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Victims, Resistance, and Civilized Oppression

Jean Harvey

Introduction

When we think of resisting oppression, we think first of events like the rescue of Danish Jews by their fellow citizens when they were about to be deported to death camps. More than 6000 were ferried to safety in Sweden. Fewer than 500 were captured. This event displays the features we expect to find in a paradigm case of resistance: the oppressors are clearly “the enemy” in that they clearly intend serious harm, even death, to the victims and cannot reasonably claim to be unaware of this; the resistance involves many people united in a common cause; it is aimed directly at thwarting a violently oppressive action; and it constitutes an act of transparent rebellion against the oppressive regime. It also displays features we first think of as desirable. It succeeded in two key respects: those involved did indeed save thou- sands of lives and did so in a way that clearly conveyed the defiance of the Danish people for the Nazis and their worldview. The cases we think of as paradigms of resistance are often the dramatic ones, like the example given above.

Such eye-catching cases prompt several plausible beliefs about oppression in general and therefore resistance in general, but there are dangers in generalizing from these situations to ones where less obvious forms of oppression are at work, both with respect to the analysis of oppression and resistance and also with respect to the moral claims that can plausibly be supported. In fact, “oppression in general” is an uneasy phrase, since it takes significantly different forms,1 some of which pose their own special problems. There are various ways in which to categorize forms of oppression and in this article I will consider what I have earlier called “civilized oppression” (where neither violence nor the use of law is involved).2 What seem central features in paradigm cases of resisting violent oppression often do not hold here and the nature of such oppression poses special challenges with respect to resistance. I will argue that resistance here can and sometimes should take some non-standard forms that would be morally ill-suited to situations where vicious oppression occurs. Ultimately what grounds the moral claims I make goes beyond an assessment of the actions per se. I anchor them in a conception of the moral relations that should hold between the individuals in the situation, relations that are strikingly different from what is morally called for in cases where violent oppression occurs. To keep even these goals manageable, I will focus primarily on issues to do with victims of civilized oppression and their prima facie obligations to resist.

JOURNAL of SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY, Vol. 41 No. 1, Spring 2010, 13–27. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Civilized Oppression

When resisting violent oppression we aim to be effective in one or both of two ways: either in reducing the oppression or in sending a clear message of rebellion to the oppressors. Dramatic cases of resistance have a lot to do with dramatic activism. In her recent book, Analyzing Oppression, Ann Cudd emphasizes this when claiming that

A person or group resists only when they act in a way that could result in lessening oppression or sending a message of revolt or outrage to someone. My account does not categorize as resistance cases where the only ones witnessing the action are incapable of receiving a message and there is no lessening of oppression.3

All oppression is systematic: victims are repeatedly mistreated, whether the oppression is violent or not. The more brutal the oppression, the more securely victims realize that they are being systematically wronged, yet even here victims (e.g., battered spouses) sometimes excuse their oppressors and blame themselves. Their accounts reveal a further dimension of oppressive harm, a kind of deep psychological abuse that results in false consciousness, and although understand- able given the abuse, their moral accounts are tragically inaccurate.

Civilized oppression is inherently more difficult to recognize, even by its victims. It is often subtle but pervasive, and understanding it involves detecting the kinds of mechanisms used, reflecting on the power relations at work, the systems controlling perceptions and information, the kinds of harms inflicted, and the kinds of moral wrongs underlying them. Unlike violent oppression, there is often nothing conspicuous and it often involves acts of omission. Unlike law-based oppression, the acts of omission are often not codified in any formal document. Unlike violent and law-based oppression, this sphere of oppression often involves matters that cannot sensibly be made the subject matter of law. The most troubling forms operate in realms of the informal where neither law, nor even explicit institutional policy, can feasibly operate.

For example, it is difficult even for the victims to work out why they have over time lost the motivation to speak up in the regular workplace meetings chaired by the store manager. It takes a sharp eye to notice that at the beginning of the question period, he routinely gives a quick glance at the dozen or so men and glances past the two women, even when they are signaling they have a question. It takes time to realize that when a woman raises a concern, the response is always pro forma, whereas if a man raises a concern, even the same concern, there is a thoughtful engagement. It takes time to see that when one of the elect does something “extra,” there is always a passing phrase of praise or thanks in the following meeting, but that somehow that never seems to happen when one of the victim-group does so.

