Altruistic Terrorism and Emile Durkhiem

Two years ago, my Advanced Placement English class read the book Night by Elie Weisel, a moving memoir of his time spent in a German concentration camp as a child during World War II. My classmates were shocked that one person could be so awful to another, and were all relieved that they lived in a time where none of this genocide nonsense happens. They criticized, second guessed, and condemned their grandparents for turning their heads when there were six million Jews in need. Never mind the fact that news of the terrors of concentration camps was understood only after the war was won and the camps closed, what struck me as ironic was their view of the world today: these terrible things have been beaten, like Polio. The thing is, Polio is only irradiated if you live in a place where you have the opportunity to get the vaccine.
People today have access to more information than all previous generations combined, and yet ignorance still plagues and haunts us.
I found Emile Durkheim’s work intriguing, if not only because I disagreed strongly with most of his ideas; a critique follows. There is one idea, however, that intrigues me simply because it is interesting: altruism, and especially altruism in death. I have long considered the impacts of altruism in advancing society, and within our modern and global society, the actions can be larger and therefore, so can the repercussions. It is my wish to tie Durkheim’s ideas about altruism to a specific issue in our world: terrorism.
All of Durkheim’s theories rest upon a foundation that he built for them. This is as important, and perhaps a more important, contribution to the Sociological world. Indeed, these foundations are not only the ideas upon which his theories rest but all of Sociological study and the field of Sociology as well. It could be said that from these ideas, the field of Sociology as a serious study was born.
Sociology, the science of society, was largely due to the effort of Durkheim. It seems to me that he was obsessed with gaining credit as a scientist and making his work a study to be taken seriously. He was successful in this endeavor, as is evident in his lasting legacy and tribute: the fact that sociology is indeed seen as a science a hundred years after his work. He sought to prove through his theories that society could be studied in a methodical way, going so far as to use the Scientific Method in his own observations. There is a definite taste in his somewhat stubborn studies – he refused to study the individual and was concerned only with society as a whole.
Society, though, is different than other sciences like physics and biology, and even psychology. Because society is made up of many individuals and institutions, it is enormously difficult to study. Although I recognize that it is possible to not only observe but predict human behavior, I believe that man, and therefore society, has the agency to choose his own life – or demise. This is because man is cognate, and each individual has the power to make his or her own decisions. Even instinctual animals are several levels behind humans in this regard. All members of their species are expected to act in certain ways at certain times and can be relied upon to do so or have a lesser chance of survival. Humans are different perhaps precisely because they are complex – and maybe too complex to study.
Another foundation upon which Durkheim’s theories rest is that of the Organic Analogy. Durkheim sought to compare society directly to an organism, with different institutions making up the “organs” such as government, economics, and religion, and within those, the tissues and cells and organelles which make up those institutions. He discussed the Division of Labor within this analogy, stating that each organ worked according to it's ultimate design.
How does this fit into the idea of the American dream? The individual’s role in the great organism of society is, as I see it, very subdued in Durkheim’s approach. In fact, he leaves almost no room for the individual in his model. I suppose that the “cells” of the body are individuals, but even within the cells, organelles and nuclei work together to form a working body. This could be interpreted as the family. So, the family is the cell…that still does not solve the issue that if a mitochondria wanted to be a cytoplasm, it could not do it. The parts of the body are birthed to a specific role and remain in that role all their lives. They did not choose who they were or what function they wished to play. If this is Durkheim’s society, count me out!
But as was stated and is a constantly criticized issue in Durkheim’s theories, the individual has no place. Durkheim was not concerned with THAT part of the analogy – only with the larger , more important organs. In that case, how far does the analogy carry? Can we name which of Durkheim’s organizations is the brain or heart or lungs? Should we be able to; are any of them really more important than the others? We have to step back even further, to the actual being, to see the real thing: society. But society is only (and can only be studied as) its parts. So we’re back to square one.
It would seem to me that this is a faulty analogy that may seem rather appealing on the surface. However, perhaps he did not intend for it to be really literal…why, then, would he use it?
The third and final underlying foundation of Durkheim’s theories is that of the social fact, a term he coined in order to define the entity that society becomes beyond its individual components. One definition of a social fact: social facts are the social structures and cultural norms and values that are external to the individual. This is important to remember when reading Durkheim because he leaves the individual out of virtually all of his theories, even going so far as to state that the individual is nothing without society.
Durkheim’s social facts are often cited as being the values, morals, and traditions of a society, but they also include its laws and general norms held by the people. They can be economic, political, religious, or governmental. Social facts are important to Durkheim because they are measurable and observable on a large scale. They can in fact leave out the individual. They must. For any fact of society to be legitimate, it must be overreaching to all of society, and ignore the individual. While Durkheim’s focus is on the society, it is also important to remember that without the individual, there is no society! Even he admits this (pg 27). In this way, Durkheim could observe a changing society where the facts long held were crumbling. Matters of ethnicity, religion, politics and economic beliefs were beginning their shift in his time and continue forming a chasm in today’s world.
The social fact has allowed much good science and study of society. It has allowed studies based upon religion and environment and gender to not only take place but to be accepted and taken seriously. The idea of the social fact has indeed become embedded in our society today.
Durkheim’s discussions of moral obligation are even more confusing precisely because he cannot discuss the morality of a society without discussing the individual’s morals, which he deigns to do in his piece The Science of Morality. He discusses in this same section a piece entitled Discipline and Freedom in which much is said about altruism, a topic which is very interesting to me. He defines altruism as “attachment to other than oneself”, and says that it “is as deeply rooted as it is contrary in the psychological nature of man” (114). So altruism, though inherent, remains mysterious.
