BillHustonBlog: A Taxonomy of Violence

After Derrick Jensen's visit to Binghamton University, we've had a great discussion on Peacenet,
one of the best in years. Central themes include "When is violence permissible?", and "what defines violence?" So I dug this up....

My note to Peacenet indicated that I wrote this "several years ago". I believe I wrote this sometime after March 17, 2003 during the trial of the Saint Patrick Day's Four. Republished here Sept. 2008. Small updates Oct 17, 2016.

A Taxonomy of Violent Actions:

What defines violence?
What are the limits to non-violent actions?

This framework is an attempt by one activist to evaluate what is meant by "non-violent direct action". This is because of the wide variations of what is meant by violence, especially with regards to property damage, non-physical methods (like psychological warfare), and when non-human animals are the victims. This framework can be used by people who are thinking about engaging in non-violent direct actions, civil disobedience, ploughshares actions, etc., to help evaluate if such actions are morally justifiable. This framework can also be used to judge the moral justifications for state-sanctioned violence.

Categories of Seriousness

Peace Protest (quite trivial)

Never produces injury or property damage
No intentional violation of any law
Clearly non-violent by almost any definition

Nonviolent Resistance / NVR (from Elliott Adams)
- This is where a law may be broken, but it is incidental to the act of disrupting some harm.
- Generally, no intent to cause injury or property damage.
- For example: a blockade at an industrial facility, a lockdown to some construction equipment, or disruption of a meeting.
- This may involve violation trespass, or disorderly conduct.
- The law broken is not the issue -- there is some other cause.
Civil Disobedience (usually trivial, but some risk of charges)

Never produces injury or property damage
A law is broken deliberately.
e.g., smoking pot in public, at a "weedfest",
a Rosa Park-type civil rights action
The law broken is the issue

Vandalism (trivial to moderately serious)

Never produces injury to sentient creature
May involve minor physical property damage
Ploughshares actions, hammering on nuclear weapons
E.g., defacing money, government signs, buildings (graffiti),
defacing or spoofing websites, or Denial-Of-Service; adbusting / pranks (Yes Men)
Pouring your own blood on buildings

Consider: some treat this as more serious threat due to potential blood transmitted diseases

Coercion (moderately serious)

use of threats or exploiting a power relationship to restrain action, or to elicit non-voluntary action

Personal Physical Restraint or Obstruction (serious)

Use of actual force against a person to restrain or obstruct that person from acting, or to force a non-voluntary action

Major Physical Property Damage (very serious)

Purpose of the action may be actual or symbolic
Inanimate: e.g., Destroying buildings, vehicles, weapons, data/information
Environmental: e.g., crops, forests, air or water pollution
Consider: Affects persons or institutions?
Consider: Second-Order effects (military bombs water filtration system or destroys crops, which causes actual injury to persons later)

Injurious Violence (gravely serious)

Crimes against sentient beings which cause injury, suffering, or death
E.g., kidnapping, assault, torture, murder
Clearly inconsistent with principles of non-violence
Consider: Animal vs. Human
Consider: non-physical violence (e.g., psychological torture)
Consider: is this ever justifiable?

Self-defense?
to prevent future violence?
punitive? revenge? retribution?
to stop "an evil so great"?

Evaluation Schema

Seriousness: Trivial? Moderate? Grave?

Is there ACTUAL or Potential damage to structures, machines, or other inanimate things?
Is there ACTUAL or Potential environmental damage (crops, forests, water supplies)?
Is there ACTUAL or Potential injury to persons (sentient creatures)? How many persons affected?
Consider the motive: Symbolic (generally less serious) or for Direct Effect (generally more serious)?

Urgency: Immediate threat or Time to wait?

Consider: prior actions of the adversary

Exhaustion of Remedy: Last resort or First Approach?
Necessity: Only course of action or Gratuitous/Ego?

Must we think in these terms? What about "Turn the other cheek" and forgiveness?
Gandhi taught liberation through suffering the blows of our attacker

"Iterated Prisoners Dilemma" (Tit-For-Tat, etc) model from mathematics [see Dawkins, Axelrod, Hofstadter, etc.] may support this
"In a society, to minimize overall violence, we must each expend effort to not become replicators of violence. We must each absorb it when it comes our way."

Cause: Reactive or Proactive?

Forms of Proactive:

Preemptive intervention
Unprovoked attack

Forms of Reactive:

Retaliation, Revenge, Punitive
Redemptive, Repentance, Atonement
Defensive

Responsibility: Personal or Anonymous?

If you take responsibility for your action, it may be better justifiable.
Motive: Principled and just or Selfish or Irrational?

Personal Atonement, Repentance, Disapproval Display, Interventionist

In a democracy, the people are ultimately responsible for the actions of their government. Thus, if the people do not act to separate themselves from a renegade, oppressive regime, then by silence and inaction they become complicit and bear responsibility for the violence committed on their behalf

Retribution, Revenge, Punishment? To shame your opponent?
Consider: Have you condemned your adversary as evil, or do you allow for their rehabilitation and atonement? Might they have some good in their hearts? Do you forgive them?

Caution: Certainly affecting only proper target or Indiscriminate attack of innocents?

Were innocent creatures actually harmed? How many?
Was caution exhibited to prevent harm to innocents?
Was any harm to property, persons, or the environment limited to only what was necessary?
Even if there is a Small Chance of Grave Harms, have you considered alternative actions?

Direction: Towards yourself or Towards others?

Gandhi taught of taking suffering upon yourself as most effective (Satyagraha)
Or did you actually cause harm to other living beings?
Did you put other living beings at RISK of harm?

Perception: Turns people on to your cause or Turns people off?

Will the cause seem justified in the court of public opinion?
Is public opinion important?
Will people come to your side or move away from it?
Is it done in such a way to cause many others to learn from it? (Publicity/spectacle)

Exercises

Evaluate within this framework:

Several people block entrance to a federal building prior to, and in protest of their government engaging in what they perceive to be an unjust military action
Someone spray paints "No War!" on the side of a building in the middle of the night
Abortion
Someone murders a doctor who commits abortions, for moral and religious reasons, and to prevent future abortions
Someone anonymously throws a Molotov cocktail through the window of a recruiting station located in a plaza with many other businesses, but it does not ignite
The state executes a man accused of being a serial murderer
Several nuns and a priest break in to a military installation and use small hand tools to damage tanks, missiles, and other weapons of mass destruction. They are caught doing this.
The police use tear gas, non-lethal "bean bag" bullets, and psyops (like bright lights and amplified sounds of animals being killed all during the night) against a 53 y/o woman who refuses to be removed from her home for a psychiatric examination. She was not accused of any crime. (Shirley Allen, Roby IL 1997)
The U.S. Preemptively strikes Iraq, a sovereign nation because they possess WMDs and have links to terrorism.
American Revolutionary War

Notes

Peace is not only the goal. Peace is a process: We should not become too focused on goals/results. "There is no way to peace. Peace *is* the way." -- A. J. Muste
Consider:

Would I do it?
Even if I would not do it, would I approve of others doing it?
Would Gandhi or Jesus have done it?

An authentic spiritual practice may be helpful. Often Christians who do this work are knowledgeable of Liberation Theology, or are Catholic Workers, or Quakers, or Mennonites.
Other activists claim that Yoga or Buddhist meditation practice is helpful.
Gandhi was trained in the Yoga tradition.