Virtuous Violence

What motivates violence? How can good and compassionate people hurt and kill others, or themselves? Why are people much more likely to kill or assault people they know well, rather than strangers? This provocative and radical book delves into the minds of perpetrators to demonstrate that most people commit violence because they genuinely feel it is the morally right thing to do.

In Virtuous Violence (pub. date Jan. 23rd), Alan Page Fiske and Tage Shakti Rai redefine the way we think about violence. Moral motivations drive the heroes of The Iliad and a mother who smacks her child. A belief in what is right for society, however misguided, lies at the heart of honor killings and the Manson murders. Violent acts—the infamous and the everyday—are recast in this compelling study as attempts to regulate society through cultural ideals.

Virtuous Violence presents a wide-ranging exploration of violence across different cultures and historical eras, demonstrating how people feel obligated to violently create, sustain, end, and honor social relationships in order to make them right.