This chapter argues that an adequate assessment of revolutions (and the role of law in revolutions) is often stymied by historical exclusions and theoretical myopia. Historical exclusions centralise certain experiences and present sanitized and one-sided narratives of the revolutionary experiences they centralise, especially with respect to violence, slavery, and colonialism. On the basis of such ideological uses of history, theoretical accounts paper over these social and political realities in order to legitimate particular revolutionary constitutions and to elevate them to the status of a paradigm or ideal type. This paradigm serves as the yardstick by which other experiences are assessed. The main feature of this paradigm is that it postulates a distinction between political and social revolutions. It presents the American Revolution of 1776 as an exemplar for the political revolution that concerns itself with the establishment of government under law. In contrast, the French Revolution of 1789 is presented as an exemplar for the social revolution that also seeks to tackle social injustice. The deficiency of this paradigm construction is not merely methodological, but also substantive and normative. It reduces the plurality of the revolutionary phenomena, it ignores the revolution’s dialectical nature, and it presents a certain type of revolutionary constitutions as ones that legitimate the polity.

Chapter 5, focusing mainly on Mauritius and British Guiana, examines the ongoing dialogue between indentured workers, magistrates, public commentators, and colonial administrators over the laws governing labor and their underlying principles. By the 1860s and 1870s, the increasing dissonance between Indians’ perceptions of justice and their legal entitlements and magistrates’ hardening line toward labor discipline and public order had prompted more-direct resistance on the part of laborers. State representatives, in response, defended their actions by portraying Indian indentured workers as a largely docile population that benefited from the colonial labor system but was veined through with moral failings and subject to the cynical influence of disruptive individuals. The fissures between the overseer-state and its charges, already apparent even in its early years, were growing into a yawning chasm as a system that billed itself as supportive of “free labor,” Liberal principles, and moral colonial rule increasingly abandoned its paternalist guise to advocate and practice coercion, restriction of labor mobility, and, when deemed necessary, violent suppression of collective action.

This chapter takes as a starting point one of the great figures of the Athenian civil war: Archinus, a resistance fighter against the Thirty from the outset and the main architect of the reconciliation in 403. By a strange turn of events, Archinus endeavored to recast Athenian law and to mark the permanence of the community beyond the vicissitudes of the civil war. Archinus, a tireless promoter of a reunified city, managed to gather two groups around his project, which each presented symmetrical evolutions: on the one hand, all the democrats who, having fought against the Thirty, did not want to open the civic body to new entrants, even deserving ones; and on the other hand, all ‘those from the town’ who were ready to cooperate with the restored democracy, such as Rhinon, a fascinating political ‘weather vane’ who appears, in many respects, to have been Archinus’ alter ego in the oligarch camp. After violently opposing each other during the civil war, these men agreed to merge into a single chorus, dancing in step within a seemingly pacified city. However, this irenic vision must be put into perspective in view of the violent upheavals experienced during the reconciliation process. Far from being a foregone conclusion, reconciliation actually went hand in hand with the maintenance of a strong political conflict, as illustrated by an astonishing profusion of trials between 403 and 399, attested to both by numerous law court speeches and by extraordinary epigraphic sources (i.e. curses [katadesmoi] engraved on lead tablets and buried in the ground). These clashes clearly worked to the advantage of the ‘moderates’ on both sides, who succeeded, at the time, in winning before the Assembly and in the courts and, subsequently, in imposing their version of history in the city.