Spotting isolated incidents of this kind does not readily occur, partly because many victims neither expect nor look for problems to do with exclusion and

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denigration in their workplace. Even when occasional incidents are noticed, those at the receiving end can find sensible excuses for a long time. The manager is tired; he just did not notice that Susan indicated first that she had a question. He’s having a stressful day and he’s forgotten the extra thing that Sue did last week. Time is very short today; the room was double booked. So he’s concentrating on the “really important” things and little courtesy items have been set aside. Sensible explanations can hold up for a long time, but not indefinitely. At some point even the most generous spirited of sharp-eyed victims runs out of plausible excuses and faces the unpleasant task of re-thinking the nature of the problem.

There are dozens of apparently small actions that can, and in cases of non- violent oppression do, form long-term patterns of exclusion, subordination, and denigration that can have a devastating cumulative impact, not only on the psy- chological well-being of the victims, but also on their opportunities, life-path, and chances of fulfillment in various ventures that involve others. Civilized oppres- sion, then, poses a special challenge in that apparently trivial acts that often pass under the social radar screen can wreck the lives of those systematically at the receiving end. For the non-oppressed the perceived triviality is a barrier to taking the claims about oppression seriously and although civilized oppression covers a spectrum of cases, there are many where the initial response of the non-oppressed is understandable. The significance of the actions, the way in which they form patterns of systematic abuse, contempt, exploitation, or dismissal, needs to be learned. As hard as it is in these cases for the victims to perceive what is happening, it is harder still for the non-oppressed.

Educational Initiatives as First Stage Resistance

When members of the oppressed group are arrested in the middle of the night, we want to release them from the prison trucks. If they are being shot in voting lines, we want to send in armed guards to protect them. The first line of attack here is often aimed at the blatantly oppressive acts. With civilized oppression, on the other hand, often the first line of “attack” is to get people to notice the persistent but subtle acts of discrimination and their effects on the victims. It is a major task in itself to enable people in general just to see that there is a serious problem. Unlike forms of violent oppression where the agents have no morally reasonable line of justification, some agents of civilized oppression (please note, “some”) understandably do not recognize their actions as oppressive. At least, it is under- standable in these cases prior to the general and widespread educational initiatives that raise awareness about the mechanisms of civilized oppression, something that cannot be achieved overnight. Over time listeners may come to reflect more on what they see and do, but the very nature of the oppression at work means that making a sincere and firm decision not to be a party to it and to intervene when it occurs is not in itself going to succeed. Being alert to its various manifestations takes not only good will, but also a kind of awareness, certain perceptual skills, in

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fact. This is one of the significant differences between these forms of oppression and the more vicious kinds and it has implications to do with resistance.

If the non-oppressed take time to learn about the phenomena, is this resis- tance? When the oppressed talk about how the incidents form effective mecha- nisms of exclusion, exploitation, or subordination, is this resistance? I think so. In Oppression, Privilege, and Resistance, the editors, Lisa Heldke and Peg O’Connor, write that “. . . if the analysis of systems of oppression tells us any- thing, it tells us that there exist many ways to resist—because oppression is not just one thing”4 and the first “strategy of resistance” they mention is education, both formal and informal.5 Learning from victims of oppression is an often informal educational mode of undermining future oppression and both the listener and the speaker can be seen as engaged in resistance. In fact, for good reasons (explained above), educational initiatives, both formal and informal, are often the first line of attack here. Because of the difference in the kind of oppression involved, moving in directly on the actual actions has a far greater chance of success in the case of violent oppression (or oppression directly reflected in law) than in the case of civilized oppression, and although perhaps we are not accus- tomed to thinking of explaining and learning, and so on, as acts of resistance, they are crucial components to resisting some cases in the spectrum of civilized oppression and robustly qualify as “resistance.”

As difficult as it is for victims to perceive and describe what is involved and what the impact is, articulate and thoughtful victims constitute a special source of knowledge and understanding, perhaps especially so in the case of these less blatant forms of oppression. Yet this source of understanding is largely untapped unless the privileged are willing to learn about subtle but serious oppression. Indeed the privileged have an obligation to make the effort to imagine and understand what day-to-day life is like for an oppressed person, but this is no ordinary kind of learning. As Elizabeth Spelman writes in Inessential Woman, “the acquisition of such knowledge requires a kind of apprenticeship; and making oneself an apprentice to someone is at odds with having political, social, and economic power over them.”6 She is aware of the dangers if the right relationship is not in place, if the habitual sense of entitlement and social power that is usual for the privileged is not set aside. The socially advantaged can easily and unilat- erally create an image or account that is wildly inaccurate.7

Moral Deference and the Obvious Constraints on the Victims’ Prima Facie Obligations

Laurence Thomas provides a memorable term for this kind of learning in the title of his article, “Moral Deference”:

