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On the Judgment of History
In the face of conflict and despair, we often console ourselves by saying that history will be the judge. Today’s oppressors may escape being held responsible for their crimes, but the future will condemn them. Those who stand up for progressive values are on the right side of history. As ideas once condemned to the dustbin of history―white supremacy, hypernationalism, even fascism―return to the world, threatening democratic institutions and values, can we still hold out hope that history will render its verdict?
Joan Wallach Scott critically examines the belief that history will redeem us, revealing the implicit politics of appeals to the judgment of history. She argues that the notion of a linear, ever-improving direction of history hides the persistence of power structures and hinders the pursuit of alternative futures. This vision of necessary progress perpetuates the assumption that the nation-state is the culmination of history and the ultimate source for rectifying injustice. Scott considers the Nuremberg Tribunal and South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which claimed to carry out history’s judgment on Nazism and apartheid, and contrasts them with the movement for reparations for slavery in the United States. Advocates for reparations call into question a national history that has long ignored enslavement and its racist legacies. Only by this kind of critical questioning of the place of the nation-state as the final source of history’s judgment, this book shows, can we open up room for radically different conceptions of justice.
Joan Wallach Scott critically examines the belief that history will redeem us, revealing the implicit politics of appeals to the judgment of history. She argues that the notion of a linear, ever-improving direction of history hides the persistence of power structures and hinders the pursuit of alternative futures. This vision of necessary progress perpetuates the assumption that the nation-state is the culmination of history and the ultimate source for rectifying injustice. Scott considers the Nuremberg Tribunal and South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which claimed to carry out history’s judgment on Nazism and apartheid, and contrasts them with the movement for reparations for slavery in the United States. Advocates for reparations call into question a national history that has long ignored enslavement and its racist legacies. Only by this kind of critical questioning of the place of the nation-state as the final source of history’s judgment, this book shows, can we open up room for radically different conceptions of justice.
144 pages, Paperback
Published September 22, 2020
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About the author
Joan Wallach Scott
57 books88 followersJoan Scott is known internationally for writings that theorize gender as an analytic category. She is a leading figure in the emerging field of critical history. Her ground-breaking work has challenged the foundations of conventional historical practice, including the nature of historical evidence and historical experience and the role of narrative in the writing of history, and has contributed to a transformation of the field of intellectual history. Scott's recent books focus on gender and democratic politics. Her works include The Politics of the Veil (2007), Gender and the Politics of History (1988), Only Paradoxes to Offer: French Feminists and the Rights of Man (1996), and Parité: Sexual Equality and the Crisis of French Universalism (2005). Scott graduated from Brandeis University in 1962 and received her PhD from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1969. Before joining the Institute for Advanced Study, Scott taught in the history departments of Brown University, the University of Illinois at Chicago, Northwestern University, the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and Rutgers University.
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June 9, 2020
American historian Joan Wallach Scott (° 1941) earned her spurs in gender historiography, but in these Ruth Benedict lectures at Columbia University, she focuses on a very theoretical question, namely whether history has its own moral weight . With that she refers to phrases such as: "history will judge," or "we are on the right side of history." For her, that question became particularly topical after Donald Trump took office in the US and racist and extremist right flared up; had history not clearly referred these movements to a dark and uncivilized past? For sure, an interesting question!
In these lectures, she ventures into an analysis of 3 moments in the 20th century in which the 'judgment of history' was formally invoked: the Nuremberg Tribunal in 1946, the Truth Commission in South Africa in 1996 and the movement for compensation of slavery in the United States. She offers a very critical, post-structuralist analysis of those moments, which she says could not substantiate that moral weight of history because they followed too much the logic of the nation-state. In an epilogue Scott sketches the contours of a new philosophy of history, distancing herself of linear, progressive historiography. This book is an interesting read, but with a too hastily written conclusion. More about this in my History-account on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show....
(advance copy received through NetGalley)
In these lectures, she ventures into an analysis of 3 moments in the 20th century in which the 'judgment of history' was formally invoked: the Nuremberg Tribunal in 1946, the Truth Commission in South Africa in 1996 and the movement for compensation of slavery in the United States. She offers a very critical, post-structuralist analysis of those moments, which she says could not substantiate that moral weight of history because they followed too much the logic of the nation-state. In an epilogue Scott sketches the contours of a new philosophy of history, distancing herself of linear, progressive historiography. This book is an interesting read, but with a too hastily written conclusion. More about this in my History-account on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show....
(advance copy received through NetGalley)
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October 22, 2024In general, we forget how fairly recent the statement “history will judge” as a concept is, only emerging with the Enlightenment and modernity. The German history theorist Reinhart Koselleck showed this abundantly: modernity (for him from about 1750 onwards) saw history as an ascending line which connects past, present and future and takes them into an ever higher form of civilization and development. Instead of a multitude of histories, history became an autonomous unit (a 'collective singular'), with its own moral power. Joan Wallach Scott follows that view and adds that the nation-state in particular was seen as the guiding goal, the telos of that historical development and thus the bearer of that moral judgment. But it is precisely because of this that the power of the historical judgment is perverted.
