Email to Philip Zimbardo, author of 'The Lucifer Effect'

June 6, 2007

Dear Philip Zimbardo,

I hope you're well. I was inspired to buy a copy of your book The Lucifer
Effect after watching your eloquent interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy
Now (March 30, 2007). The book is a great achievement, hugely important and
I warmly congratulate you. Your writing is full of both reason and humanity,
a truly powerful combination, and easy to read too. I've also had fun
exploring your various websites. Thank you.

I was pleased to see you note early in the book that:

"...most psychologists have been insensitive to the deeper sources of power
that inhere in the political, economic, religious, historic, and cultural
matrix that defines situations and gives them legitimate or illegitimate
existence. A full understanding of the dynamics of human behavior requires
that we recognize the extent and limits of personal power, situational
power, and systemic power." (p. x)

How true.

It was both correct and brave of you to go all the way to the top and indict
Cheney, Rumsfeld and Bush for the crimes committed at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo
Bay and all the other places around the world where torture and abuse
continue to take place, in their name, in the so-called "war on terror".

You also describe the shocking events of Haditha, where Iraqi civilians,
including women and children, were killed in cold blood. As with My Lai in
Vienam, there are likely untold numbers of similarly shocking incidents
elsewhere in Iraq (and Afghanistan).

What I found to be missing from your book, however, was an unequivocal
identification of the overarching framework of imperial power under which
such war crimes have - and continue to be - committed. In particular, we
must surely judge the invasion of Iraq by the same standards that were
upheld at the Nuremberg war trials where it was clearly stated:

"To initiate a war of aggression ... is not only an international crime, it
is the supreme international crime, differing only from other war crimes in
that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."

The concept of aggression was defined clearly by US Supreme Court Justice
Robert Jackson, chief prosecutor for the United States at Nuremberg. An
"aggressor," Jackson proposed to the Nurember tribunal, is a state that is
the first to commit such actions as "invasion of its armed forces, with or
without a declaration of war, of the territory of another State." Clearly
true in the case of Iraq - and Afghanistan, many would argue. Justice
Jackson also noted at Nuremberg: "If certain acts of violation of treaties
are crimes, they are crimes whether the United States does them or whether
Germany does them, and we are not prepared to lay down a rule of criminal
conduct against others which we would not be willing to have invoked against
us." (Quoted by Noam Chomsky, 'A Just War? Hardly', ZNet commentary, May 20,
2006; http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2006-05/20chomsky.cfm)

Although you rightly describe the invasion as a "preemptive war against
Iraq", it's disappointing that you did not refer back to the Nuremberg
judgement and identify the war as "the supreme international crime". After
all, isn't this directly relevant to the full understanding you seek; to
recognise the brute realities of systemic power especially as it relates
today to the US government acting as the most powerful 'rogue state' on the
planet? Doesn't this constitute the background - the parameters, the
mindset, the very real forces - to all the recent crimes and abuses you
describe so powerfully and movingly in your book? To point this out would
not require a lengthy revelation of US (indeed western) history, elite
priorities, and the goals and policies of state-corporate power - we have
the work of Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, William Blum and many others for
that - but surely making more substantial reference to this realpolitik is
directly relevant and helpful to your thesis? I do note, of course, that you
rightly warn of nations relying on "ideology", "patriotism", and the
rhetoric of "threats to national security"; the powerful impact that this
has on individuals and societies; and that you refer in passing to the
classic work of Erich Fromm: still so relevant and vital today.

To end on a more appreciative note, I love your positive and hopeful focus
on "heroism" and was pleased to see you write warmly of the work of Martin
Seligman. His book "Authentic Happiness" is also a groundbreaking work that
I enjoyed. You are likely also familiar with the work of writers such as
Daniel Goleman, Alan Wallace and Matthieu Ricard who have emphasised the
core value of compassion in the search for authentic happiness. Sharon
Begley's recent book, 'Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain', has ample
scientific evidence underpinning this approach. To me, compassion is at the
root of heroism; and, as such writers have explained, compassion can be
strengthened considerably by positive efforts in meditation and mindfulness,
with all kinds of myriad benefits flowing from that - both for ourselves as
individuals and society as a whole. These are all very hopeful and inspiring
developments.

If you have time, it would be nice to hear back from you in response to the
above points. In any case, I wish you well and thank you once again for your
excellent and inspiring work.

Best wishes,
David Cromwell
Co-Editor, Media Lens
www.medialens.org