It is a mode of moral learning which those who have been oppressed are owed in the name of eliminating the very state of their oppression. In the absence of such learning, oppression cannot but continue to be a part of the fabric of the moral life. Indeed, the absence of such

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learning, the studied refusal to engage in such learning, is one of the very ways in which oppression manifests itself. Worse, such studied refusal to learn adds insult to injury.8

There are grounds, then, for claiming that the non-oppressed should try to under- stand what the oppression involves by listening to the victims, not, though, as a matter of intellectual curiosity, but with the empathy owed to those who suffer contempt and injustice. As Laurence Thomas points out in his article, “Moral Flourishing in an Unjust World,” “either diminished category persons [oppressed persons] must play a role in others coming to understand their specific experiences or there will be precious little understanding of any diminished social category group by persons not belonging to it.”9 The learning curve for the non-oppressed is steep in the case of non-violent oppression and understandably the initial response is one of trying to “explain away” one incident after another. This is not surprising given that victims themselves often do the same for a long time before realizing that the relentless pattern cannot reasonably be accounted for that way.

Thomas, I think, clearly implies that the oppressed have an obligation to be involved, something I wish to consider more closely. For example, in the same article on moral flourishing he writes that “Diminished social category persons who exempt themselves contribute, if only unwittingly, to the continued existence of an unjust world”10 and even more bluntly claims that the oppressed “fail to do their part in making this world a better place when in the name of being a victim, they insist on being silent.”11 Victims should speak up, protest, and explain. It is an irreplaceable contribution to lessening oppression.

I agree that victims of oppression have a prima facie moral obligation to actively resist, but care is needed in talking about what this means and what kind of justification can be offered. There are some morally obvious limits on the resistance to be called for from victims. If it is a moral obligation, it is an imperfect rather than a perfect duty.

The most obvious concern is that of personal resources, especially time and energy. Speaking up, explaining problems, time after time, is tiring. The relevant incidents form an ongoing pattern, so taking resistance seriously means an ongoing commitment. Thomas refers poignantly to “the weariness of it all that stems from the feeling that one must speak up because no one else will . . .”12 Ann Cudd writes that “It is implausible to suggest that resistance to oppression by the oppressed is morally required at all times with respect to all forms of oppression . . . oppression is such a pervasive condition of one’s life that it would be impos- sible to struggle against all of it at once.”13 It would be unreasonably burdensome on an individual’s time and energy to expect almost constant engagement.

There are also sometimes serious prudential concerns, even in the case of non-violent oppression. There is always vulnerability when resisting oppression, since systematic power differences are central to the nature of oppression. Also, the forms of power here ex hypothesi do not rely on physical force, which is one reason why these forms of oppression are so recalcitrant. The power differences also make speaking about oppressive patterns stressful. However phrased,

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however calmly explained, it is usually and correctly seen as a kind of protest and resistance, and powerfully placed people would rather not hear protest. It is not something that makes anyone’s day. So while some risk has to be undertaken if there is ever to be a more socially just way of living, there may come a point when moral obligation moves into the realm of the supererogatory.

A Less Obvious Moral Constraint on the Victims’ Prima Facie Obligations

There is at least one less obvious limit, though, of a morally interesting kind. Suppose for the sake of argument that there are no concerns to do with time, energy, or risk of retaliation. Under these conditions, if reflective victims are the best source of insight about oppression, and if such injustice should be lessened, do we have enough to ground an obligation on the part of such victims to address relevant incidents when they encounter them? It is an attractive position in that it accords the victims a privileged position; it recognizes the “moral deference” (to use Thomas’s phrase) owed and calls for their voice to be heard. However, what begins as deference can transform itself into a kind of second-order oppression, not because of the drain on time and energy or risk of retaliation, but because the focus on the oppression can begin to coercively define the person’s whole identity.

The claim that oppression damages a person’s identity or self-conception is of course nothing new, but the damage that philosophical work on oppression now standardly describes is different from what I have in mind here. In feminist philosophy, for example, attention has been drawn to the harm that results from internalizing the negative conceptions, beliefs, and stereotypes of the oppressors. Sandra Bartky writes, “. . . suppose that I, the object of some [negative] stereo- type, believe in it myself . . . I may then find it difficult to achieve what existen- tialists call an authentic choice of self, or what some psychologists have regarded as a state of self-actualization.”14 My self-conception and so also my self- development are affected. Relatedly, so too is my self-respect. In Damaged Iden- tities, Narrative Repair, Hilde Lindemann Nelson notes that