Scott beautifully illustrates that in her first two Ruth Benedict lectures, one on the Nuremberg Tribunal that sentenced the Nazi leaders, and the second on the Truth Commission after the apartheid regime in South Africa. Both approaches, however different, made an explicit appeal to history as the ultimate judgmental body. Scott deconstructs those approaches in a very Foucaultian way. She beautifully exposes how both implicitly adhered to the logic of the nation-state and thus served specific meta-political interests. Both agencies ignored the claims of the nation-state to absolute sovereignty and to the monopoly on violence, thus failing to question the very foundations of that nation-state. The Nuremberg Tribunal sidestepped that tricky issue by calling 'The Third Reich' an aberration of history, the Commission of Truth by ignoring the structural basis of white rule (grounded in colonialism). In her third lecture, she also applies such a deconstruction to the movement for compensation for slavery in the United States. That too relies on the judgment of history, but according to Scott it perceives too little that racism is inherent to the constitution of the American nation-state, which also undermines the moral weight of that state and thus to the history of it.
In an epilogue, Scott brings those analyses together and tries to learn from that blind spot. She pleads for a different, non-modernist history approach: “a record of discontinuity and multiple temporalities, a process of contention and conflict, a story of struggles with and for power, with no sharp boundaries between past, present, and future” . And the logical consequence of this is that history has no moral weight at all, cannot be a "redeemer", as postmodernity in the line of Foucault had already shown. At the same time, she has a hard time with that, because such a conclusion seems to take away any ground for action for just change: if history is not a linear uphill line, but only continuous disruption, then there seems no hope for a better future at all . Referring to the Marxist publicist Massimo Tomba, she solves this issue by proposing that history as disruption on the contrary offers a positive prospect: because the future is open, opportunities are constantly being created to work for a better society.
All very interesting, but unfortunately Scott deals with these fundamental questions in her epilogue rather haphazardly and so her train of thougt remains somewhat on the surface. Instead, I would like to refer to Zoltan Boldiszar Simon's book (History in Times of Unprecedented Change: A Theory for the 21st Century) that I recently read and where the same question (“what if history is not an upward trend, but a chain of constant fundamental change?”) is dealt with in a much more in-depth manner, up to the question whether such a view still offers perspectives for positive action.
(an advanced copy of this book was provided through NetGalley)
Scott beautifully illustrates that in her first two Ruth Benedict lectures, one on the Nuremberg Tribunal that sentenced the Nazi leaders, and the second on the Truth Commission after the apartheid regime in South Africa. Both approaches, however different, made an explicit appeal to history as the ultimate judgmental body. Scott deconstructs those approaches in a very Foucaultian way. She beautifully exposes how both implicitly adhered to the logic of the nation-state and thus served specific meta-political interests. Both agencies ignored the claims of the nation-state to absolute sovereignty and to the monopoly on violence, thus failing to question the very foundations of that nation-state. The Nuremberg Tribunal sidestepped that tricky issue by calling 'The Third Reich' an aberration of history, the Commission of Truth by ignoring the structural basis of white rule (grounded in colonialism). In her third lecture, she also applies such a deconstruction to the movement for compensation for slavery in the United States. That too relies on the judgment of history, but according to Scott it perceives too little that racism is inherent to the constitution of the American nation-state, which also undermines the moral weight of that state and thus to the history of it.
In an epilogue, Scott brings those analyses together and tries to learn from that blind spot. She pleads for a different, non-modernist history approach: “a record of discontinuity and multiple temporalities, a process of contention and conflict, a story of struggles with and for power, with no sharp boundaries between past, present, and future” . And the logical consequence of this is that history has no moral weight at all, cannot be a "redeemer", as postmodernity in the line of Foucault had already shown. At the same time, she has a hard time with that, because such a conclusion seems to take away any ground for action for just change: if history is not a linear uphill line, but only continuous disruption, then there seems no hope for a better future at all . Referring to the Marxist publicist Massimo Tomba, she solves this issue by proposing that history as disruption on the contrary offers a positive prospect: because the future is open, opportunities are constantly being created to work for a better society.
All very interesting, but unfortunately Scott deals with these fundamental questions in her epilogue rather haphazardly and so her train of thougt remains somewhat on the surface. Instead, I would like to refer to Zoltan Boldiszar Simon's book (History in Times of Unprecedented Change: A Theory for the 21st Century) that I recently read and where the same question (“what if history is not an upward trend, but a chain of constant fundamental change?”) is dealt with in a much more in-depth manner, up to the question whether such a view still offers perspectives for positive action.
(an advanced copy of this book was provided through NetGalley)
July 28, 2020
Barack Obama, among others, likes to accuse people of being on the wrong side of history. As if history is some sort of self-correcting gizmo where truth always rises to the top. This is of course complete nonsense, and Joan Wallach Scott’s book On The Judgment of History proves it by examining three major attempts to actively get on the right side of history.
She picked the Nuremburg Trials, South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) and the current attempts to wring reparations for blacks out of the US government. In every case, history has been twisted, abused, ignored and sometimes just plain sidelined. The results are always disappointing. Both of history and of this book.
