Making Amends: Atonement in Morality, Law, and Politics

255 Pages·2009·0.58 MB·English

by  Linda Radzik

Making Amends
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Making Amends
linda radzik Atonement in Morality, Law,
and Politics
1
2009
1
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Radzik, Linda, 1970–
Making amends : atonement in morality, law, and politics / Linda Radzik.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN978-0-19-537366-0
1. Responsibility. 2. Atonement. 3. Reparation (Criminal justice) 4. Restitution.
5. Reconciliation. 6. Restorative justice. 7. penance. I. Title.
BJ1451.R332009
170––dc22 2008029039
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
For my parents, Leo and Margie Radzik
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acknowledgments
I
n2004–2005 I was the fortunate recipient of a fellowship from the Alexander
von Humboldt Foundation, which supported this work. At a conference
of Humboldt fellows held in June, 2005, I learned that the foundation itself
and its support for international cooperation among scholars is meant to be
a form of amends for the perversion of science and scholarship that took
place under the Nazi regime. I hope that this work honors the spirit of that
project.
I owe many thanks to Professor Otfried Höffe at the Eberhard Karls
U niversität in Tübingen, Germany, for his hospitality, wisdom, and encour-
agement during my fellowship year. A faculty development leave from Texas
A&M University enabled me to accept the fellowship. The GlasscockCenter
for Humanities Research at Texas A&M also provided fi nancial support
and lively audiences for this work. I was a visiting faculty member at the
University of Minnesota when I fi rst conceived this project, and I benefi ted
greatly from my interactions with the students and faculty, especially the
3M reading group. Colleen Murphy and Christopher Bennett both com-
mented on signifi cant portions of the manuscript, and I am very grateful for
their help. For their input, support, and encouragement over the life of this
project I also offer sincere thanks to Ashley Currier, Norman Dahl, Susan
Egenolf, Marian Eide, Elisabeth Ellis, Daniel E. Farnham, Theodore George,
Heather J. Gert, Richard J. Golsan, Michael Hand, Thomas E. Hill Jr., Gerry
J ohnstone, Jacquelyn Ann Kegley, Katherine Kelly, Pamela E. Klassen,
Avery Kolers, Michael LeBuffe, Shaun Longstreet, John W. Marshall, John J.
McDermott, Geoffrey Sayre McCord, Prudence Rose, Roger Sansom, David
Schmidtz, Robin Smith, Daniel Van Ness, Gary Varner, and Joan Wolf.
Special thanks and love go to Robert R. Shandley, my partner in all of life’s
adventures, philosophy included. He discussed every aspect of this project
with me over and over again, at all hours and through every wild change in
my mood. His patience and good sense were invaluable. Our daughter, Mary
Shandley, shared her keen sense of fairness with me and kept me from making
at least one major mistake. I look forward to even more help from her as she
enters second grade. This book is dedicated to my parents, Leo and Margie
Radzik, who gave me the opportunity to be a student and the confi dence to
be a teacher.
Some of the material in the book is drawn from essays I have published
previously. Parts of chapters 2 and 4 appeared in “Making Amends,” American
Philosophical Quarterly 41, no. 2 (2004): 141–54. Portions of chapter 5 are
drawn from “Do Wrongdoers Have a Right to Make Amends?” Social Theory
and Practice29, no. 2 (2003):325–41. Most of chapter 6 and part of chapter 1
appeared as “Offenders, the Making of Amends, and the State,” in Gerry
Johnstone and Daniel W. Van Ness, eds., The Handbook of Restorative Justice
(Portland, Ore.: Willan, 2007), 192–207. I thank the publishers for their
permission to use this work.
viii | acknowledgments
contents
chapter one An Ethic for Wrongdoers 3
chapter two Repaying Moral Debts: Self-Punishment
and Restitution 25
chapter three Changing One’s Heart, Changing the Past:
Repentance and Moral Transformation 55
chapter four Reforming Relationships: The Reconciliation
Theory of Atonement 75
chapter fi ve Forgiveness, Self-Forgiveness, and
Redemption 111
chapter six Making Amends for Crime: Restorative Justice
and the Liberal State 153
chapter seven Collective Atonement: Making Amends to the
Magdalen Penitents 175
Notes 199
Bibliography 231
Index 241