the social contexts in which they are open to refiguring. Borneman theorizes modes of accountability, the meaning of "regime change" and the American occupation of Iraq, and the mechanisms of democratic authority in Europe and North America.

Reflections on politics, loss, and reconciliation in Europe and the Middle East

About the Author

John Borneman is Professor of Anthropology at Princeton University. His books include Belonging in the Two Berlins: Kin, State, Nation and Syrian Episodes: Sons, Fathers, and an Anthropologist in Aleppo.

Reviews

Loss is a fundamental human condition that often leads both individuals and groups to seek redress in the form of violence . . . This book focuses on the redress of political crime in Germany and Lebanon, extending its analysis to questions of accountability and democratization in the United States and elsewhere. Feb. 2014

* Allegra *

John Borneman's book provides a series of thoughtful and wide-ranging reflections on ethics and politics, drawing on scholarship in anthropology, social and political theory, and psychoanalysis, as well as extensive ethnographic fieldwork. . . . Expansive in scope, each essay is clearly written and insightful, and will appeal to a wide range of scholars concerned with issues of memory, accountability, democratization, and international geopolitics, as well as the histories and politics of Europe and the Middle East.

* Intl Jrnl Middle East Studies *

[T]his is an engaging, often idiosyncratic, and consistently provocative collection of essays.

* PoLAR *

[This]book . . . is highly relevant to a number of regional and investigative arenas, including psychological and political anthropology, as well as history, gender, and the study of violence, trauma, and reconciliation. In also seeking to bring classic anthropology into conversation with critical forms of contemporaneous anthropology, the book also serves as an example for the continuing relevance of anthropology in public and international debates.

* American Ethnologist *

Borneman has produced an important book, and his discussion of modes of accountability and their significance in assessing and comparing political crimes and their ongoing memory is very useful.

* H-Memory *



Book Information
ISBN 9780253223517
Author John Borneman
Format Paperback
Page Count 262
Imprint Indiana University Press
Publisher Indiana University Press
Weight(grams) 431g