Violence Essay ⋆ Essays on Controversial Topics ⋆ EssayEmpire

Violence is an injurious force exerted to cause damage to people or things. Shaped by a multitude of social, political, and economic forces within families, neighborhoods, nation-states, and the broader international community, violence is a complex problem related to patterns of thinking and behavior. It embodies an expression of power often used to demonstrate authority or repression, or to persuade others to behave in particular ways. Also characterizing violence is an element of intent by its perpetrator. Intention is obvious in physical forms of violence but is minimally evident or even nonexistent in its structural or symbolic forms. Finally, discussions about violence often take on a moral tone, classifying it as just or unjust.

Violence, therefore, is an amorphous phenomenon that defies easy categorization as it surfaces in numerous shapes. Still, it is useful to consider three broad forms: physical, structural, and symbolic. This entry describes all three formations of violence but focuses upon physical violence as a social problem.

Three Forms of Violence

Physical violence is the material manifestation of harmful aggression with the intent to injure others. Examples include beating, burning, bombing, torturing, raping, or shooting. Violent occurrences characterized as social problems include wars, homicides, suicides, school shootings, production and sale of weapons, capital punishment, terrorism, sexual assault, and domestic violence such as child abuse and wife beating. Under the umbrella of physical violence, three nuanced typologies exist: self-directed, interpersonal, and collective violence. Self-directed violence includes self-mutilation and suicide. Interpersonal violence is violence manifested between individuals or communities, whether known to one another or not. Collective violence is the instrumental use of force by people who self-identify as members of a particular group who oppose another group. In such a case, they engage in violence to achieve political, economic, or social objectives. Examples include armed conflicts between states, genocides, and terrorism.

Structural violence refers to economic and political structures that constrain human capabilities. This type of violence is often called the violence of hunger, poverty, or humiliation. While not directly imposing manifestations of physical force, structural violence involves policies and institutions that indirectly cause harm and constrain opportunities for individuals or groups. An example of structural violence is a World Bank/International Monetary Fund policy called “structural adjustment,” which did not directly mandate physical force against people but did impose regulations on governments. These policies constrained access to lifesaving social services for millions of civilians living in developing countries.

Symbolic violence is the imposition of perceptions and groupings of thought upon a marginalized social agent who accepts this social order as just, thereby perpetuating the dominant structures. An example of symbolic violence is gender inequity. Specifically, symbolic violence is at play when a woman sees it as her role to take on an unequal share of burdensome work. Yet in her actions, she is also upholding an economy that men dominate.

Violence as a Social Problem

As a social problem, violence is pervasive globally. More than 1.6 million people die every year from violence. In addition, the wake of violence causes injury to millions more and has numerous health, social, and economic consequences. The harmful effects of violence on health include physical symptoms such as bruises and serious brain injuries, psychological consequences such as depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, and behavioral consequences such as alcohol and drug abuse. Social consequences of violence include strained relationships and social isolation, which can impact school performance and employment opportunities. Violence also places a sizeable burden on economies through exorbitant health care and legal costs as well as lost productivity.

Increasingly, people perceive violence as a public health concern because of its related physical, sexual, reproductive, and mental health ramifications. In some countries, health care expenditures due to violence have accounted for up to 5 percent of the gross domestic product. Yet violence cannot be understood solely in terms of its physical and material scars. It also involves serious assaults on the dignity of people and has the potential to create a pervasive sense of insecurity and fear.

According to the World Health Organization, of the more than 1.6 million fatal victims of violence worldwide in 2000, nearly one third (520,000) were homicides, about half (815,000) were suicides, and an estimated 310,000 (19 percent) died as a direct result of war. The highest rates of homicide exist among men ages 15 to 44 years, mostly from low- and middle-income countries, and the highest suicide rates are among men age 60 years and over.

Often associated with its liberal gun policies, U.S. homicide rates are particularly high when compared with homicide rates in other industrialized countries. Every day, more than 80 Americans die from gun violence. Nevertheless, the U.S. homicide rate is still lower than in most developing nations.

