Throughout my time in education, I can’t count all the hours I’ve spent in history classes. From contemporary history to ancient medieval history (and the cold sweats I would break in-between because of AP United States History), I had a hard time understanding the purpose of learning about the past, until I convinced myself that we learn about the past to better prepare for the future. But if that is the real reason why we learn about history, why do we as a human race continue to make the same mistakes, continue to oppress and marginalize groups, and why does it seem that we can’t ever learn from our past? Welcome to the world of structural violence.
Structural (or sometimes systemic) violence is institutional violence that violates or restricts the rights and needs of a specific group. This violence is put in place by laws, policies, and structures that harm and impair a specific group of people. By now, many students have heard history lessons about how structural violence has impacted the world, even if they might not realize it. An example was during slavery in the United States, African Americans had no freedom. Unwilling to live and die on a plantation, many African Americans revolted. Slave owners used these revolts to justify slavery, thus keeping the cycle going. This is a prime example of structural violence: when an institution (in this case, the U.S. government) encourages injustice, any response against that injustice (such as revolts) is viewed as the wrongdoing.
The biggest issue with structural violence is that the violence itself is hidden, while the reaction to it is exposed. This unbalanced attention fails to bring justice. It also comes down to simple human nature: when humans are collectively doing something wrong, they attempt to justify it morally. The harm caused by structural violence shortens lives, leads to disproportionate incarceration, and compounds across generations.
While I used slavery as an example, a more modern illustration of structural violence can be seen in urban communities. Due to decades of redlining, racial steering, wage gaps, and other systemic barriers, certain communities within our nation are exposed to higher crime rates (which also means higher incarceration rates), lower life expectancy, and a lower quality of life. The indirect harm caused by institutions keeps members of these communities dependent on the very institutions creating these issues, continuing the cycle.
Now, what is the solution? To combat structural violence, the first step is shedding light on it. Structural violence thrives when it isn’t addressed; by addressing it, we bring it out of the shadows. Learning about history, isn’t learning only about the past, but the lesson in which we can derive to improve the future.