Telling Lies, Telling Tales and Telling (and Doing) the Truth: Racism, Moral Repair and the Case for Reparations

First, in the section ‘Telling Lies’, this article attempts to illustrate recent everyday racism. Racism has a history and takes many different forms. I describe a particular practice of racism (found in Britain, circa 1970), which relied, for its doctrine, on supposedly scientific assumptions about biology and breeding—and received a confirming fillip through the celebration of monarchy, empire and rose-tinted history. Second, in ‘Telling Tales’, the story of Zacchaeus is taken as exemplifying a form of moral repair in which telling and doing the truth are intimately related. Third, in ‘Telling and Doing the Truth’, I contend that telling and doing the truth in relation to racism requires not only a clear naming of racism’s lies but also the making of reparations, for the reason that the lies of racism subtended manifold injustices, of which Atlantic slavery and the exploitation of colonies are notable instances. I take the history of the West Indies as providing a clear case where moral repair is (over)due, and I consider the form that reparations might take.

Law and Emotion in Moral Repair: Circumscribing Infringement

The reciprocal relationship between law and emotion is a question about the relationship between culture and nature, or the evolutionary underpinnings of human social interaction. Behaviours originating as functional survival strategies have become dysfunctional social infringements, out of context, in need of moral repair. Law as a cultural construct attempts to regulate interaction, infringement, and repair, so as to ensure continued cooperation within a hierarchical social structure, and based on our emotional capacity. The article focuses on sexual infringements and property infringements, conceptualised by the metaphorical frameworks of MEASURE and SIZE, and appraised by various emotions. I trace the influence of emotions in biblical legal texts and their interaction with legal reasoning and moral exhortation. I discuss how law regulates and balances moral emotions, curbing excess and avoiding disproportionate revenge. I point to the rhetorical function of law to direct emotions in the service of moral values and social cohesion.

Dynamics of Moral Repair: Forgiveness, Self-Forgiveness, and the Restoration of Value Consensus as Interdependent Processes

Most psychological research has investigated victims’ forgiveness and offenders’ self-forgiveness separately, ignoring interactive and dynamic processes between them. We suggest that both parties are interdependent in their attempts to revalidate the values violated by the wrongdoing. In the present study, both partners of close relationships dyads (including 164 complete couples) were surveyed over three time-points following the report of a wrongdoing by one of the partners. Latent growth modeling showed that victims’ forgiveness was associated with growth in their perception of a value consensus with the offender. Victims’ value consensus perception was associated with growth in offenders’ perception of value consensus and engagement in genuine self-forgiveness (working through). However, directly, forgiveness was associated with decline in offenders’ genuine self-forgiveness, while offenders’ self-punitiveness was associated with decline in victims’ forgiveness. The findings highlight the regulatory function of victim forgiveness and the pivotal role of restoring value consensus in interactive moral repair.