Humanity : A Moral History of the Twentieth Century

by Jonathan Glover

• ISBN13: 9780300087154
• ISBN10: 0300087152
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 2001-08-11
• Publisher: Yale University Press

Summary

This important book confronts the brutal history of the 20th century to unravel the psychological mystery of why so many atrocities occurred--the Holocaust, Hiroshima, the Gulag, Cambodia, Yugoslavia, Rwanda, and others--and how we can prevent their reoccurrence.

Author Biography

Jonathan Glover is director of the Centre of Medical Law and Ethics at King's College, London.

Table of Contents

Preface	ix
Acknowledgements	xi
Never Such Innocence Again	1	(10)
PART ONE ETHICS WITHOUT THE MORAL LAW
Nietzsche's Challenge	11	(7)
Self-interest as a Restraint	18	(4)
The Moral Resources: Humanity	22	(4)
The Moral Resources: Moral Identity	26	(5)
The Festival of Cruelty	31	(9)
Answering Nietzsche	40	(7)
PART TWO THE MORAL PSYCHOLOGY OF WAGING WAR
Close Combat	47	(11)
The Case of My Lai	58	(6)
The Shift to Killing at a Distance	64	(5)
Bombing	69	(20)
Hiroshima	89	(24)
War and the Moral Resources	113	(6)
PART THREE TRIBALISM
Rwanda	119	(4)
The Tribal Trap	123	(10)
The Political Containment of Tribalism	133	(8)
The Roots of Tribal Conflict	141	(8)
The Capacity to Unchain Ourselves	149	(6)
PART FOUR WAR AS A TRAP
The Trap of the Trenches	155	(10)
The Home Front	165	(12)
The Stone Has Started to Roll: 1914	177	(23)
Sliding Out of the Trap: 1962	200	(24)
Ways Out	224	(13)
PART FIVE BELIEF AND TERROR: STALIN AND HIS HEIRS
In Those Years	237	(4)
The Trap of Terror	241	(11)
Belief: Ends and Means	252	(5)
Stalinism and the Moral Resources	257	(8)
The Working of the Belief System	265	(9)
Stalinism, Truth and Moral Identity	274	(9)
Mao's Utopian Project	283	(16)
Overturning the Basket: Cambodia	299	(11)
Utopia and Belief	310	(7)
PART SIX THE WILL TO CREATE MANKIND ANEW: THE NAZI EXPERIMENT
The Core of Nazism	317	(11)
Obedience and Conformity	328	(9)
The Attack on Humanity	337	(12)
The Erosion of Moral Identity	349	(6)
The Nazi Moral Identity	355	(5)
The Willingness to Believe	360	(5)
Philosophers	365	(14)
Bystanders	379	(15)
Interpreting the Nazi Episode	394	(7)
PART SEVEN ON THE RECENT MORAL HISTORY OF HUMANITY
Some People and Not Others	401	(4)
Ethics Humanized	405	(6)
Epilogue: The Past Alive in the Present	411	(4)
References	415	(33)
Sources and Acknowledgements	448	(3)
Index	451