In Nuremburg, allied lawyers spent countless days slicing and dicing words and concepts, as lawyers always do. They questioned whether Germany was actually a nation-state and whether the National Socialists were actually a political party. They of course pontificated on the morals or lack thereof in a genocide of Jews, without the slightest sense of irony or hypocrisy, because all of their countries had done something similar, if not to Jews then to natives or other ethnics or homsexuals. But history is written by the victors, and history’s “judgment” is therefore quite worthless.
In South Africa, the TRC became a self-purge of guilt under the commission’s leadership of Bishop Desmond Tutu. It was designed to be a national, collective self-reckoning, but degenerated into lurid confessions by individuals to ask forgiveness from other individuals. No one was prosecuted and no new laws were born from its loins. Did the nation heal from all this bleating? Many think not.
And in the USA, calls for reparations for hundreds of years of slavery followed by hundreds of years of discrimination have led precisely nowhere, as blacks are still far behind in social and economic terms. New generations of blacks are discovering their more recent ancestors also called for reparations, as they suffered similar indignations and insults, not to mention discrimination and death. White supremacy is still on the right side of history, it seems.
So history is not the truth filter many like to claim, and it is just a cop-out, a way to avoid dealing with a crime, a rogue, a bigot or a criminal. Barack Obama in particular, should be ashamed.
Scott’s book is a written version of a lecture series she gave. She is a historian of renown, but the book is sadly flat and uninspiring, often just snippets of quotes from her research. I could find no great insights of hers to repeat, and nothing quotable to impress readers here. What she says has to be self-evident to students of history. For the rest of us, it is pretty obvious anyway.
David Wineberg
She picked the Nuremburg Trials, South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) and the current attempts to wring reparations for blacks out of the US government. In every case, history has been twisted, abused, ignored and sometimes just plain sidelined. The results are always disappointing. Both of history and of this book.
In Nuremburg, allied lawyers spent countless days slicing and dicing words and concepts, as lawyers always do. They questioned whether Germany was actually a nation-state and whether the National Socialists were actually a political party. They of course pontificated on the morals or lack thereof in a genocide of Jews, without the slightest sense of irony or hypocrisy, because all of their countries had done something similar, if not to Jews then to natives or other ethnics or homsexuals. But history is written by the victors, and history’s “judgment” is therefore quite worthless.
In South Africa, the TRC became a self-purge of guilt under the commission’s leadership of Bishop Desmond Tutu. It was designed to be a national, collective self-reckoning, but degenerated into lurid confessions by individuals to ask forgiveness from other individuals. No one was prosecuted and no new laws were born from its loins. Did the nation heal from all this bleating? Many think not.
And in the USA, calls for reparations for hundreds of years of slavery followed by hundreds of years of discrimination have led precisely nowhere, as blacks are still far behind in social and economic terms. New generations of blacks are discovering their more recent ancestors also called for reparations, as they suffered similar indignations and insults, not to mention discrimination and death. White supremacy is still on the right side of history, it seems.
So history is not the truth filter many like to claim, and it is just a cop-out, a way to avoid dealing with a crime, a rogue, a bigot or a criminal. Barack Obama in particular, should be ashamed.
Scott’s book is a written version of a lecture series she gave. She is a historian of renown, but the book is sadly flat and uninspiring, often just snippets of quotes from her research. I could find no great insights of hers to repeat, and nothing quotable to impress readers here. What she says has to be self-evident to students of history. For the rest of us, it is pretty obvious anyway.
David Wineberg
August 9, 2020
In this book, Scott considers the judgement of history-how we consistently say "never again" after horrific events and rely on history to condemn bad actors of the past. Scott is arguing that the "moral impeccability to the judgment of history" perhaps isn't as solid as many think it is. Using the case studies of the Nuremberg Trials, the Truth and Reconciliation Committee in South Africa, and the case for reparations in the United States, Scott details how history is invoked as a mechanism to absolve current actors for their actions. She writes: "The invocation of history's judgment suggests an external force at work. It is projection in two senses. One psychic: our own wishes attributed outward, in this case to a seemingly extrahuman, necessarily progressive force-History. The other temporal: assessing actions-our own and those of others-from the perspective of an imagined redemptive future that we will have had a hand in creating."
Scott is ultimately arguing that History cannot be the only force working for change. Real, tangible, lasting change can only come about through the present actions of citizens. History can, and should, be used to learn about past injustices, but it cannot carry the full moral weight of absolution.
I gave this book 3 stars because while I love the introduction and conclusion, and the main thesis put forth, the rest of the book read like a historiography to me. There was too little analysis and development of the main idea-judgment of history. But, I think it is a good introductory piece and a great reference for historians.
Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC of this book!
Scott is ultimately arguing that History cannot be the only force working for change. Real, tangible, lasting change can only come about through the present actions of citizens. History can, and should, be used to learn about past injustices, but it cannot carry the full moral weight of absolution.
I gave this book 3 stars because while I love the introduction and conclusion, and the main thesis put forth, the rest of the book read like a historiography to me. There was too little analysis and development of the main idea-judgment of history. But, I think it is a good introductory piece and a great reference for historians.
Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC of this book!
September 4, 2020
TL;DR
On the Judgment of History by Joan Wallach Scott shows us that though the actions of history may be settled, the lessons are never finished. Recommended.