Although oppression always damages people’s identities by depriving them of opportunity, it frequently also has a second kind of destructive impact. A person’s identity is twice damaged by oppression when she internalizes as a self-understanding the hateful or dis- missive views that other people have of her. The lesbian mother, the wheelchair-bound worker, the Japanese American might all come to see themselves in the terms reserved by the oppressive institutions of their society for people like them. They then lose, or fail to acquire, self-respect.15

Lindemann Nelson refers to this kind of damage as “infiltrated consciousness,” a wonderfully apt phrase.16 Psychological oppression, then, is a most painful com- ponent of the oppressed’s lived experience and a powerful weapon in the hands of the alert oppressor. In Bartky’s poignant description, “The psychologically oppressed become their own oppressors; they come to exercise harsh dominion over their own self-esteem.”17 The negative messages are internalized and they

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distort the person’s self-conception and wreck both self-respect (the basic sense of respect for myself as a self or person or individual worthy of the same respect as other individuals) and self-esteem (for the non-moral attributes of myself I would otherwise value).

This is one of the most painful aspects of belonging to an oppressed group, this and the feeling of powerlessness to do anything about it. The threat to self-identity that I have in mind, however, is different. The most striking difference is that it does not originate in those we think of and refer to as “the oppressors.” The source of the problem lies with people who genuinely respect the victims, who care about the oppression and are committed to working against it, and who have an attitude of moral deference toward the victims.

When we think of the oppressed being trapped, constrained, confined, it is usually directly tied to their being oppressed. Their experience “is that the living of one’s life is confined and shaped by forces and barriers which are not accidental or occasional and hence avoidable . . . It is the experience of being caged in. . . .”18

This experience of being trapped can readily rule over someone’s heart and mind, and confine thought and vision as much as the oppression confines day-to-day life. Being oppressed, though, can become a form of tyranny in other ways. In par- ticular, someone can gradually slide into devoting herself just about entirely to working against the kind of oppression experienced, not because of a fully aware, personal choice (which can happen), but in response to the persistent moral expectations of others, especially non-oppressed but concerned others who have an attitude of moral deference toward the victim. They continually ask her views on situations where such oppression is involved. They repeatedly ask permission to put her name forward as a spokesperson at this or that event or as a member of a relevant group or committee. They refer others to her, encouraging them to speak with her, to ask about the experience of someone oppressed, and to learn more about what it means. When a situation arises where it seems clear that oppression of the relevant kind is a major factor, they stand back and defer to her, letting her take center stage in responding to the situation since she has the relevant experi- ence and insights. After the situation is resolved, they ask her to explain how it all struck her, what she noticed that they did not, what her responses were, and why she decided upon them. And so on. And so on. Ex hypothesi, all of this is motivated by moral deference.

I mentioned at the beginning of this section that I am supposing, for the sake of argument, that there are no concerns to do with time, energy, or risk of retaliation. The concern here is not to do with personal resources or safety, but with saturation of focus. If not freely chosen, it can constitute an extra dimension of oppression, a second-order oppression, so to speak. Deference has been trans- formed into subtle but persistent compulsion, but from the most unexpected of sources since, paradoxically, those most likely to be responsible for this distortion of self-identity are those who value the insights of the victim and are concerned to understand and lessen the oppression. They are full of good will and respect, yet much though both are to be treasured, they give none of us 20-20 vision.

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Supportive, concerned, and non-oppressed individuals may unwittingly urge the victim into actions and commitments that effectively make resisting oppression the one and only goal of any significance in her life. It can involuntarily permeate her whole being. Although it can happen to non-oppressed resisters, victims of non-violent oppression are particularly vulnerable since without their involve- ment, much of this oppression will not even be visible, let alone understood. Given this vital role, there is an increased temptation, for all the morally right reasons, to transform moral deference into something different.

Dreams and hopes, life projects and life pathways, all reasonable in them- selves, may be inaccessible to the oppressed. Yet dreams are important even when there is very little chance of their being fulfilled, in fact especially then. This is not some naive assertion that if we hold fast to our dreams, we can make them come true. We can try, but we may or not may succeed if they require the fair co-operation of others. But they also matter because in an important sense I do not know a great deal about myself now if I have not been able to reflect quite a lot about who I would be if the freedom and fair opportunity existed.

