Love and Arms

In violently resisting unjust violence, one finds oneself ethically obliged todo the wrong thing. This is a difficult position to sustain.What does it mean that violence could be "justified"? What doessuch justification signify, and what does it accomplish? Whatunderlies its conditions and limitations? Perhaps most importantly, is there any way to resist injustice effectively without feeding acycle of violence?Love and Arms investigates the paradoxes of just war from thestandpoint of a Canadian woman who was involved in the mostviolent era of South Africa's armed struggle against apartheid.Helen Douglas bases her analysis on a close reading of thephilosopher Emmanuel Levinas, for whom everything humanbegins from our unconditional responsibility for the suffering ofothers. Thread by thread, she patiently unpicks scenes of aggressionand resistance, reweaving them into a brilliant and heartfelt analysisthat deepens our understanding of both love and arms.