‘Critias was indeed the most rapacious, the most violent and the most murderous of all those who were part of the oligarchy.’ In the ancient tradition, Critias is a man systematically described in superlatives. The ancient sources readily depict him as an extremist oligarch, a misguided disciple of Socrates, oblivious to the lessons of his former master. Incomparable Critias? This superlative representation deserves to be deconstructed. Not in order to rehabilitate his tarnished memory but because the man is a convenient bogeyman who acts as the singular representative of what was in reality a collective adventure. Not only does his role as leader of the Thirty remain to be proven, but this exclusive focus also tends to obscure the vast chorus that surrounded him: Far from being a lone wolf, Critias was the spokesman or, rather, the coryphaeus of Athenian oligarchs united by common habits and experiences. A poet and a virtuoso musician, Critias even promoted a true choral policy, striving to convince all the Athenians remaining in the city to align to his radical positions. Breaking with the democratic experiment and its multiple and competing choruses, the oligarch sought to create a single, distinctive and hermetic chorus, of which all the members had to dance in unison and where the slightest deviation was mercilessly punished. Better still, in the tumult of the civil war, Critias had a dream: to establish a permanent state of exception in order to forge a new brand of men entirely devoted to the cause of the oligarchy.

This chapter considers how the right to freedom of thought should be viewed in circumstances of injustice. Specifically, we discuss whether the right not to reveal thoughts, the right not to be punished for thoughts, or the right not to have thoughts impermissibly altered, should ever be overridden. Examples include whether histories of genocide can justify surveillance of antisemitic or racist attitudes, whether access to thoughts may be helpful in proving intent to discriminate, and whether internet privacy protections should yield in the face of uses of social media in ways that further structural injustice. The chapter concludes that defences of freedom of thought as an ideal may be less convincing in situations of significant injustice or threats of violence.

This chapter of the handbook introduces dehumanization as another dark side of humanity. Humanness is a central concept in moral psychology, and whereas people normally treat other humans with moral consideration, they may turn to dehumanize others as a result of moral disengagement and moral exclusion. The author reviews recent psychological accounts of dehumanization that are grounded in empirical research and highlights the diverse forms it takes: dehumanization varies from subtle to blatant, from interpersonal to intergroup, and from simple to complex. In these theoretical accounts, dehumanizing a person or group means ascribing less of certain human attributes to the target – both attributes that distinguish humans from other animals and attributes that distinguish humans from inanimate agents. Within this general framework, the author reviews the empirical literature on how dehumanization may function to prime, facilitate, and justify harm during intergroup conflict. He also considers a number of critiques and debates over these ideas and findings that have recently surfaced.

Violence can happen everywhere in the lives of young people with cognitive disability. Young people with cognitive disability, family members, and workers talk about what needs to change. Services need to work together to help young people with cognitive disability. Others need to know about and respect the culture of young people with cognitive disability. Others need to respect young people’s choices on whom they want to love. Young people with cognitive disability can be helped to understand what is violence. Services can change what they do so that they can keep young people with cognitive disability safe. Young people with cognitive disability say that there should be ‘nothing about us unless it is led by us’.

This chapter explains what this book is about. Becoming an adult is different for everybody. Young people with cognitive disability can find it hard to get the right supports to become an adult. Many young people can experience violence and abuse. This book tells the stories of young people with cognitive disability from different backgrounds. Family members and practitioners also talk about stories of young people with cognitive disability.

This chapter looks at the Department of Child Safety and the criminal justice system. Child Safety often didn’t understand that a young person had a cognitive disability. Sometimes young people with cognitive disability were abused while they were in Child Safety. Young people with cognitive disability often did not get much help when they left Child Safety. Parents with cognitive disability often had their children removed from them by Child Safety. Some young people were abused by police. Young people with cognitive disability who went to prison didn’t get much help. They also found it hard when they left prison.

This chapter explores what we know about violence against young people with cognitive disability. It looks at what can make it more likely that young people with cognitive disability are abused. It’s hard to really know how many young people with cognitive disability have experienced violence. Young people with cognitive disability can be harmed by workers, family, or friends who are meant to help them. Abuse can happen in many places. Services and society need to learn how to keep young people with cognitive disability safe. We need to make sure young people can make decisions for themselves.

Family, friends, partners, and pets can help young people with cognitive disability as they become adults. Some young people with cognitive disability had families who spoke up for them and helped them when times were hard. Some young people with cognitive disability had partners who helped them feel good about themselves. Friends could help young people with cognitive disability leave abusive situations. Professionals can do more to help young people with cognitive disability make friends and be part of their community.