When someone is indeed hemmed in by unjust constraints on opportunity and access, dreaming does not thereby become a form of self-indulgence unsuited to the moral urgency of the oppressive situation, something that should be set aside in favor of fighting for the cause. Staking a claim to individuality, even if mainly via the resources of the mind, is fighting for the cause. Oppressive structures are built around generalized conceptions of the oppressed group’s members, around negative images and demeaning beliefs about “them.” The stereotypes form lenses through which the individuals are seen, or rather, remain unseen. In resisting oppression, exploring one’s individuality is as important as being in solidarity with others who are oppressed. This is not to undermine the essential role of relationships in a person’s identity, but reflective, tenacious, and self-originating dreaming, even when there is no reasonable expectation of the aspirations being realized, is also a key component in developing or enhancing self-identity. It is one kind of psychological resistance, and unlike some other forms of resistance (like protesting or explaining the phenomena involved), such dreams resist oppression precisely by turning away from it. The main moral claim I am arguing for here, then, is that someone who is oppressed has no moral obligation, not even a prima facie obligation, to focus on the oppression to the point that it constrains and defines the entire self-identity.

Concern about Paternalism

This means that some caution is needed in morally deferring to the victims if we are to avoid its functioning coercively on their self-conception. The moral value of such deference depends on such caution and alertness being in place. The distortion into a coercive, second-order oppression requires no malice, no intent to harm, and no visibly hostile acts. Indeed, the distortion itself is very likely to be

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in the form of civilized oppression with all the actions appearing insignificant or reflecting obvious good will, all of it imbued with genuine respect, and all of it without any arrogance.

This distortion is more than a remote possibility. In fact the number of cases will increase as the general consciousness of the respect owed to victims of oppression grows. Another reason why the distortion of moral deference is likely to become more frequent is the concern about paternalism. Feminist philosophers have for decades drawn attention to the prevalence of objectionable paternalism in sexist practices. Men who have not been at the receiving end of systematic subordination quite often take on the role of interpretative expert. They correct the women’s descriptions and inform them of what “really happened” at gatherings they themselves did not attend, what this person or that “really meant” when something untoward was said, how the victims should have responded so as not to “get things out of proportion,” and even how the victims should have felt in situations they themselves have never experienced. The relationship between such men and the victims of sexism bears no resemblance to Spelman’s notion of an apprentice relationship. If a privileged, non-oppressed person’s thinking is devel- oped without interaction or the right kind with the victims, the dangers of mis- perception, oversights, and the imposition of false descriptions on the relevant phenomena are all too familiar.

This kind of high-handed paternalism is morally objectionable. This said, there are dangers in overemphasizing the concern. In particular it can give rise to problematic attitudes, and two bear directly on resistance to oppression. In the first place it can cause privileged, non-oppressed people who are genuinely concerned about the oppression to feel reluctant to be involved in some forms of resistance (e.g., protest), no matter how patiently they have tried to learn about the phenom- ena from the victims. They do not want to be guilty of paternalism. This can easily result in the second-order oppression described above where the actual victims are seen as being “on duty” to protest and explain almost constantly and where their public identity and perhaps their self-identity are defined by their role as an oppressed victim.

The second danger of overemphasizing paternalism is that of creating in oppressed victims an unrecognized attitude of intolerance of imperfection in those who would support them in their resistance. Arrogant paternalism is objectionable and embodies a form of disrespect for the victims, but there is a line to be drawn between this and the simple fact that human beings, no matter how well motivated and prepared, will occasionally “get it wrong.” This in itself does not establish that paternalism is at work, yet in practice this inference is sometimes quickly made. The best of people will make some mistakes, but if only the privileged non- oppressed who are morally perfect and infallible are suited to be involved in resistance, then the victims must struggle on alone.

If magnified beyond reasonable bounds, legitimate concern about paternalism toward victims of oppression can hinder rather than boost resistance in at least these two ways. A concern about appearing paternalistic can prompt the non-

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oppressed to step back from leading roles in an oppressive situation (especially if victims are present), which in turn can lead to the kind of distortion of moral deference explained above. Also, it can make victims too quick to accuse someone of objectionable paternalism if they do take a significant role (especially if they make a slip), which in turn can lead to further isolation of the victims from the genuinely caring, genuinely committed non-oppressed and also to less willingness on the part of the non-oppressed to be actively involved in resistance.

Resistance and Moral Relations

It makes a difference whether we see resistance as aimed primarily at block- ing or lessening acts of oppression, or whether we see resistance as involving something more, namely, the amending and re-building of moral relations. There are implications if we see (as I and many others do) a close connection between, on the one hand, issues to do with resisting oppression and, on the other, funda- mental moral matters to do with the nature of the moral community we envision and the various moral relations that should be developed and nurtured within it. This includes moral issues to do with self-respect, one’s relationship toward oneself, if you will. Much has been written on the connection between oppression and self-respect,19 but for reasons of space, it is not something I can discuss here. There is, however, another set of moral relations I wish to consider.

