The Hand of Compassion (ebook)

Argumento de The Hand of Compassion (ebook)

"Approximately two-thirds of this volume is devoted to personal narratives of five rescuers, based on interviews conducted by Monroe. The autobiographies of the rescuers are substantial additions to the body of Holocaust testimony. To her credit, Monroe is an unobtrusive interviewer and a light-handed editor who allows the stories to unfold in illuminating detail."--Choice

"The Hand of Compassion is a compelling and powerful read, a terrific book filled with moving narratives of risk, loss, and sadness, and at the same time, the rescuers' affirmation that all human beings deserve the right to decent treatment. It is an analysis that takes social and political theory out of the text and places the reader in the midst of human suffering and courage."--James M. Glass, Perspectives on Politics

"Infrequently does one read a book that clearly stands as a major contribution to its field. Even less frequently does such a book manage to speak lucidly and intelligibly to two worlds--academia and the general public. In presenting a new theory--of identity and perspective--to help understand the actions of rescuers during the Holocaust, Professor Monroe offers us not only a compelling explanation but one that is at the same time as emotionally moving as it is intellectually persuasive. This is an extraordinary achievement."--David Easton, author of A Systems Analysis of Political Life

"Monroe's very well written argument is advanced and justified by the five individual first-person narratives, gripping in their microdetail, at the heart of this book. I couldn't put the book down."--Susanne Hoeber Rudolph, University of Chicago, author of Reversing the Gaze

"Monroe's accounts of the rescuers are gripping and valuable. She is a sensitive interviewer who gets the most out of her subjects, and her analysis yields some unique conclusions about the theory of morality."--Robert E. Lane, Yale University, author of The Loss of Happiness in Market Democracies

Winner of the 2005 Robert E. Lane Award, Division of Political Psychology, American Political Science Association
Honorable Mention for the 2005 Giovanni Sartori Book Award, Qualitative Methods Section of the American Political Science Association0PREFACE ix
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS xv
Stories That Are True 1
CHAPTER ONE: Margot 9
CHAPTER TWO: Otto 55
CHAPTER THREE: John 101
CHAPTER FOUR: Irene 139
CHAPTER FIVE: Knud 165
CHAPTER SIX: The Complexity of the Moral Life and: the Power of Identity to Influence Choice 187
CHAPTER SEVEN: How Identity and Perspective Led to Moral Choice 211
CHAPTER EIGHT: What Makes People Help Others: Constructing Moral Theory 239
A Different Way of Seeing Things 257
APPENDIX A: Narratives as Windows on the Minds of Others 267
APPENDIX B: Finding the Rescuers 287
NOTES 291
BIBLIOGRAPHY 331
INDEX 355