E-book: Igor Kon “To beat or not to beat? Igor Kon: To beat or not to beat.

In the distant post-war years, when I studied at the history department of the Leningrad Pedagogical Institute named after A. I. Herzen, we had a large course in the history of pedagogy. It was read by a well-known specialist in this field, Professor E. Ya. Golant (1888–1971). I read well, emotionally, with excellent knowledge of the matter. All the classics of pedagogy in his presentation were remarkable scientists and great humanists. But at some point in each of his lectures, Evgeny Yakovlevich sighed deeply, became sad and said: "However, he had one limitation - he considered corporal punishment of children inevitable." Since this was said about almost all the classics of pedagogy (in everything else they differed from each other and without this they would not have become classics!), we laughed that, apparently, this is the only authentically established pedagogical truth, which for some reason is hidden from us.

Daily life reinforced this impression. It's not that we were all severely flogged as children - no one ever laid a finger on me personally, but slaps and pokes were considered a normal part of Everyday life. Professors of pedagogy were no exception. In the summer after my second year, together with my classmates, I worked as an educator in a pioneer camp, and two sons of our professor of pedagogy, Leonid Evgenievich Raskin (1897–1948), were in the senior detachment there. He was a wonderful person, his course is one of the few that I listened to in its entirety, from beginning to end, because it was interesting. However, his sons were great non -vaults, and when on the first Sunday, Raskin arrived at the camp, he told my friend: "I know my boys, so if he will not want to give him a slap, I will not be a claim." Of course, it was a joke, I don’t think that Leonid Evgenievich actually beat his sons, and my classmate did not use this permission either, but tolerance for bodily influences was normal for us.

There is nothing to say about Anton Semenovich Makarenko. In words, he was against assault, but we all read the Pedagogical Poem and had no doubt that if Makarenko had not beaten Zadorov once, he would not have succeeded with these hooligans.

For almost the entirety of human history, flogging has been considered necessary, if not the only effective tool education. Not many are better off in modern world. According to numerous polls, 90% of American parents "believe" in spanking; even among middle-class families, which are much more liberal than working-class and farming families, only 17% "do not believe" in it. Appropriate "pedagogical" practices are also quite widespread.

At the same time, there is a fight against corporal punishment. They are categorically condemned by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) in 2004 proclaimed nothing less than European ban on corporal punishment of children.

With some delay, they started talking about this problem in Russia, and at the highest state level:

"Truly terrible problem- Violence against children. According to the official data of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, in 2009 more than 100,000 children and adolescents suffered from criminal attacks... It is known that cruelty breeds counter cruelty. After all, children learn the model of behavior that adults usually show them, and then, of course, they transfer it into their lives: school, college, army, and in own family. The duty of the whole society is to create an atmosphere of intolerance towards manifestations abuse with children, identify and prevent such cases" (Message of the President of the Russian Federation to the Federal Assembly on November 30, 2010).

As a liberal and humanist, I fully share these ideas. But how scientifically substantiated and socio-pedagogically realistic are such recommendations? Is there a lot of walking in the world utopian ideas, the implementation of which is obviously impossible, and attempts to do this would do more harm than good?

A purely theoretical, historical and anthropological interest in this topic arose in me back in the 1980s. In The Child and Society (Historical-Ethnographic Perspective) (1988) I wrote:

“How does corporal punishment affect a child’s self-awareness and self-esteem? Today’s pedagogy is sure that it is negative, and for conditions in which spanking looks like an exceptional, extraordinary event, this conclusion is probably true. But there was a time when spanking children was Is it possible to say that in such a society there was no and cannot be any individual dignity at all?

As already mentioned, in medieval Europe children were beaten and flogged everywhere, but this practice was especially common in England. English teachers and parents of the 16th–17th centuries. were famous for their cruelty throughout Europe.<…>Officially sanctioned flogging persisted in English schools, including aristocratic ones, until very recently. Nevertheless, no one reproached the English gentlemen for their lack of self-respect. On the contrary, an indication of developed personal dignity and pride is present in any foreign stereotype of an Englishman.

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Igor Semenovich Kon

To hit or not to hit?