This article has been particularly concerned with civilized oppression, but now I wish to look especially at one end of the spectrum of cases falling within such oppression. Civilized oppression by definition involves no violence, but where it takes its most subtle form it involves very fine-grained actions indeed and they seem utterly trivial to those not repeatedly at the receiving end. These cases are not rare, but they are the hardest to notice. Small but patterned differences in communication usually play a role, including repeated acts of omission, which are particularly difficult to notice.

How can actions that seem completely trivial constitute oppression? Consider an example readily found in daily life. Suppose that those in the more powerful position are comfortable chatting with members of one group but not with those of another. Suppose that the powerful men are comfortable talking informally with other men, but far less so with women. It seems at first a purely personal matter, but it can in fact disadvantage members of the excluded group, both practically and motivationally. They do not receive the timely bits of information and quick tips members of the other group receive; they miss the short anecdote about the new manager that makes the person seem more approachable; and they do not hear the occasional, spontaneous word of praise of encouragement. They miss out on all the richness of the well-disposed, casual encounter. It also means that the socially better positioned are unlikely to know those individuals as well as they do the people they chat with, and in a society where connections can affect success, this can make a difference. What seem like acts of commission or omission of no significance can function in powerful ways.

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In other cases at this end of the civilized oppression spectrum everything from glances given or omitted, tone of voice, the jokes told, the interruption of someone’s sentence, the turning away when someone approaches, all of these and dozens more can be either isolated events of no significance or they can form part of a pervasive and relentless pattern the cumulative impact of which can derail lives. None of these kinds of actions can feasibly fall under, say, institutional regulations that give explicit directives. The onus comes down to the individuals. Only by becoming a lot more aware of our actions can we begin to explore whether there lies behind these patterns some attitude of animosity, denigration, or dismissal.

In these cases the agents who are systematically marginalizing members of some group are often acting out of socialized habits acquired without intent or reflection. We think of oppressors as people who, to quote Ann Cudd, “intend to act in order to continue or intensify the oppression of a social group,”20 but agents of some kinds of oppression typically have no such intention. They are often warm-hearted and generally benevolent individuals who are aware of and some- times actively concerned about discrimination of a more visible kind. They have never thought of themselves as oppressors and would be taken aback by the description, and yet they are indeed engaged in systematically disadvantaging members of the group in question.

In the cases I have in mind, the oppressors do not fit the usual model. The problem is not simply that they do not understand how what they are doing can have such devastating effects on people’s lives and feelings, or how what they do can function oppressively. The problem in the cases of interest here is more basic: they are in a literal sense unaware of their actions. They do not know that they routinely glance first at the men in the meeting to see if they have anything to say, before turning to the women. They are unaware that when a woman raises a concern in the meeting, they end eye contact with them, something they do not do when a man speaks. And in case we jump too quickly to blame, it should be said that if we set aside oppression for a moment, it is an everyday phenomenon. We all have habits we are unaware of. We can and should commit ourselves to uncovering them and reflecting on them, but this is a process that takes time and may never be securely “finished.” One person tends to repeat sentences when he is nervous, but does not know this. Someone else keeps randomly inserting the word “like” into every other sentence, but does not know why listeners become irritated. Another writes a five-page article and uses “notwithstanding” six times with no recognition of this word addiction. In the cases of interest here, however, the unperceived habits are not so innocent; they sustain marginalization. However, since they are unaware of their actions, they are not in a position to reflect on the significance of those actions and their effects. Unlike the more dramatic situations of oppression, then, these oppressors need have no intention to disadvantage those they oppress. They do not recognize themselves as oppressive and, more to the point, understandably so.

We have no innate perceptual skill that enables us to note each and every action of ours. Those we explicitly think about have a decent chance of being seen

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by us, but habitual actions often pass unregarded, especially if the habits were acquired in the distant past. This commonplace failing lies behind the special cases I am referring to here, the part of the civilized oppression spectrum where the mechanisms of subordination are at their most subtle. Whether or not social- ized habits are as innocuous as they are often assumed to be cannot be determined until, first, we are fully aware of them, and then take time to reflect on them (including speaking with those the habits affect or involve), but certainly appear- ances can be deceptive. Agents of this kind of oppression need not be in any obvious sense “the enemy,” even though it is vital that the habits change. In this respect the situations are very different from the classic instances of resisting violent oppression where the oppressors are clearly malicious, actively hostile, and obviously “the enemy.”

