Ethnic Conflict and War Crimes in the Balkans by Jelena Obradovic

Author:Jelena Obradovic [Obradovic, Jelena]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Modern, 20th Century, Revolutionary, Europe, Baltic States, General, Military
ISBN: 9780857734044
Google: BLDdDwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2013-07-15T01:12:03+00:00

Denial: a discourse, rather than a symptom

To understand denial in Serbia, authors often draw on literature from psychology and behavioural sciences, which is used in order to conceptualise denial as a social, cultural or political phenomenon (e.g. Ramet 2007). Psychology uses studies of moral disengagement and moral rationalisation and cognitive dissonance (see e.g., Tsang 2002, Bandura 1999, Bandura et al. 2001, Bersoff 1999, Simon et al. 1995) to explain how humans restructure inhuman behaviour to make it appear acceptable (Bandura 1999:193).

Cohen, on the other hand, goes a step further and discusses denial responses to atrocities committed by others. In the social sciences, van Dijk (1992) and Cohen (2001) conceptualise denial as anything that is not a direct acknowledgement. Elsewhere, Wittlinger (2006:66) has phrased this as anything but ‘a clear and unambiguous acknowledgement.’ Therefore, denial is extremely broad (Cohen 2001): it can include anything from blame attribution to minimising the number of victims or the ‘turning of a blind eye’ (see Cohen 2001). Frequently, denial is interpretative (Cohen 2001), where it is used as a form of explanation (‘it took place, but with fewer victims’), rather than categorical (‘no, that event never took place’) (see Cohen 2001). Following van Dijk (1992), ‘language users’ who pursue denial strategies are well aware that the statement they are attempting to deny is outside of social norms (van Dijk 1992:89). Since what is actually unknown cannot be interpretatively denied at the same time (see Cohen 2001), denial seems to be employed mainly as a mediation strategy (van Dijk 1992:97).

Thus denial, can be employed for a number of different effects and strategies. This is another aspect not captured by attitude-measuring surveys discussed in Chapter 2. For instance, Cohen suggests that we should consider what is being denied (knowledge of a crime? The crime itself? Its significance?); how it is being denied; by whom, and to what purposes (Cohen 2001). He identifies denial strategies amongst perpetrators, victims and bystanders. All groups can use the same mechanisms of denial such as justification, minimisation and rationalisation. According to van Dijk (1992) denial theory claims to understand not the structural causes of the behaviour (‘the reasons’), but the accounts typically given by deviants themselves (‘their reasons’, added emphasis). It is concerned less with literal denial than with interpretations or implications, especially attempted evasions of judgement (Cohen 2001:58).

Understanding denial in its narrative, account form is of significance, since moving away from the current medicalised and psychologised view of denial as a cognitive block can yield a much richer analysis of the accounts provided by respondents. Thus ‘accounts of denial are not mysterious internal states, but typical vocabularies with clear functions in particular social situations’ (Seu 2010:442).

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