Disclaimer: The publisher provided a free Advanced Reading Copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Review: On the Judgment of History
Since 2016’s election, the number of times I’ve heard the phrase “history will not judge _______ well” (or some variation) has skyrocketed. It seems to come up once a week while scrolling through social media. The idea that history will provide comeuppance for crimes committed now is one that many people, including myself, cling to for hope. But is it true? Does history provide an outlet for justice? Dr. Joan Wallach Scott investigates that question in her book On the Judgment of History, which is part of the Ruth Benedict Book Series from Columbia University Press. Dr. Scott’s launching point for this study was Nazi’s marching on Charlottesville. She asks a question that I think many people asked themselves. Hadn’t the nazi ideology been defeated and thoroughly repudiated after World War II? To answer this question, Dr. Scott looked at attempts (or lack thereof) to reconcile three of history’s biggest atrocities: the Nuremberg trials after World War II, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa, and reparations for slavery in the United States. Dr. Scott’s investigation is inciteful, elegant, yet not comforting. But harsh truths are truths nonetheless, and On the Judgment of History has a lot of truth in it.
The introduction of On the Judgment of History states that this book came from a series of lectures that Dr. Scott gave for the Ruth Benedict Lectures at Columbia University. I would have loved to sit in on one of those lectures. (I haven’t looked for them on YouTube.) As stated earlier, this book looks at the aftermath of three of history’s biggest atrocities: the Nuremberg trials, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa, and reparations for slavery in the United States. As one would imagine of a book based on a lecture series, this is an academic book. Dr. Scott peppers the text with quotes and references. The writing is very analytical and academic focused, but there is plenty to learn and enjoy for hobbyists like me.
There are three sections of this book, and each fit together wonderfully. Dr. Scott ties them into a unifying whole in a very satisfying way. Though slight in pages, this book contains depth. It made me more curious about the Nuremberg Trials, and I learned so much about the reparations movement.
The Nuremberg Trials
Dr. Scott’s analysis of the Nuremberg trials shifted my perspective. She noted that the goal was to establish the Nazi crimes so that they and their ideas were politically and morally out of bounds forever. Dr. Scott noted that the trial was careful to separate individuals and the state. For example in the opening address, Robert Jackson said, “Of course, the idea that a state, any more than a corporation, commits crimes is a fiction. Crimes always are committed only by persons.” Jackson worried about legal issues for a nation’s sovereignty. Yet he often drifted back between the Nazi state as a nation to an organized criminal organization. Dr. Scott’s analysis is excellent. She notes that Jackson’s balancing act erases the German’s who resisted the Nazis while trying carefully to avoid punishing the Nazi state in such a way that the U.S. treatment of African-Americans could be called into question. So, Jackson and others made the violation of other nation’s sovereignty into the key issue.
Does this section on the Nuremberg trials and their documentation of Nazi horrors vindicate the question of whether History redeems the deeds of the past or at least instructs us to prevent them from happening again? I say no, and I think Dr. Scott would as well. Put aside the fact that Holocaust Deniers exist and grow online; set aside the fact that Nazi extremism is loud and proud in the Trump years; look at the trial itself. Nuremberg served as a way for ‘good’ nations to distinguish themselves as law abiding, and it prescribed racism to Nazi extremism.
South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commision
Dr. Scott opens this section with a beautiful quote from Jacques Derrida, “One could never, in the ordinary sense of the words, found a politics or law on forgiveness.” The Truth and Reconciliation Commission sought to document the crimes of apartheid; it focused not on retribution but reconciliation better known as forgiving. Her focus here is the interplay of Kader Asmal and Bishop Desmond Tutu. Asmal wanted to assign responsibility for past crimes while recognizing the role of dissenters in changing the system and, ultimately, change the system such that it didn’t happen again. He sought to create a collective change while Tutu focused on individual responsibility. Tutu’s focus on forgiving healed the individual without giving political agency to those who had to forgive. More often than not, forgiveness would be required of unpunished injustices.
Does this section demonstrate that History provides accountability? Again, I’d say no. There is a human need for justice, and forgiveness, when compelled externally, is not justice. Forgiving someone who has transgressed you is an individual act that must come from within. While it is often healing, the act only heals when the person chooses it on their own. While apartheid’s crimes are recorded and deemed unacceptable for history, it likely did little for individuals as racism, hurt, anger, and loss of life do not go away upon forgiving.
The quote that Scott opens the chapter highlights something I’ve been thinking a lot about lately as a U.S. citizen. The U.S. thinks of itself as a law and order nation, and we are quick to punish. Our politics and our laws have nothing to do with forgiveness, maybe less to do with justice. We, Americans, yes, I do include myself, are loath to forgive. We are quick to throw people in jail or, at least, to call for their jailing. This is not unique to one party or the other. We as a nation require punishment, and acts of forgiveness become astonishing. I remember after the murder of Daniel Pearl that his father forgave the terrorists. It was unthinkable that a father could forgive the murderers of his son. I couldn’t understand it, and I’m not sure I could have ever been that strong. But I think about it a lot as I see both lefties and righties call for the jailing of their political opponents. Will we ever be smart enough to forgive and find balance?
