CR #7: Structural Violence

Structural violence describes the way in which structures such as economic, political, or cultural systems harm the greater community by preventing people from meeting their basic needs or fulfilling their fullest potential. There isn’t one person to blame for the barrier, but rather a system. It is structural because these systems are often too embedded into a political or economic organization. There are choices people can not make or things people can not do because they are limited to by racism, clasism, or property. Furthermore, Paul Farmer’s idea of accompaniment starts with being present with a person or community. He takes this further and invites people, especially liberation theologists and ethnographers, to understand the whole picture and not simply judge based on one characteristic. Farmer (2003) says, “To explain suffering, one must embed individual biography in the larger matrix of culture, history, and political economy” (51). Farmer tells the story of a girl named Acephie in a Haitian village. She lived the standards of a woman who often became maids at the hands of the wealthy, and contracted HIV. Not only did she suffer the effects of this disease, but also raised a child who later contradicted HIV. Chouchou, on the other hand, was a boy from another village in Haiti plagued with governmental unrest. He was arrested, jumped, and beaten to death left to die in a ditch. Farmer argues that these two stories are more than just stories of violence, but rather shows the effects of structural violence. Chouchou was living in a violent government where he did not have freedom of speech while Acephie lived in a structured society where women had to be market women or maids and she did not receive the care she needed. Referring back to the idea of accompaniment, this concept is necessary to induce change especially for people like Acephie and Chouchou. It asks to recognize that their suffering is produced by larger mechanisms that policies need to change. Policy-level accompaniment includes appreciative inquiry, which is acknowledging what has already been done to this community. It asks people about their lo cotidano, what is their everyday like? What affects that? What can we do to better their day-to-day? By examining what has been successful or not successful and what people actually need to survive and live, then the listening ears of those who make policies can do its job of working for the people.

Transitional justice describes the way in countries that have recently had conflict chooses to focus on systematic human rights violations. According to King & Page (2018) it is “more focused on the causes that gave rise to the harmful effects, particularly rights violations, abuses and atrocities” (12). For example, how do we move away from our seemingly discriminatory judicial system? Institutional accountability is important in order to make change in policy level, and is morally right because they can acknowledge and fix their errors and power imbalances. My community partner, Parent Services Project (PSP) works with families to help parents educate themselves and their children. Because many of the families immigrated from countries without education, the systems in those countries did not allow them access to education that they often need to have a gain on economic opportunity. Some families fled persecution in their home countries, and other parents suffered in their childhood because of the economic structures. Therefore, PSP combats theses faults and aims to help promote child development and literacy. This program is specifically attuned for the community in the Canal district, many of whom are Spanish-speaking. Their playgroup was even created due to a concerned parent of their child’s education and a desire to be educated as a parent. PSP’s response was to create a weekly playgroup where children can socialize and learn, and parents can learn how to be an even better parent for their child. Although PSP advertises a goal of educating families, they also are working towards ending structural violence.