There have been arguments that attitudes and indeed labels of reproach should be used even when people are unaware that they are oppressive. Probably the most well-known is Cheshire Calhoun’s in her article “Responsibility and Reproach.”21 Calhoun considers the claim that it “[is] possible to make clear that one excuses while simultaneously offering moral correction,”22 but rejects this approach. She declares that “it does not work in most adult-adult interactions” since it is “likely to be viewed by the recipient either as insulting, because it impugns his status as a normal adult, or arrogant, because it claims privileged moral authority.”23 But the rejection of this approach hinges on the phrase “moral correction,” which at least suggests a certain mode of interaction, one that may not be morally appropriate in the cases being discussed. It is a phrase that suggests a mode that is somewhat condescending, as does the term “reproach.” But if we change the mode of the interaction, then I am not convinced that excusing while offering some painfully won moral insight is bound to appear arrogant and so provoke hostility. I sympathize with much of what is claimed in Calhoun’s article if we are speaking about the more blatant forms of oppression, including the somewhat more visible cases of non-violent oppression, for example, a man who at home quietly refuses to do any cleaning, cooking, or babysitting. But the claim that “The logic of moral language dooms any attempt to sustain or convey the obligatoriness of X, while simultaneously excusing most failures to do X”24 is over-generalized. There is nothing incoherent in claiming that we have an obli- gation to acquire far sharper skills of perceptual awareness about our own actions, a vital component of resistance here, and yet that, since this is something that improves gradually over time, one may in the early stages be excusably unaware of some of one’s actions and so also of their moral significance.

Resisting the subtlest cases of oppression raises basic questions about what our relationships should be with those whose ordinary human faults happen, in this case, to have fairly devastating effects. In fact speaking of “those” with such faults is misleading, since they are commonly shared and none of us is simply gifted with complete awareness of our own actions. Members of one oppressed group may function oppressively in their treatment of members of another oppressed group. The unusual situation of the oppressor here is one of the special

24 Jean Harvey

features of cases at this end of the spectrum of non-violent oppression: the good will, the general benevolence, but the lack of knowledge about some of his long-term, socialized habits all make him a radically different kind of oppressor from the Nazi Commandant rounding up the Danish Jews. In such situations being firmly against the oppression does not necessarily mean being against the oppres- sors. Resistance here may mean building relationships with those who unwittingly contribute to the oppression, rather than taking a more hostile attitude toward them, something that would be fully appropriate in more blatant cases. If the envisioned moral community is partly a place where we support each other in our ordinary imperfection and failings, which is the shared lot of humans, then resistance to oppression can sometimes take non-standard forms.

I am not suggesting that such initiatives be undertaken in a spirit of submis- sive appeasement, but as an exercise of moral agency and membership in the moral community. Calhoun notes that “Reproachful labels . . . confirm our iden- tities as moral agents,”25 but so do many other initiatives and responses in our moral relations with others. And if one is not living in despair or constant fear, if thoughtful expression of moral agency has survived the oppression and if empa- thetic understanding of simple faults, both one’s own and those of others, has not evaporated in the grief of being repeatedly denigrated and excluded, then I think some responsibility as a member of the community, however poorly treated, remains, particularly in these special cases. Moral agency is not the only precious attribute people have, nor even the most precious, nor do I accept it as a necessary condition for membership in the moral community. These are not claims I can argue for here, but all this said, such agency is an invaluable partner of hope, and individual moral agency is an indispensable component in working toward social justice, given the nature and prevalence of subtle but serious forms of oppression. Reflective victims of such oppression are not only a special source of understand- ing about the phenomena and how they function, they are also key players in moving this dysfunctional aspect of the moral community forward into something that better reflects mutual respect and support. Success cannot be ensured, but some attempts to improve our moral relations with others and so also the func- tioning of the moral community is a reasonable and basic moral commitment that can be called for from all, from agents of oppression, privileged non-oppressors, and victims of oppression whose moral self has not been demolished by their experience.

Conclusion

It is dangerous to generalize about oppression as such. Our findings will be over-generalized and we will, I think, miss some important insights about the less paradigmatic forms. If we reflect on the full range of oppressive mechanisms and situations and consider especially civilized oppression, then there are good reasons for claiming that resistance can sometimes take non-standard forms. Educational initiatives, especially informal modes, constitute a crucial first line of

Resistance and Civilized Oppression 25

attack in connection with civilized oppression. The victims themselves are a vital source of such learning and I agree with Laurence Thomas and others that victims have a prima facie obligation to be involved in furthering awareness of oppression.