U.S. Slavery Reparations
The section on reparations caught my interest the most. It states plainly that the U.S. has never dealt with slavery in a meaningful fashion. We try to bury it in the past without any thought as to how it affects us today. Dr. Scott quotes Ta-Nehisi Coates here. (Rightly so, please, read The Case for Reparations. It’s a beautiful argument for reparations. Her discussion on debt as another means of imposing a quasi-slavery is excellent. Reparations could be thought of as a demand for lost earnings. Yet the U.S. will not be introspective about slavery. While Germany reckoned with its history and moved on, the U.S. trots merrily along thinking slavery and racism ended with the Civil War, and that everyone in the U.S. is equal. Reparations requires an admission of guilt that a shockingly high number of Americans will not recognize. While Dr. Scott lists the positive and negatives from Reconstruction to the present, she notes that these do little to dismantle the systematic inequality between whites and blacks in the U.S. I found this to be a powerful section on a topic that we will never move past without discussing as a nation.
This section also highlights how historians are continually revisiting the past and reinterpreting in the light of new findings, of new stories. Too often, we treat history as a story with a beginning and end, but it’s not that way. As Dr. Scott says, there is no one story to be told that is history. This is the section where the evidence is conclusive that history can fail to hold nations accountable for past horrors. One example that she uses is John Conyer’s HR 40 bill to study the effects of slavery on contemporary African-Americans. Year after year, congress failed to even bring the bill to a vote. Slavery continued through poll taxes, lynching, Jim Crow laws, etc.
Obviously, this section shows that History doesn’t provide justice for the acts of slavery. In the U.S., history is used to pave over those horrors. Hell, history books in Texas and elsewhere list slavery near the bottom of reasons for the Civil War, and the Lost Cause is still alive and well in the South. It took an HBO show – The Watchmen, worth your time – to educate most of America about the bombing of black wall street. A new HBO show – Lovecraft Country – looks to educate many Americans on sundown towns. History for the average U.S. citizen is more about the myth of American exceptionalism than dealing with our nation as a whole.
So, Is There Comfort in the Historical Record?
Now for the bad news, if one is looking to be comforted by the idea that history is a moral force that motivates the powerful or rights the wrongs of the past, I don’t think you’ll find it here. I didn’t. But this just means that we need to act now. Instead of being complacent and waiting for history to judge, we should judge. We should act to right the wrongs ongoing in our time.
Conclusion
Joan Wallach Scott’s On the Judgment of History is a complex look at how humanity responded to three of history’s greatest crimes. Dr. Scott shows that history isn’t a tool for justice. History doesn’t have a single story; there’s no plot arc. History is simply a tool for learning, and it’s up to us to use that knowledge to better ourselves and our nation.
On the Judgment of History by Joann Wallach Scott is available from Columbia University Press on September 22nd, 2020.
7 out of 10!
On the Judgment of History by Joan Wallach Scott shows us that though the actions of history may be settled, the lessons are never finished. Recommended.
Disclaimer: The publisher provided a free Advanced Reading Copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Review: On the Judgment of History
Since 2016’s election, the number of times I’ve heard the phrase “history will not judge _______ well” (or some variation) has skyrocketed. It seems to come up once a week while scrolling through social media. The idea that history will provide comeuppance for crimes committed now is one that many people, including myself, cling to for hope. But is it true? Does history provide an outlet for justice? Dr. Joan Wallach Scott investigates that question in her book On the Judgment of History, which is part of the Ruth Benedict Book Series from Columbia University Press. Dr. Scott’s launching point for this study was Nazi’s marching on Charlottesville. She asks a question that I think many people asked themselves. Hadn’t the nazi ideology been defeated and thoroughly repudiated after World War II? To answer this question, Dr. Scott looked at attempts (or lack thereof) to reconcile three of history’s biggest atrocities: the Nuremberg trials after World War II, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa, and reparations for slavery in the United States. Dr. Scott’s investigation is inciteful, elegant, yet not comforting. But harsh truths are truths nonetheless, and On the Judgment of History has a lot of truth in it.
The introduction of On the Judgment of History states that this book came from a series of lectures that Dr. Scott gave for the Ruth Benedict Lectures at Columbia University. I would have loved to sit in on one of those lectures. (I haven’t looked for them on YouTube.) As stated earlier, this book looks at the aftermath of three of history’s biggest atrocities: the Nuremberg trials, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa, and reparations for slavery in the United States. As one would imagine of a book based on a lecture series, this is an academic book. Dr. Scott peppers the text with quotes and references. The writing is very analytical and academic focused, but there is plenty to learn and enjoy for hobbyists like me.
There are three sections of this book, and each fit together wonderfully. Dr. Scott ties them into a unifying whole in a very satisfying way. Though slight in pages, this book contains depth. It made me more curious about the Nuremberg Trials, and I learned so much about the reparations movement.
The Nuremberg Trials
Dr. Scott’s analysis of the Nuremberg trials shifted my perspective. She noted that the goal was to establish the Nazi crimes so that they and their ideas were politically and morally out of bounds forever. Dr. Scott noted that the trial was careful to separate individuals and the state. For example in the opening address, Robert Jackson said, “Of course, the idea that a state, any more than a corporation, commits crimes is a fiction. Crimes always are committed only by persons.” Jackson worried about legal issues for a nation’s sovereignty. Yet he often drifted back between the Nazi state as a nation to an organized criminal organization. Dr. Scott’s analysis is excellent. She notes that Jackson’s balancing act erases the German’s who resisted the Nazis while trying carefully to avoid punishing the Nazi state in such a way that the U.S. treatment of African-Americans could be called into question. So, Jackson and others made the violation of other nation’s sovereignty into the key issue.