Foreword

In the distant post-war years, when I studied at the history department of the Leningrad Pedagogical Institute named after A. I. Herzen, we had a large course in the history of pedagogy. It was read by a well-known specialist in this field, Professor E. Ya. Golant (1888–1971). I read well, emotionally, with excellent knowledge of the matter. All the classics of pedagogy in his presentation were remarkable scientists and great humanists. But at some point in each of his lectures, Evgeny Yakovlevich sighed deeply, became sad and said: “However, he had one limitation - he considered corporal punishment of children inevitable.” Since this was said about almost all the classics of pedagogy (in everything else they differed from each other and without this they would not have become classics!), we laughed that, apparently, this is the only authentically established pedagogical truth, which for some reason is hidden from us.

Daily life reinforced this impression. It's not that we were all severely flogged as children - no one ever laid a finger on me personally - but spanking and poking were considered a normal part of everyday life. Professors of pedagogy were no exception. In the summer after my second year, together with my classmates, I worked as an educator in a pioneer camp, and two sons of our professor of pedagogy, Leonid Evgenievich Raskin (1897–1948), were in the senior detachment there. He was a wonderful person, his course is one of the few that I listened to in its entirety, from beginning to end, because it was interesting. However, his sons were great non -people, and when on the first Sunday, Raskin came to the camp, he told my friend: “I know my boys, so if he will not want to give him a slap, I will not be a claim.” Of course, it was a joke, I don’t think that Leonid Evgenievich actually beat his sons, and my classmate did not use this permission either, but tolerance for bodily influences was normal for us.

There is nothing to say about Anton Semenovich Makarenko. In words, he was against assault, but we all read the Pedagogical Poem and had no doubt that if Makarenko had not once beaten Zadorov, he would not have succeeded with these hooligans.

Almost throughout the history of mankind, spanking was considered a necessary, if not the only effective means of education. Not many are better off in the modern world. According to numerous mass polls, 90% of American parents "believe" in spanking; even among middle-class families, which are much more liberal than working-class and farming families, only 17% “do not believe” in it. The corresponding “pedagogical” practices are also quite widespread.

At the same time, there is a fight against corporal punishment. They are categorically condemned by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) in 2004 proclaimed nothing less than European ban on corporal punishment of children.

With some delay, they started talking about this problem in Russia, and at the highest state level:

“A truly terrible problem is violence against children. According to the official data of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, in 2009 more than 100,000 children and adolescents suffered from criminal attacks... It is known that cruelty breeds counter cruelty. After all, children learn the model of behavior that adults usually show them, and then, of course, they transfer it into their lives: school, college, army, and their own family. The duty of the whole society is to create an atmosphere of intolerance towards manifestations of cruelty to children, to identify and stop such cases” (Message of the President of the Russian Federation to the Federal Assembly on November 30, 2010).

As a liberal and humanist, I fully share these ideas. But how scientifically substantiated and socio-pedagogically realistic are such recommendations? How many utopian ideas are walking around the world, the implementation of which is obviously impossible, and attempts to do this would do more harm than good?

A purely theoretical, historical and anthropological interest in this topic arose in me back in the 1980s. In The Child and Society (A Historical-Ethnographic Perspective) (1988) I wrote:

“How does corporal punishment affect a child’s self-awareness and self-esteem? Today's pedagogy is sure that it is negative, and for conditions in which spanking looks like an exceptional, extraordinary event, this conclusion is probably true. But there was a time when the spanking of children was massive. Is it possible to say that in such a society there was no individual dignity at all and cannot be? Not at all.

Current page: 1 (total book has 29 pages) [available reading excerpt: 20 pages]

Igor Semenovich Kon
To hit or not to hit?

Foreword

In the distant post-war years, when I studied at the history department of the Leningrad Pedagogical Institute named after A. I. Herzen, we had a large course in the history of pedagogy. It was read by a well-known specialist in this field, Professor E. Ya. Golant (1888–1971). I read well, emotionally, with excellent knowledge of the matter. All the classics of pedagogy in his presentation were remarkable scientists and great humanists. But at some point in each of his lectures, Evgeny Yakovlevich sighed deeply, became sad and said: “However, he had one limitation - he considered corporal punishment of children inevitable.” Since this was said about almost all the classics of pedagogy (in everything else they differed from each other and without this they would not have become classics!), we laughed that, apparently, this is the only authentically established pedagogical truth, which for some reason is hidden from us.