I wonder what Durkheim would say of society’s moral obligation to society. Surely just as the individual sacrifices freedom in exchange for security within society, society promises order and, in reality, is morally obligated to its individuals. We see this especially in government, but also in other aspects of society like religion and education and law. Here, let us turn our discussion to our modern globalized society. Is one society morally obligated to another? On the verse side, can one society legitimately control another? This is an issue in current US policy: whether the United States can really mitigate foreign conflicts; and whether the United States should have the power and audacity to attempt at being the world’s peacemaker. Then again, can a privileged society stand aside while innocent people are oppressed, killed, or economically unstable? I think not; but perhaps it is up to the individual to mobilize such as effort. We have seen such a mobilization in the current situation in Darfur, Sudan where hundreds of thousands have been slaughtered during a period of ethnic cleansing. Millions of dollars have been donated through grass root movements, and while this is a significant improvement to ignorance, the situation is still unsolved and people continue to lose their lives every day. The people have, in the past, had the power to change the world through such movements, like ending the Vietnam War, but it would seem that the world (and the situation) is dramatically different.
Perhaps this problem will never truly be solved; the line between doing too much and too little is thin. The changing world’s solution to war was the creation of the United Nations, an organization that, despite its noble intentions, does very little to actually solve any real problems. In fact in its entire history, the UN has had only one real success, the Sinai peninsula, and that was over 50 years ago. Despite its shortcomings, however, the UN is to be credited with opening up the lines of communication for nations, and is an integral part in our global society. The UN’s attempts at assistance currently focus on the Middle East and the issue of terrorism. In our world, “terrorist” is almost a swear word. It carries great power the create fear, which of course is its intention. Durkheim, as far as I can tell, never theorized about terrorism, mostly because it was not so large an issue in the 19th century when he was publishing. However, he did discuss altruism, which is akin to but almost exactly opposite suicide terrorism. Or is it? Can terrorism be altruistic? I turn to another world example, that of the tiny country of Chechnya in the Caucasus mountains between Russia and Georgia.
Having studied the situation between Chechnya and Russia for two years, I am constantly appalled at the world’s lack of response to Chechnya’s needs. Chechnya is a protectorate of Russia seeking independence. It is no coincidence that Russia continues its grasp on an area which controls the oil pipelines from the Caspian Sea to Russia, although the area holds a more lasting history of oppression from Russian leaders for centuries. After petitions to the United Nations and similar organizations, forming a legitimate and democratic government with an elected President (who was assassinated in 2005), and having open skirmishes with the Russian army for more than a decade, the Chechens turned to terrorism.
I wish to be very clear: terrorism is not to be excused in any case, but it can be made to be understandable. The people of Chechnya have lost more than half of their population, seen their cities literally crumble, lived in destitution, and altogether have had an embittering experience with Russian leaders for centuries. It is not difficult, then, to wonder why the Chechens feel that no one pays attention to their hardships, especially when they can see how much world media is directed toward terrorism. So, in September 2004, Chechen rebels stormed a school in Beslan and held hostage its inhabitants. Over 300 people lost their lives in this incident, and whether reports of the police storming the building caused these deaths, the tragedy is that it happened, yes, but also that it could have easily been prevented.
Of course, it is easy for me to sit in a position of very limited power and responsibility and say that I would have done any differently than Russia’s government. However, I think it is not difficult to suppose that any truly moral person would have prevented the lost of so many lives at almost any cost, and especially not in exchange for money.
This case of terrorism is what I would like to call altruistic terrorism, which, despite its oxymoronic appearance, actually makes sense, especially considering that it is the poignancy which labeled the rebels “terrorists” in the first place, hoping to seek legitimacy in the world’s view and jump on the War on Terror’s bandwagon. This is an entirely different sort of terrorism that religious fanaticism, however, and should not be confused with that type.
Altruistic terrorism can be used as a tool to advance or destroy a society. In the case of Chechnya, however, the militants employing such a tool failed in their timing to realize that they would be seen as fanatical. No one would even consider listening to their message after such a terrible act, and again, whether the fault of the rebels or the “rescuers”, the rebels had no power to either confirm or deny their specific actions.
So where does morality come into this society? Can one really withhold a dieing people the power to lash back against their aggressors? One would not condemn self defense as a motive for even murder, and yet the altruistic terrorist is indeed condemned for the scrape they gave the oppressor. In any case, it is important to remember that killing innocent people is wrong, and killing children downright abhorrent. However, one must look at the situation from both sides. How can one child’s life be less important than that of any other’s?
In this regard, Durkheim’s obsession with Society at large is helpful. One can argue for ages about individual’s motives and reasons, but the big picture remains the big picture. Russian society is no doubt hurt by the pinprick of Chechnya’s aggression, and Chechnya is certainly hurt by the iron fist. Can we, in this regard, zoom out all the way to Charles Darwin, and say that the society is not fit to survive and will therefore find its place in the world or perish? I think that this is where Durkheim’s analysis of society is weakest: the very fact that we help those in need, protect to weak, and hold onto the infirm, in fact the very ideals that make us human, make it impossible to watch the overarching Society demolish all who stand in its way.
We must never forget, as Durkheim did, that society is made up of individuals, and that those individuals have a morality entirely of their own, regardless of any societal rules, laws, or norms. In the end, the individual is his own master, and the very fact that we can choose makes us that much different than any animal.