Does this section on the Nuremberg trials and their documentation of Nazi horrors vindicate the question of whether History redeems the deeds of the past or at least instructs us to prevent them from happening again? I say no, and I think Dr. Scott would as well. Put aside the fact that Holocaust Deniers exist and grow online; set aside the fact that Nazi extremism is loud and proud in the Trump years; look at the trial itself. Nuremberg served as a way for ‘good’ nations to distinguish themselves as law abiding, and it prescribed racism to Nazi extremism.
South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commision
Dr. Scott opens this section with a beautiful quote from Jacques Derrida, “One could never, in the ordinary sense of the words, found a politics or law on forgiveness.” The Truth and Reconciliation Commission sought to document the crimes of apartheid; it focused not on retribution but reconciliation better known as forgiving. Her focus here is the interplay of Kader Asmal and Bishop Desmond Tutu. Asmal wanted to assign responsibility for past crimes while recognizing the role of dissenters in changing the system and, ultimately, change the system such that it didn’t happen again. He sought to create a collective change while Tutu focused on individual responsibility. Tutu’s focus on forgiving healed the individual without giving political agency to those who had to forgive. More often than not, forgiveness would be required of unpunished injustices.
Does this section demonstrate that History provides accountability? Again, I’d say no. There is a human need for justice, and forgiveness, when compelled externally, is not justice. Forgiving someone who has transgressed you is an individual act that must come from within. While it is often healing, the act only heals when the person chooses it on their own. While apartheid’s crimes are recorded and deemed unacceptable for history, it likely did little for individuals as racism, hurt, anger, and loss of life do not go away upon forgiving.
The quote that Scott opens the chapter highlights something I’ve been thinking a lot about lately as a U.S. citizen. The U.S. thinks of itself as a law and order nation, and we are quick to punish. Our politics and our laws have nothing to do with forgiveness, maybe less to do with justice. We, Americans, yes, I do include myself, are loath to forgive. We are quick to throw people in jail or, at least, to call for their jailing. This is not unique to one party or the other. We as a nation require punishment, and acts of forgiveness become astonishing. I remember after the murder of Daniel Pearl that his father forgave the terrorists. It was unthinkable that a father could forgive the murderers of his son. I couldn’t understand it, and I’m not sure I could have ever been that strong. But I think about it a lot as I see both lefties and righties call for the jailing of their political opponents. Will we ever be smart enough to forgive and find balance?
U.S. Slavery Reparations
The section on reparations caught my interest the most. It states plainly that the U.S. has never dealt with slavery in a meaningful fashion. We try to bury it in the past without any thought as to how it affects us today. Dr. Scott quotes Ta-Nehisi Coates here. (Rightly so, please, read The Case for Reparations. It’s a beautiful argument for reparations. Her discussion on debt as another means of imposing a quasi-slavery is excellent. Reparations could be thought of as a demand for lost earnings. Yet the U.S. will not be introspective about slavery. While Germany reckoned with its history and moved on, the U.S. trots merrily along thinking slavery and racism ended with the Civil War, and that everyone in the U.S. is equal. Reparations requires an admission of guilt that a shockingly high number of Americans will not recognize. While Dr. Scott lists the positive and negatives from Reconstruction to the present, she notes that these do little to dismantle the systematic inequality between whites and blacks in the U.S. I found this to be a powerful section on a topic that we will never move past without discussing as a nation.
This section also highlights how historians are continually revisiting the past and reinterpreting in the light of new findings, of new stories. Too often, we treat history as a story with a beginning and end, but it’s not that way. As Dr. Scott says, there is no one story to be told that is history. This is the section where the evidence is conclusive that history can fail to hold nations accountable for past horrors. One example that she uses is John Conyer’s HR 40 bill to study the effects of slavery on contemporary African-Americans. Year after year, congress failed to even bring the bill to a vote. Slavery continued through poll taxes, lynching, Jim Crow laws, etc.
Obviously, this section shows that History doesn’t provide justice for the acts of slavery. In the U.S., history is used to pave over those horrors. Hell, history books in Texas and elsewhere list slavery near the bottom of reasons for the Civil War, and the Lost Cause is still alive and well in the South. It took an HBO show – The Watchmen, worth your time – to educate most of America about the bombing of black wall street. A new HBO show – Lovecraft Country – looks to educate many Americans on sundown towns. History for the average U.S. citizen is more about the myth of American exceptionalism than dealing with our nation as a whole.
So, Is There Comfort in the Historical Record?
Now for the bad news, if one is looking to be comforted by the idea that history is a moral force that motivates the powerful or rights the wrongs of the past, I don’t think you’ll find it here. I didn’t. But this just means that we need to act now. Instead of being complacent and waiting for history to judge, we should judge. We should act to right the wrongs ongoing in our time.