Daily life reinforced this impression. It's not that we were all severely flogged as children - no one ever laid a finger on me personally - but spanking and poking were considered a normal part of everyday life. Professors of pedagogy were no exception. In the summer after my second year, together with my classmates, I worked as an educator in a pioneer camp, and two sons of our professor of pedagogy, Leonid Evgenievich Raskin (1897–1948), were in the senior detachment there. He was a wonderful person, his course is one of the few that I listened to in its entirety, from beginning to end, because it was interesting. However, his sons were great non -people, and when on the first Sunday, Raskin came to the camp, he told my friend: “I know my boys, so if he will not want to give him a slap, I will not be a claim.” Of course, it was a joke, I don’t think that Leonid Evgenievich actually beat his sons, and my classmate did not use this permission either, but tolerance for bodily influences was normal for us.

There is nothing to say about Anton Semenovich Makarenko. In words, he was against assault, but we all read the Pedagogical Poem and had no doubt that if Makarenko had not once beaten Zadorov, he would not have succeeded with these hooligans.

Almost throughout the history of mankind, spanking was considered a necessary, if not the only effective means of education. Not many are better off in the modern world. According to numerous mass polls, 90% of American parents "believe" in spanking; even among middle-class families, which are much more liberal than working-class and farming families, only 17% “do not believe” in it. The corresponding “pedagogical” practices are also quite widespread.

At the same time, there is a fight against corporal punishment. They are categorically condemned by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) in 2004 proclaimed nothing less than European ban on corporal punishment of children.

With some delay, they started talking about this problem in Russia, and at the highest state level:

“A truly terrible problem is violence against children. According to the official data of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, in 2009 more than 100,000 children and adolescents suffered from criminal attacks... It is known that cruelty breeds counter cruelty. After all, children learn the model of behavior that adults usually show them, and then, of course, they transfer it into their lives: school, college, army, and their own family. The duty of the whole society is to create an atmosphere of intolerance towards manifestations of cruelty to children, to identify and stop such cases” (Message of the President of the Russian Federation to the Federal Assembly on November 30, 2010).

As a liberal and humanist, I fully share these ideas. But how scientifically substantiated and socio-pedagogically realistic are such recommendations? How many utopian ideas are walking around the world, the implementation of which is obviously impossible, and attempts to do this would do more harm than good?

A purely theoretical, historical and anthropological interest in this topic arose in me back in the 1980s. In The Child and Society (A Historical-Ethnographic Perspective) (1988) I wrote:

“How does corporal punishment affect a child’s self-awareness and self-esteem? Today's pedagogy is sure that it is negative, and for conditions in which spanking looks like an exceptional, extraordinary event, this conclusion is probably true. But there was a time when the spanking of children was massive. Is it possible to say that in such a society there was no individual dignity at all and cannot be? Not at all.

As already mentioned, in medieval Europe, children were beaten and flogged everywhere, but this practice was especially common in England. English teachers and parents of the 16th–17th centuries. were famous for their cruelty throughout Europe.<…>Officially sanctioned flogging persisted in English schools, including aristocratic ones, until very recently. Nevertheless, no one reproached the English gentlemen for their lack of self-respect. On the contrary, an indication of developed personal dignity and pride is present in any foreign stereotype of an Englishman.

How to explain this paradox? Perhaps spanking, which is considered a normal element of the socio-normative system, is perceived by the individual consciousness not as something offensive to the individual, but as an ordinary routine procedure? Or is the psychological effect of spanking reduced due to the collective hostility and hatred of the pupils towards the despot-teacher, who can punish, but not humiliate, just as a soulless machine cannot humiliate a person? Or is it not so much the method of punishment that has a psychological effect, but rather the ideas about its legality or illegality that develop in the child as a result of assimilation of school and other rules that exist independently of his will and are given to him?

This problem is also posed on a more general sociological plane. In 1958, U. Bronfenbrenner, after analyzing 15 conducted between 1932 and 1957. research on the methods of raising children, tried to generalize the class differences existing in this area. From these data it followed that parents from the working environment resorted to corporal punishment more often than the representatives of the middle classes. According to subsequent researchers, this contributes to a greater prevalence of authoritarian attitudes in the work environment, a tendency to physical violence, child abuse and the maintenance of a special “subculture of violence” (pugnacity, identification of masculinity with aggressiveness, high level crime, etc.). However, a detailed analysis of later studies has shown that class differences in parenting style have significantly decreased, and the assumptions based on them, although they have not lost their heuristic value, can no longer be considered empirically valid. This topic requires a more detailed study of parenting values ​​and parenting style in general (I hope that I will not be suspected of wanting to rehabilitate spanking).”

