Contents

Journey to Belonging: Flight from Shame

Howard Zehr

Introduction

In the world of criminal justice, prison walls are overwhelming realities. Within these walls of concrete and razor ribbon we keep people locked up, pointing fingers of blame and shame, guarding others from them. But, the outer walls of prison are mirrored by inner prisons. Within each prisoner—indeed, within each one of us—there are parts of ourselves that we keep locked up, pointing fingers of blame and shame, guarding these parts from others. All of us have tragedies and traumas; all of us have inner wounds, parts of our personalities that we hide. Do we sentence these parts to life without parole? Or do we recognize the need for healing?

Those of us enmeshed in contemporary western culture are used to hearing the concepts of shame and honor applied to cultures and eras distant from our own. However, I am increasingly convinced that they continue to operate in powerful, and often subterranean, ways. In fact, I would like to hypothesize that they provide an important lens for understanding crime, justice, and the responses of victims.

To explore this journey, I suggest we use a lens of trauma. When we use more common shorthand terms like "crime,"we trigger a host of stereotypes and assumptions that condition the subsequent dialogue. The lens of trauma, however, may allow us to explore this reality more objectively, and with greater empathy and understanding.

I will use this concept—trauma—a bit loosely, as a continuum extending from very high levels of ordinary stress on one end to traumatic and post-traumatic stress on the other. Such trauma is a core experience of both victims and offenders. Being the victim of crime is deeply traumatic; the suffering often includes threats to fundamental assumptions about identity, relationships and meaning. Offenders often experience trauma as well, both as a precursor to their offenses and as a result of their experience of "justice." Their violence may actually be a re-enactment of trauma that they experienced earlier but did not respond to adequately. Unfortunately, society tends to respond by delivering more trauma.

Shame and Humiliation or Honor and Respect

Shame may also be an important dimension of this trauma. I am intrigued by the role of humiliation and the search for its opposite—honor and respect—in 1) the origins of offending behavior, 2) the ways offenders experience justice, 3) the trauma of victimization and 4) the ways victims experience justice. I am convinced by the argument of psychiatrist James Gilligan, that shame—along with the desire to avoid, remove or transform shame—motivates much, if not all, violence.

I also suspect that shame—along with the desire to avoid, remove or transform shame—is a crucial component of victims' trauma, thus driving and shaping their needs for justice. Unfortunately, justice, as we know it, often does little to remove or transform shame, for either offender or victim. In fact, the process of justice often increases shame and humiliation for all parties. The result: offenders may re-offend and victims may demand vengeance.

Since the publication of John Braithwaite's important book, Crime, Shame and Reintegration, the topic of shame has become highly controversial within restorative justice circles. If it is true, as Gilligan and Braithwaite suggest, that shame and the desire to remove it, motivates much crime, then our prescription for crime is counter productive or ineffective. We impose more shame, stigmatizing offenders in ways that begin to define their identities and encourage them to join other "outsiders" in delinquent subcultures. Guilt and shame become a self-perpetuating cycle, feeding one another. In fact, psychiatrist Gilligan argues that punishment decreases the sense of guilt while at the same time accentuating shame, the very motor which drives offending behavior!

The dynamics of shame also help to explain why shame is ultimately ineffective as a deterrent to those at the fringes of society, such as racist groups or paramilitaries. It feeds into shame/rage cycles and forces those who are ostracized to come together more urgently. This often strengthens the very phenomenon we hope to discourage. I remember vividly the reflections of a participant in one of my courses, a former paramilitary ex-prisoner in Northern Ireland. It was not shame that caused him to change—indeed, efforts at shame had strengthened his resolve and his solidarity with his compatriots. It was a new vision of meaning and belonging that changed him.

The experience of shame and humiliation is a thread that runs through victims' experiences as well, and the struggle to remove or transform it is a central element in the journey to healing and belonging. Why? One reason is that in western societies, which value power and autonomy, it is shameful to be overpowered by others. When we are victimized, our status is lowered. We are humiliated by that event, but also often by the ways that we respond to that event—the things we did or didn't do at the time, the ways it affects us afterwards. Shame is further heaped on us when others do not validate our versions of what happened, thus forcing us to keep our experiences secret.

The Process of Justice

Retributive theory argues that pain will restore a sense of reciprocity, but the dynamics of shame and of trauma help explain why this so often fails to achieve what is desired for either victim or offender. Retribution seeks to vindicate and reciprocate, but is often counterproductive.

In order to progress on their journeys, both victim and offender need ways to replace their humiliation with honor and respect. Shame and humiliation must at least be removed and ideally be transformed. This does not easily happen within the retributive framework of our criminal justice systems.

Restorative justice theory, on the other hand, argues that what truly vindicates is acknowledgment of the harm that has been done to the victim and recognition of his/her needs. This is combined with an active effort to encourage offenders to take responsibility and make right the wrongs. By addressing this need for vindication in a positive way, restorative justice has the potential to affirm both victim and offender and help them transform their stories.

Telling Our Stories

Our identities are embedded in our stories, so the re-creation of meaning requires the "re-storying" of our lives. Those who created the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa recognized that healing comes by facing one's past, coming to terms with it, drawing boundaries around it, and incorporating experiences of hurt and wrongdoing into a new story. Repressed memories are dangerous; painful experiences cannot be denied, but must be incorporated into who we are. Sharon Wiggins was sentenced to death for a crime committed at age 13 or 14. She is now serving a life sentence. She knows she cannot deny her past:

"I have a hard time believing I am the same person who came to prison 27 years ago. But, I realize that if it were not for those experiences, I would not be the person I am today. So, I hold on to that part of my past in order to recognize this part of me now."

For victims, as well as for offenders, this involves not only retelling their stories, but transforming these stories of humiliation and shame into stories of dignity and courage. This process has a public, as well as a private, dimension. That's why Judith Lewis Herman, in her seminal book Trauma and Recovery, prefers the term "testimony." Stories are shaped in the telling and retelling; they need compassionate listeners to hear and to validate their "truths."

Meaning and Healing

I suspect that there is another layer to this as well. Ellen Halbert was brutally attacked in her bedroom by an enraged man in a Ninja suit who had hidden in her attic all night. When I interviewed her recently, she tied the sense of shame felt by victims to the fingers of blame pointed, not only by others, but by oneself. Recovery involves a search for meaning set in stories of resilience, validated by others.

Several years ago, I completed a book based on interviews with and photographs of men and women who were serving actual life sentences as a result of having participated in the taking of a life. More recently, I worked on a similar project with survivors of severe violence. My dialogues with those who have offended and those who have been offended against have convinced me that issues of belonging—of connection and disconnection—are intimately related to the causes of trauma and also to the transcendence of trauma. A core element of trauma is disconnection and the road to transcendence of this trauma is through re-connection.

Whether we have victimized or have been victimized, the journey from brokenness and isolation to transcendence and belonging requires us to re-narrate our stories so that they are no longer just about shame and humiliation, but ultimately about dignity and triumph. Questions of meaning, honor and responsibility are all part of the healing journey. The process of justice can contribute to or detract from this "Journey to Belonging."

Adapted from Journey to Belonging, a paper delivered at the international conference Just Peace? Peace Making and Peacebuilding for the New Millenium, Massey University, Albany, New Zealand, April 24-28, 2000. If you would like to read the original paper, it is available for the cost of copying and postage at www.converge.org.nz/pma/a100500.htm