Power and Innocence A Search for the Sources of Violence

by May, Rollo

• ISBN13: 9780393317039
• ISBN10: 039331703X
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1998-03-17
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

Rollo May defines power as the ability to cause or prevent change; innocence, on the other hand, is the conscious divesting of one's power to make it seem a virtuea form of powerlessness that Dr. May sees as particularly American in nature. From these basic concepts he suggests a new ethic that sees power as the basis for both human goodness and evil. Dr. May discusses five levels of power's potential in each of us: the infant's power to be; self-affirmation, the ability to survive with self-esteem; self-assertion, which develops when self-affirmation is blocked; aggression, a reaction to thwarted assertion; and, finally, violence, when reason and persuasion are ineffective.

Table of Contents

Preface	13	(6)
Part I	19	(62)
ONE Madness and Powerlessness	19	(28)
1. Powerlessness Corrupts	23	(4)
2. Madness and Society	27	(5)
3. Powerlessness and Drugs	32	(3)
4. The Cry for Significance	35	(5)
5. The Argument of This Book	40	(7)
TWO Innocence and the End of an Era	47	(18)
1. The Greening and the Parching of America	50	(7)
2. Other Forms of Innocence	57	(8)
THREE Language: The First Casualty	65	(16)
1. The Distruct of Words	68	(4)
2. Obscenity and Violence	72	(2)
3. Words and Symbols	74	(1)
4. Words and Experience	75	(6)
Part II	81	(118)
FOUR Black and Impotent: The Life of Mercedes	81	(18)
1. The Missing Anger	84	(6)
2. The Rites of Rebirth	90	(3)
3. Violence as Life-destroying and Life-giving	93	(6)
FIVE The Meaning of Power	99	(22)
1. Defining Power	99	(3)
2. Power and the Intellectuals	102	(3)
3. Kinds of Power	105	(8)
A. Exploitative	105	(1)
B. Manipulative	106	(1)
C. Competitive	107	(2)
D. Nutrient	109	(1)
E. Integrative	109	(4)
4. Power and Love	113	(8)
SIX The Power to Be	121	(26)
1. Origins of Power in Childhood	123	(3)
2. The Life of Oliver	126	(11)
3. Self-Affirmation	137	(5)
4. Self-Assertion	142	(5)
SEVEN Aggression	147	(18)
1. The Meaning of Aggression	148	(4)
2. Varieties of Aggression	152	(2)
3. The Psychology of Aggression	154	(2)
4. Destructive Aggression	156	(2)
5. Constructive Aggression	158	(7)
EIGHT Ecstasy and Violence	165	(16)
1. Violence in Literature	170	(2)
2. Ecstasy in War	172	(6)
3. The Search for Recognition	178	(3)
NINE The Anatomy of Violence	181	(18)
1. The Psychoneurological Aspects of Violence	182	(4)
2. Varieties of Violence	186	(1)
3. Destructive Violence	187	(4)
4. Constructive Violence	191	(8)
Part III	199	(62)
TEN Innocence and Murder	199	(20)
1. The Tragic Day at Kent State	201	(2)
2. The Guardsmen	203	(2)
3. Billy Budd's Tragic Flaw	205	(6)
4. Virgins and Dragons	211	(8)
ELEVEN The Humanity of the Rebel	219	(22)
1. Civilization Needs the Rebel	222	(3)
2. Rebel and Society: A Dialectic	225	(6)
3. The Artist as Rebel	231	(4)
4. The Limits of the Rebel	235	(6)
TWELVE Toward New Community	241	(20)
1. Farewell to Innocence	241	(4)
2. "If I could have found my tongue"	245	(4)
3. Love and Power	249	(4)
4. Toward a New Ethic	253	(8)
Notes	261	(14)
Index	275