Conclusion
Joan Wallach Scott’s On the Judgment of History is a complex look at how humanity responded to three of history’s greatest crimes. Dr. Scott shows that history isn’t a tool for justice. History doesn’t have a single story; there’s no plot arc. History is simply a tool for learning, and it’s up to us to use that knowledge to better ourselves and our nation.
On the Judgment of History by Joann Wallach Scott is available from Columbia University Press on September 22nd, 2020.
7 out of 10!
December 25, 2020
In 2014, I wrote a post on my personal blog about a phrase I kept hearing and which puzzled me, "History will judge..." Pundits and politicians alike were throwing this phrase around as if there in the future existed a panel of historians expected to pass judgment on humanity based on our actions (or in-actions).
Since I wrote that blog post six years ago, this phrase has come into even heavier rotation as chaos and morally ambiguous behavior became the norm on behalf of members of our executive branch, and, to some extent, our legislative branch as well.
I am not alone in thinking about the use of this phrase. Historian and Professor Emerita Joan Wallach Scott became puzzled by it in 2019 when a friend of hers commented on the anti-climax of the Mueller Report by saying that history would judge those who worked to corrupt the democracy of the United States.
This exchange sent Wallach Scott on an investigative journey to find the origins and the meaning of the concept of history as an agent of judgment. The result of that journey is the book, On the Judgment of History (Columbia University Press, 2020).
To investigate the meaning of this concept, Wallach Scott presents three case studies--the Nuremberg Trials following World War II, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa following the dismantling of Apartheid, and the movement for Reparations in the United States. What binds these case studies together is that they "explore the different ways in which the idea of the state as the embodiment and enactment of history operated." (p. xx). Moreover, they engage directly with the nation state as the telos of history; they highlight the connection between nation states and racism; and they demonstrate the use of the nation state as the impetus for what the people involved intend to achieve. In the case of the Nuremberg trials, the goal is the conviction of the war criminals who perpetrated the Holocaust. In the case of South Africa's TRC, a path forward out of Apartheid. In the case of the Reparations Movement, a reckoning with the United States' original sin, slavery.
The case studies are based on extensive and impeccable research, as would be expected of a historian of Wallach Scott's caliber. It raises several important questions, explicitly ("Could the nation state exist without racism at its core?" (p. xxii)) and implicitly (What is the purpose of history?) In her case studies, Wallach Scott demonstrates how history has been utilized (Nuremberg), deferred (South Africa), and challenged (the US). In the end, however, the case studies only partially succeed in addressing the issue at hand, namely why we today refer to history as an impartial, moral judge.
Wallach Scott shows us where the idea of History as Judge comes from by stating that it "is associated with the Enlightenment belief that there is but one History, which moves in an ever-improving direction: forward, upward, cumulatively positive." (p. xv) Because of its origins in the Enlightenment, this One History of forward-moving positivity is inherently European, male, white, colonial, Christian (Protestant, to be exact), intrinsically intertwined with the development of the nation state, and the view of the nation state as the culmination of human civilization (or the nation state as telos).
To answer the question of why this phrase has caught on the way it has, Wallach Scott states that in an increasingly secular age, History has become the "righteous Judge of the Universe." (p. 76) That is to say, where people used to turn to God on Judgment Day for the separation of sheep and goats, we now turn to History in a future deferred.
These conclusions have led me to the following conclusions of my own.
First, as Wallach Scott concludes, the idea of History as a moral judge is an expression of increased secularism in the United States. But, it is also an expression of the normalization of Apocalyptic Christianity in the American mainstream. Writes Wallach Scott, "The unveiling of the role of race in the economic history of the United States explodes long-standing, congratulatory progressive histories as myth. [---] This acknowledgment is a form of restitution and it opens the possibility for reclaiming the lost promise of justice, the messianic hope of the judgment of history." (My italics.) Wallach Scott's decision not to delve deeper into this view of history is the book's lost opportunity.
Second, there is a conspiracy at the heart of American history and the argument over what that conspiracy is, is the reason for the seemingly irreconcilable polarization in American society today. I agree with Wallach Scott's conclusion that "appeals to the judgment of history [...] function more as consolatory polemic in the present than as evidence of deep confidence in the future." (p. 82) There is no doubt that American society is in crisis. Until we can start having a constructive conversation about the buried secrets of our past, we will continue to be a society in crisis. History will not save us, because, as Wallach Scott also states, History with a capital H is written by a group of highly trained and specialized professionals known as historians. It is not a force of its own.
Finally, the idea of History as a Moral Judge of Good and Evil is an American idea and based on American values, which in the mainstream are Christian (Protestant, to be exact) values. Of the three case studies that Wallach Scott presents, two use history to pass judgment and one does not. It is not a coincidence that the two in question (Nuremberg, Reparations) involve Americans in leading roles. The third (the TRC) was an internal South African affair. As a historian trained and educated entirely outside of the American educational system, I reacted to the use of the phrase "History will judge" already in 2014 because the idea that such a notion is even possible was (and is) completely alien to me.
On the Judgment of History by Joan Wallach Scott is a thought-provoking book that opens up for discussion on the role of history and what history is and can be. Ultimately, the book misses its mark because in its choice of case studies, it becomes a demonstration of the belief that the internal concerns of the United States are also the concerns of the world.