Violence and Conflict

When a conflict arises—whether between individuals or groups—a social actor can choose to avoid or engage in the conflict nonviolently or violently. A social actor may choose to take up arms to defeat his or her opponent. In this sense, violence is an offensive strategy for asserting and gaining power. Violence can also be a defensive strategy, a behavior conducted to protect oneself, allies, and/or property in the face of acute aggression. In this manner, violence is utilized to neutralize the encroaching enemy. Overall, violence has led to an estimated 191 million lives lost directly or indirectly as a result of conflict in the 20th century, over half of them civilians.

The Importance of Understanding Violence

Violence has been central to defining and characterizing the social world. Max Weber defined a nation-state as the legitimate monopolization on the use of physical force or violence within a given territory. Thomas Hobbes argued that humans in a state of nature had a right to everything in the world, which justified the use of violence against everybody else. Yet, in the interest of personal survival, humans renounced this right to use violence and instead respected the authority of a state (with its monopoly on violence) to maintain peace.

The role of violence in the record of human history is disputed. Some scholars assert that humans are innately violent and violence has always been part of the human condition. Others point to archaeological evidence that suggests that violence is a more novel aspect of humanity, taking a prominent role only when war became a regular practice after the transition to sedentary existence (around 6000 BCE).

Experts maintain that violence is regenerative, that it can give birth to itself. Perpetrators of violence such as child abusers often were victims of violence themselves. Revolutionary militants who overthrow repressive dictators often exercise violence later to command obedience of the populace. This notion that “violence begets violence” is critical to effectively planning and implementing various violence prevention programs and policies.

Violence Prevention

Individuals and collectives invest in violence prevention to reduce both the likelihood of violent occurrences and their harmful ramifications. Unfortunately, these efforts often only become a concern after the violence has already occurred. The Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict identified several factors that put states at risk of violent conflict: (a) lack of democratic processes, (b) gross social inequalities, (c) control of valuable natural resources by a single group, and (d) rapid demographic changes that surpass a state’s capacity to provide services to the populace. Monitoring states for these factors and taking action to curb them if they arise are helpful contributions to diminishing the prevalence of violence.

Other forms of violence prevention include encouraging healthy behaviors and attitudes in individuals through therapy programs and psychological support. Violence prevention can also be part of training on conflict resolution, active communication, and relationship building. Finally, some seek to prevent violence by instituting various policies that address the social and economic forces leading to violence. The 2002 World Health Organization report on violence and health offered the following succinct recommendations for violence prevention: (1) create, implement, and monitor a national action plan for violence prevention; (2) enhance capacity for collecting data on violence; (3) define priorities for, and support research on, the causes, consequences, costs, and prevention of violence; (4) promote primary prevention responses; (5) strengthen responses for victims of violence; (6) integrate violence prevention into social and educational policies, and thereby promote gender and social equality; (7) increase collaboration and exchange of information on violence prevention; (8) promote and monitor adherence to international treaties, laws, and other mechanisms to protect human rights; and (9) seek practical, internationally agreed responses to the global drug trade and the global arms trade.

Bibliography:

Bourdieu, Pierre and Wacquant, Loic. 2004. “Symbolic Violence.” Pp. 272-74 in Violence in War and Peace: An Anthology, edited by N. Scheper-Hughes and P. Bourgois. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
Galtung, Johan. 1969. “Violence, Peace, and Peace Research.” Journal of Peace Research 6(1):167-91.
“On Nonviolence & Violence.” 2007. Special Issue of Daedalus: Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences 136(1).
Scheper-Hughes, Nancy and Philippe Bourgois. 2004. Violence in War and Peace: An Anthology. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
World Health Organization. 2002. “World Report on Violence and Health.” Retrieved March 27, 2017 (http://www.who.int/violence_injury_prevention/violence/world_report/en/).
World Health Organization. 2007. “Third Milestones for a Global Health Campaign for Violence Prevention Report, 2007: Scaling Up.” Retrieved March 27, 2017 (http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/43671/1/9789241595476_eng.pdf).

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