what you have learned about prison gangs and the threat of violence

Violence seems to be an inherent part of human history . Violence is even a strong element in the history of state formation . What we nowadays call nation states could only have evolved after the monopolization of tax and violence by state . In the ancient days of feudalism , the king could rule with absolute power thanks to his ability to the use of exclusive violence against his internal and external enemies . His army in turn , is financed by the collection of tax from his people who will be protected by the king from `unfair

oppression and exploitation by others . The democratic revolution after the middle ages did not change this monopolization of violence by the state . For this reason , the history of the human race is still closely connected to violence . Now we have to witness a new violent phase of human history : the war against terrorism which is collective violence between states , groups and mostly innocent individuals

Brownsteing 's book does not discuss the context of war as part of state violence monopolization , but it touches the broad issues related to violence in a particular society the US . Issue of violence related to drug related crimes , violence in the modern family , violence against women , violence amongst the youth , violence against the poor and the minorities , and also violence against the worker . In an interesting chapter about the innocent bystander , the question arises : are bystanders victims or part of the problem due to their inability or unwiilingness to stop violence

This book chooses a certain perspective adopted from sociology and psychology to explain the phenomenon of violence : social constructionism . This perspective is a classical explanation of human history in which almost everything in the social reality is the result of human intervention and construct . Unlike its competitor , evolutionary psychology , the social construction approach is emphasizing the culturally determined behavior of individuals and groups . Evolutionary psychologists are , in turn , always emphasizing the biological factors in explaining the violent nature of humans . According to this alternative approach , man is by nature violent due to his inner biological structure which constitutes chromosomes , genes , and DNA . Social constructivists strongly oppose this approach since man is `programmed ' to be violent or non-violent depending on the group and culture in which he belongs or originates . For this reason , non-violence can be seen as a cultural trait in certain societies whereas other societies see violence as an undifferentiated part of its social reality

The origins of social construction is phenomenology in which the most important issue is the retracing of the original constitution of the fundamental skeleton of the life-world which man takes for granted in the natural attitude and which the social scientist rarely makes thematic . In other words , the phenomenologist argues that the common sense world is taken for granted while the opposite is true . The common sense world becomes problematic when the origins of this world are analyzed . Man is seen as napve because he does not have doubts about the past , present and future...