I see the victims’ obligations as being both more and less than perhaps is usually thought of. I have argued that at least at one end of the civilized oppression spectrum there are agents of oppression who are radically different from the paradigm cases and that victims should try to inform the relationships that hold between themselves and these oppressors, should try to help amend the condition of the moral community. In these cases I am not recommending taking such initiatives in a spirit of reproach, but as fellow members of the moral community, fellow strugglers, and even with some empathy for the commonly shared failings that lie behind the oppressive acts. In these circumstances such moves are indeed forms of resistance, but recommending that victims do this is probably going beyond what is usually thought of as reasonable to ask of victims of oppression.

On the other hand I have added one less obvious moral constraint to those that set morally sound limits on what should be called for from victims. They are not obliged to mold their self-identity so that it centers solely around their identity as a victim of oppression. The constraint means that the victims’ prima facie obli- gations are not as stringent as we sometimes think.

Resisting oppression, then, can take many different forms, depending on the kind of oppression involved and how it manifests itself. Reforming or changing the major social institutions, important though it be, will never be enough. The victims as individuals will always play a key role, if they are allowed to. Morally desirable resistance to oppression reaches all the way from the level of the political down to the level of the intensely personal, and this richness of contri- bution is a natural consequence of the full range of oppressive experiences and the moral relations lying behind them.

Notes

1 See, for example, Iris Marion Young’s chapter on “Five Faces of Oppression,” in her book Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990).

2 J. Harvey, Civilized Oppression (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1999). 3 Ann E. Cudd, Analyzing Oppression (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006), 192–93. 4 Lisa Heldke and Peg O’Connor, ed., Oppression, Privilege, and Resistance (New York: McGraw Hill,

2004), 561. 5 Ibid. 6 Elizabeth V. Spelman, Inessential Woman: Problems of Exclusion in Feminist Thought (Boston:

Beacon Press, 1988), 178. 7 Ibid., 179–80. 8 Laurence Thomas, “Moral Deference,” Philosophical Forum 24, no. 1–3 (1992): 247. 9 Laurence Thomas, “Moral Flourishing in an Unjust World,” Journal of Moral Education 22, no. 2

(1993): 93. 10 Ibid., 87. 11 Ibid., 94. 12 Thomas, “Moral Deference,” 240.

26 Jean Harvey

13 Cudd, Analyzing Oppression, 198. 14 Sandra Bartky, Femininity and Domination: Studies in the Phenomenology of Oppression (Rout-

ledge: New York, 1990), 24. 15 Hilde Lindemann Nelson, Damaged Identities, Narrative Repair (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University

Press, 2001), 21. 16 Ibid. 17 Bartky, “On Psychological Oppression,” in Femininity and Domination, 22. 18 Marilyn Frye, The Politics of Reality (Freedom, CA: Crossing Press, 1983), 4. 19 See, for example, Bernard R. Boxill, “Self-Respect and Protest,” Philosophy and Public Affairs 6, no.

1 (1976): 58–69; Robin S. Dillon, “Self-Respect: Moral, Emotional, Political,” Ethics 107, no. 2 (1997): 226–49, “How to Lose Your Self-Respect,” American Philosophical Quarterly 29, no. 2 (1992): 125–39, and “Toward a Feminist Conception of Self-Respect,” Hypatia 7, no. 1 (1992): 52–69; Marilyn A. Friedman, “Moral Integrity and the Deferential Wife,” Philosophical Studies 47 ( January 1985): 141–50; Thomas E. Hill, “Servility and Self-Respect,” Monist 57 ( January 1973): 87–104; Thomas E. Hill, “Self-Respect Reconsidered,” in Autonomy and Self-Respect (Cam- bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 19–24; Diana T. Meyers, “The Politics of Self- Respect: A Feminist Perspective,” Hypatia 1, no. 1 (1986): 83–100; Michele M. Moody-Adams, “Race, Class, and the Social Construction of Self-Respect,” Philosophical Forum 24, no.1 (1992– 1993): 251–66; Laurence Thomas, “Self-Respect: Theory and Practice,” in Philosophy Born of Struggle, ed. Leonard Harris (Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt, 1983), 174–87; Laurence Thomas, “Rawlsian Self-Respect and the Black Consciousness Movement,” Philosophical Forum 9 (Winter–Spring 1978): 303–14.

20 Cudd, Analyzing Oppression, 195. 21 Cheshire Calhoun, “Responsibility and Reproach,” Ethics 99, no. 2 (1989): 389–406. 22 Ibid., 401. 23 Ibid. 24 Ibid., 404. 25 Ibid., 405.

Resistance and Civilized Oppression 27

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