I had no intention of taking these questions seriously. But a few years ago, when I was on a business trip in Sweden, I was invited to speak at the local organization Save the Children. It is one of the most influential and active international organizations for the protection of children from abuse and corporal punishment.

I must admit that for all my sincere sympathy for their goals and objectives, the activities of such communities have always caused me a slight skepticism. There are many organizations in the world that seek to protect everyone from everything: animals from people, people from animals, women from men, children from adults, believers from non-believers, etc., etc. All these associations profess high moral principles, but upon close contact with them, they sometimes reveal such a high degree of dogmatism and intolerance that one wants to step aside.

As they said in late Soviet times, there will be no world war, but there will be such a struggle for peace that no stone will be left unturned on Earth. In addition, some defenders of the oppressed live according to the old Soviet joke: "What we protect, we have."

However, the Swedish defenders of children did not radiate any dogmatism and extremism, it was interesting and pleasant to talk with them. And I thought: why not take up this topic? Interesting, relevant, noble, socially significant and, unlike sex education, it doesn’t look like a hornet’s nest (I was just “out of touch”). If it is impossible to save Russian children from the troubles caused by sexual ignorance, maybe they will at least be beaten less?

Having briefly read the world literature, I was surprised to find that there is no information about the state of affairs in Russia in any international database, although up to October revolution there were quite a lot of scientific publications on this topic, and in Russian classical literature this story was one of the highlights. I decided to try to fill the gap, and the Russian Foundation for the Humanities, which financed almost all of my previous research, kindly provided me with grant No.

Like all my other research, the work was conceived as global, comparative-historical and interdisciplinary, having at least three interconnected autonomous aspects:

1. Historical and anthropological How common are they in different human cultures and societies, corporal punishment, what they are, what are their social functions, what socio-structural and ethno-cultural factors they are associated with, how the normative canon of education (ideas about what should be) and the specific corporal practices that implement it are related to each other.

2. Psychological and pedagogical- how effective are these bodily practices, what are their immediate and long-term results, what short-term and long-term impact do they have on the participants in the process, punished and punishing, and if the flogging is public, then on the spectators, and how changes in the relevant practices affect moral and psychological characteristics of children and youth?

3. Sexological- what is the relationship of corporal punishment with the psychosexual complex that psychiatrists and sexologists call spanking fetishism (the need for spanking), BDSM or sadomasochism (SM). Moralists and defenders of the rod usually shyly avoid this topic, but it is widely discussed by psychoanalysts and literary critics, especially in connection with biographies. famous people who have retained their attachment to spanking for life.

Of course, my book is neither the first nor the exhaustive one. Corporal punishment is the subject of a truly vast research and development popular literature. My task is only to extract a socio-pedagogical meaning from it and help the reader, especially the teacher and the parent, to sensibly, and not dogmatically form their own life position on these difficult issues. Based on this, I tried to make the book as clear and readable as possible.

The first chapter "Cultural Anthropology of Corporal Punishment" discusses the ideological, philosophical foundations of the topic: what does "corporal punishment" mean, how it relates to the concepts of education, discipline and violence, how different cultures and religions relate to corporal punishment, and how the corresponding socio-pedagogical practices in a comparative historical perspective.

The second chapter "A Bit of History" is devoted to the history of corporal punishment of children in Western countries. I am not so much interested in the development of pedagogical theories as in specific disciplinary practices and how they were carried out in the family and school.

You may ask: why delve into history, if everyone already knows that children were always flogged? However, without historical digression it is impossible to understand not only the past, but also state of the art public consciousness. The vast scientific literature that exists on the issues I touch on is fragmentary, contradictory and inaccessible to the general reader. To avoid a tedious gallop through Europe, I chose England as the main scene of action, in which corporal punishment existed for a particularly long time, almost until the end of the 20th century, and was perhaps the most cruel. Besides, in my youth I was a specialist in the history of seventeenth-century England. It then looks briefly at the history of corporal punishment in France and Germany, and in more detail the Swedish experiment. Sweden became the first country to legally ban corporal punishment not only in schools but also in the family.