Since I wrote that blog post six years ago, this phrase has come into even heavier rotation as chaos and morally ambiguous behavior became the norm on behalf of members of our executive branch, and, to some extent, our legislative branch as well.
I am not alone in thinking about the use of this phrase. Historian and Professor Emerita Joan Wallach Scott became puzzled by it in 2019 when a friend of hers commented on the anti-climax of the Mueller Report by saying that history would judge those who worked to corrupt the democracy of the United States.
This exchange sent Wallach Scott on an investigative journey to find the origins and the meaning of the concept of history as an agent of judgment. The result of that journey is the book, On the Judgment of History (Columbia University Press, 2020).
To investigate the meaning of this concept, Wallach Scott presents three case studies--the Nuremberg Trials following World War II, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa following the dismantling of Apartheid, and the movement for Reparations in the United States. What binds these case studies together is that they "explore the different ways in which the idea of the state as the embodiment and enactment of history operated." (p. xx). Moreover, they engage directly with the nation state as the telos of history; they highlight the connection between nation states and racism; and they demonstrate the use of the nation state as the impetus for what the people involved intend to achieve. In the case of the Nuremberg trials, the goal is the conviction of the war criminals who perpetrated the Holocaust. In the case of South Africa's TRC, a path forward out of Apartheid. In the case of the Reparations Movement, a reckoning with the United States' original sin, slavery.
The case studies are based on extensive and impeccable research, as would be expected of a historian of Wallach Scott's caliber. It raises several important questions, explicitly ("Could the nation state exist without racism at its core?" (p. xxii)) and implicitly (What is the purpose of history?) In her case studies, Wallach Scott demonstrates how history has been utilized (Nuremberg), deferred (South Africa), and challenged (the US). In the end, however, the case studies only partially succeed in addressing the issue at hand, namely why we today refer to history as an impartial, moral judge.
Wallach Scott shows us where the idea of History as Judge comes from by stating that it "is associated with the Enlightenment belief that there is but one History, which moves in an ever-improving direction: forward, upward, cumulatively positive." (p. xv) Because of its origins in the Enlightenment, this One History of forward-moving positivity is inherently European, male, white, colonial, Christian (Protestant, to be exact), intrinsically intertwined with the development of the nation state, and the view of the nation state as the culmination of human civilization (or the nation state as telos).
To answer the question of why this phrase has caught on the way it has, Wallach Scott states that in an increasingly secular age, History has become the "righteous Judge of the Universe." (p. 76) That is to say, where people used to turn to God on Judgment Day for the separation of sheep and goats, we now turn to History in a future deferred.
These conclusions have led me to the following conclusions of my own.
First, as Wallach Scott concludes, the idea of History as a moral judge is an expression of increased secularism in the United States. But, it is also an expression of the normalization of Apocalyptic Christianity in the American mainstream. Writes Wallach Scott, "The unveiling of the role of race in the economic history of the United States explodes long-standing, congratulatory progressive histories as myth. [---] This acknowledgment is a form of restitution and it opens the possibility for reclaiming the lost promise of justice, the messianic hope of the judgment of history." (My italics.) Wallach Scott's decision not to delve deeper into this view of history is the book's lost opportunity.
Second, there is a conspiracy at the heart of American history and the argument over what that conspiracy is, is the reason for the seemingly irreconcilable polarization in American society today. I agree with Wallach Scott's conclusion that "appeals to the judgment of history [...] function more as consolatory polemic in the present than as evidence of deep confidence in the future." (p. 82) There is no doubt that American society is in crisis. Until we can start having a constructive conversation about the buried secrets of our past, we will continue to be a society in crisis. History will not save us, because, as Wallach Scott also states, History with a capital H is written by a group of highly trained and specialized professionals known as historians. It is not a force of its own.
Finally, the idea of History as a Moral Judge of Good and Evil is an American idea and based on American values, which in the mainstream are Christian (Protestant, to be exact) values. Of the three case studies that Wallach Scott presents, two use history to pass judgment and one does not. It is not a coincidence that the two in question (Nuremberg, Reparations) involve Americans in leading roles. The third (the TRC) was an internal South African affair. As a historian trained and educated entirely outside of the American educational system, I reacted to the use of the phrase "History will judge" already in 2014 because the idea that such a notion is even possible was (and is) completely alien to me.
On the Judgment of History by Joan Wallach Scott is a thought-provoking book that opens up for discussion on the role of history and what history is and can be. Ultimately, the book misses its mark because in its choice of case studies, it becomes a demonstration of the belief that the internal concerns of the United States are also the concerns of the world.
December 4, 2022
Crucial reading for anyone wanting to deconstruct how we do history. Scott's analysis on the perceived Telos of history illuminates the concerns of the twenty-first century, particularly in concerns over the nation-state and other sources of power.
March 9, 2025
Speaking of tours-de-force, this book, which examines the Nuremburg Trials, the end of apartheid in South Africa, and the aftermath of slavery in the United States and the results of that, is a glittering example of what a truly talented historian can create as a narrative. Naturally, the first was a success, the second had holes in it, and the third just didn't happen, as the offspring of enslaved people were pretty much left alone with a reduction of deprivation over time. Professor Scott, thank you for your honesty in writing this book.
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