Buddhist Critique of Justice

Roots of Socially Engaged Buddhism: David Loy, Sallie King, Bikkhu Bodhi and Chris Queen photo by Clemens M. Breitschaft

At the recent Socially Engaged Symposium Ari Pliskin reports that "Sallie King offered a Buddhist critique of popular conceptions of justice based on her experience at an international, interfaith peace council, where leaders of world religions gathered to address conflict.

King argued against four common forms of politics that perpetuate conflict instead of ending it:
  1. Identity politics: The sense of victimhood nourishes suffering and keeps it going generation to generation.
  2. Righteous Indignation.  The angry sense that we are justified and the others wrong.
  3. Justice: The insistence on finding justice before there can be peace.  King reported that while the Buddhists at the summit find ‘human rights’ to be a useful concept, they think justice is
    not so useful.
  4. Revenge: In particular the concept of justice based on retribution perpetuates conflict.

During the question and answer time, Fleet Maull said that he doesn’t think that Buddhists should stick their heads in the sand all together regarding the idea of justice.  While he prefers a model called integral transformative justice, he says that even retributive justice, is a desire to return to wholeness, albeit a misguided one. If we don’t engage in these feelings and thoughts, Fleet argued, we risk irrelevance.

King challenged us to engaged in a thought experiment, in which we ask ourselves whether there is anything we could achieve with the concept of justice that we cannot achieve without it, referring instead to less problematic concepts.  She believes there is not."


Read Ari's entire post here...


Question for discussion here: What do you think?

Is dismantling the construct of "justice" even possible? (Deconstructing:
reward punishment models, moral principles of 'just conduct, right and
wrongness, bringing the 'wrong' to justice, etc). How can we unwind the culture of 'victimhood' that nourishes suffering and feelings of injustice?

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Permalink Reply by Ekō (Joshua) Goldberg on August 13, 2010 at 12:33am
On a personal level, identity politics was a useful developmental stepping stone in my life. It was big in social justice activism around the time I was in my late teens and early 20s, and being able to name myself as "Jew", "queer", "white", "disabled", "mixed class", etc. helped me, at the time, to articulate and in so doing clarify the broader contexts of a lot of deep hurts and confusions relating to my experiences of privilege and oppression. It helped me see that there were systemic issues at play, not just personal failings. In this sense it both helped clarify a sense of self but also reach beyond a sense of self. It then shifted and became constricting -- a narrow, tight sense of self that had to be defended, a sense of righteous victimhood combined with self-loathing (fixation on the self plus denigration of the self). That's where Zen practice eventually proved to be a remarkable tool in unsticking that stuckness. But initially my life was so chaotic and sense of self and identity so discombobulated that although being drawn to Zen practice I couldn't stay with it because the experiences of dissolution were too unbalancing. So developing a stronger sense of self was needed to be able to have enough confidence to be able to dip my toes in something larger than my self.

Politically it was pretty much the same trajectory. Identity politics was a terrific tool initially to build the confidence to work with allies without getting stuck in rage, anger, embarrassment, shame, and guilt. Eventually it became clear that it was reinforcing a dichotomy of "other" that was not helpful but was a fantastic bridge as I started in terms of helping simultaneously recognize the significant differences in experiences across lines of identity (felt or projected by others) but still have the confidence to reach out, whether to allies or as an ally.

I'm still a newbie at Zen practice in many ways, but my gut sense is that righteous indignation and justice can be like this too -- simultaneously arising from a place of love of sentient beings and also helping nurture that love -- providing an initial stepping place for action. In excess it can lead to denigrating (of oneself or others) or narcissism/self-righteousness -- either way the same old fixation on self and the illusion of a solid "I" separate from "others". But if that immediacy of twinge at suffering is totally absent, if we are too dissolved, then that is also not a balance -- "there is no self so there is nobody suffering", too cold a detachment. Balancing the heat of anger at injustice with the coolness of humour and perspective, there are those moments in practice when that all comes together so beautifully, and then it breaks apart again and shifts.

Yesterday I was talking with a long-time activist comrade, who practices in a different Buddhist tradition, about our experiences working together and in different activist organizations, about how hard it seems to be to do activism in a healthy way -- how so many groups have such fucked up dynamics and how we ourselves get swept up in habitual ways of interacting in those groups that don't have the same kind of healthy balance that we are able to demonstrate when we're in practice communities. But in our practice communities even though there is great love and compassion for each other, and wonderful support, there is also sometimes a disconnect with our political values. Maybe that's the question above -- how to work for justice, while not being so attached to the idea of justice that we lose sight of just being in this moment with each other.

It'll be great to hear other people's reflections!
Permalink Reply by Kate Crisp (PDN Director) on August 20, 2010 at 9:13am
What you said about the 'self' and working with practice and the comparison to activism was beautifully articulated Joshua. "Justice" seems to be a tricky term...it could be about fairness or treating others 'justly'....then can quickly move down the slippery slope into 'good and bad (language deeply embedded in our cultures), punishment and reward, and thus retribution. Which in turn leads to domination paradigms and shamed based cultures in reaction to 'wrongdoing' and violence.

Marshall Rosenberg: "Of course, when you say that it can look very naive in the face of all the violence around the planet, but, as theologian and anthropologist Walter Wink explains in his writings, that violence is created by the kind of social structures we've been creating for about eight thousand years which required us to be educated in tools of domination. We're living in a society where some people call themselves superiors and claim to have the right to use punishment and reward on people to get them to behave properly." So perhaps the concept of justice is loaded in the 'eye for an eye' (retribution models of justice) concept ...but rather than throw out the concept...how might we transform it?

We use the tag 'integral transformative justice' because we are talking about alternatives to the criminal justice system. We believe we can't really throw off the term 'justice' as practitioners when basically the whole world relates and is run by this complex concept (see Fleets comments in the blog). Instead, how can we transform it, into justice as a return to wholeness. What does it take for communities to feel that things are fair or that others don't have an unfair advantage? What methods are not shame based and employ compassionate skillful means, etc?
Permalink Reply by Christina Florez_Barnes on August 15, 2010 at 2:09pm
I have been going through an internal metamorphosis in justice and punishment since my 15 year old was charged as an adult for sexual assault. He is till in prison. When he leaves he will be put in a system built for failure and crushing his hopes for a healed future. I have gone from a judgmental, self-righteous arrogant snob to a person who is filled with compassion for the struggles of a juvenile sex-offender. For not only could his life be a carryover of punishment, his family is punished also.

In order to alter my perspective of victimhood I have studied Tibeten Buddhist meditation in the Naropa University's transpersonal psychology program. It is a sometimes a daunting shift that requires presence and awareness of thought and emotion.

Currently, I must find a job and a home within the next two months so that he can leave corrections and live with me. I know it is done.....somehow, someway it is done.

I struggle with uncertainty, worry and fear and release these in meditation. I trust that everything happens for a reason and I know forgiveness and letting go are essential to personal healing. I have stopped reading the newspapers and watching television news because fear, mistrust and victimhood energy are permeated in these media.

I have started writing letters to my senators and governor to help my son, and hopefully others like him. It is a beginning.

The road is open for more action.....I trust my feet will find the way there.

My dream is to work in an organization like Fleet Maul's or within the corrections sysem, in some way. I am grateful for Fleet's work and efforts to change an important area of our society that is seriously in need of reform.

Thank you, all.

Love,

M. Christina Florez-Barnes
Permalink Reply by BA Beal on August 16, 2010 at 3:22pm
By providing an outlet and skill set through which we can help our clients express and explore their emotions in a healthy way. This process needs to begin in childhood early education, particularly with the male (boys) population.

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