I am interested not only and not so much in the punishments themselves, what and how they did with the children, but in the subjective side of the matter: how the children themselves perceived, experienced and comprehended the spanking and its influence on their later, adult life. After all, it is precisely from the retrospective comprehension of childhood experiences that the idea of ​​the rights of the child and the demand for a complete ban on corporal punishment gradually grow. Stories and real results, on the basis of international statistics, the last two paragraphs of the chapter are devoted to this movement.

Location of the third chapter pre-revolutionary Russia. Since the punishment of children, by definition, cannot differ significantly from the disciplinary methods applied to adults, one has to start with the cross-section of adults, which was one of the foundations of the autocratic feudal order, and the attitude of the state church and the “enlightened” layers of the then Russian society towards it. Further, based on memoirs and fiction, the practices of corporal punishment in schools and other educational institutions XVIII-XIX centuries, it is shown how long and painfully Russian social thought sought to liberalize and humanize school education (the famous controversy between N. I. Pirogov and N. A. Dobrolyubov is especially important in this regard) and how Russian family pedagogy evolved. Not being a specialist in the history of Russia, I do not pretend to scientific discoveries in this area of ​​knowledge. But there are no systematic studies of this topic, and without them it is impossible to figure out what, in fact, is " domestic tradition and what kind of historical legacy we (not the state, but me and my imaginary reader) would like to perpetuate, and which one, on the contrary, to overcome.

As in the previous chapter, I detail and cite personal documents, autobiographies, and works of fiction. Many of these sources are well known, some even textbooks. But put together they produce much more strong impression than is possible in school course history and literature. After reading this purely descriptive, narrative material, the thoughtful reader not only understand better past, but also mentally prepare for its subsequent theoretical discussion.

The fourth chapter "Corporal punishment in the Soviet and post-Soviet Russia» is historical and sociological. She opens short essay on the issue of corporal punishment in Soviet school and the family, about how theory and practice correlated in this issue and why in the 1980s the need to protect children from cruel treatment and corporal punishment was recognized and appeared on the pages of Soviet publications as the most important social and moral task. Then the social position of children in modern Russia, it is shown that violence against children very often only pretends to be punishment. Based on the analysis of mass surveys public opinion it is traced how the attitude of Russians to corporal punishment and their real disciplinary practices are historically changing; which socio-economic strata and population groups support and which condemn corporal punishment of children; what are the political and ideological interests behind it; how the rights of the child correlate with human rights and how all this is connected with the processes of modernization in Russia.

Chapter Five "What is the Effect of Corporal Punishment?" is predominantly psychological and contains a critical analysis of the latest world scientific literature on this issue (in Russia large-scale research this topic does not exist, disputes are at the level of "opinions", references to authorities and personal experience). Evaluating the data and conclusions of special studies, I try to answer,

a) how effective is corporal punishment in terms of the particular tasks assigned to it in comparison with other methods of discipline,

b) is it a successful obedience school and

c) what are its side and long-term psychological consequences.

This topic breaks down into a number of sub-questions: how does corporal punishment affect a child’s aggressiveness and propensity to violence, the child’s physical and mental health, family relationships, cognitive processes and mental capacity child. Since scientific studies, as a rule, do not give unambiguous conclusions such as “this is good and this is bad”, special attention is paid to assessing their methodology and the degree of evidence.

Since this kind of specialized literature has never been analyzed by anyone in our country, this chapter is especially important for practical psychologists.

The last, sixth chapter, "Spanking for Pleasure," looks at corporal punishment from a sexological perspective. What erotic feelings do corporal punishment evoke in children and adolescents subjected to it and in adults who carry out these punishments? How likely are these feelings and experiences to become fixed in the form of a lifelong attachment to spanking? How do modern psychiatry and sexology explain and evaluate these phenomena? Is it possible to “prevent” their occurrence, or is it easier to refrain from corporal punishment of children?

In the final chapter "So after all - to beat or not to beat?" theoretical results are summed up and practical conclusions are made.

This book is in its genre popular science and is intended for a wide range readers, especially for parents. Therefore, I tried to avoid technical terms and explain the issues under consideration as simply and clearly as possible. But since many of the issues discussed in it have not previously been covered in Russia, and their relevance is steadily increasing, the book may also be of interest to some professionals.

Based on this duality of the potential addressee, I applied double standard in the bibliography. In order not to burden the main text of the book, the well-known literary sources, which are easily found on the Internet, are cited without exact bibliographic references. On the contrary, used scientific works are present in the list of references quite fully, and it makes sense for a professional to refer to primary sources.

Igor Kon

January 2011

Chapter 1
CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY OF CORPORAL PUNISHMENT

Oh, childhood sunny days!

Oh, happy years, where are they?

Where is the golden rod?

Adelbert Chamisso

What does "corporal punishment" mean?

The boundless philosophical, religious, legal, psychological-pedagogical, historical-anthropological and sociological literature is devoted to the concept and essence of punishment. The last generalizing philosophical article on this topic known to me, published in the Stanford Philosophical Encyclopedia, is dated 2010 (Bedau, 2010), and the Russian Ph.D. thesis was dated 2009 (Blucher, 2009). Even a superficial review of this literature, not to mention its meaningful analysis, clearly exceeds my capabilities. In this section, I will limit myself to the most common definitions and formal parameters, without which the discussion and division of the topic is impossible.

Explanatory dictionaries define "punishment" in different ways. Dahl's and Fasmer's dictionaries do not contain this word. According to Ozhegov's dictionary, punishment is "a measure of influence against the perpetrator of a crime, a misdemeanor." According to Ushakov's dictionary, this is “a penalty imposed by those who have the right, power or force on the one who committed a crime or misconduct; Kara." The English punishment comes from the verb to punish, first recorded in 1340 and going back to Old French puniss-, which is based on the Latin verb punire- punish, inflict pain for some violations. Its earlier form is poenire, from the word poena, which may have been inspired by the Phoenician method of execution by crucifixion.

In the very general meaning words, punishment is the application of some unpleasant or undesirable measures of influence to a person or animal, causing him suffering in response to disobedience or undesirable, anti-normative behavior.

Encyclopedic definitions of the term depend on the context.

In legal, especially criminal law, literature, "punishment" is usually considered in connection with "crime". According to the Dictionary of Basic Criminal Law Concepts and Terms (Baranov, Marfitsin, 2001), punishment is “a measure of state coercion, appointed on behalf of the state by a court sentence to a person found guilty of a crime, and entails the deprivation or restriction of the rights and freedoms of this person ... » "Great Law Dictionary" defines punishment as "a measure of state coercion, appointed by the verdict of the court."

In the psychological, pedagogical and ethical literature, the link “reward and punishment” appears more often, in this sequence. It is not so much about who and how carries out the punishment, but about the ratio of positive and negative measures of influence, the conditions for their application, the degree of effectiveness and moral justification.

It is hardly possible to reduce this variety of meanings, meanings and contexts to some common denominator, but it is possible to single out a number of universal formal components in them. Any punishment is a form of power coercion, which presupposes a certain social, positional inequality. There are several components to any act of punishment:

1. An agent punishing an entity that prescribes and/or enforces punishment. These roles do not necessarily overlap in the same physical or legal entity(the legislator, the judge and the executioner are different persons). The punishing subject can be not only individual, but also collective, and his responsibility can be divided and multi-stage.

2. Object, recipient of punishment. Since punishment is applicable only to living, conscious beings (Xerxes (486-465 BC), whose warriors flogged the rebellious sea that scattered the Persian fleet, is an exception), the relationship between the punisher and the punished is, by definition, subject-subject. Only those who are able to experience suffering and realize their connection with their “wrong” actions can be punished. In this sense, the correlative of punishment is "guilt". Since the freedom of the punished is limited, he normatively acts not so much as actor, how much as the object of the corresponding manipulations. However, it is always an interactive process. The reactions of the punished, whether they are screams, tears, requests for forgiveness, or, on the contrary, resistance, abuse and insensitivity, reinforce or undermine the power of the punishing subject, causing him to respond with emotional and other reactions.

3. Actions through which punishment is carried out. Their range can be very wide, from verbal disapproval or a gesture of displeasure to severe flogging, torture, and even the death penalty.

4. Tools, means of punishment, be it a word, prison cell or a rose.

5. Legitimation - ways of justifying punishment, proving its necessity, legitimacy and proportionality.

As already mentioned, any punishment involves coercion: one side causes suffering to the other, forcing them to do what they don’t want to do, or not allowing them to do what they want (restriction of freedom or material opportunities). But unlike simple violence based on the inequality of physical strength, punishment is part of social system and normative culture. It implies some legitimacy, compliance with certain rules, which are recognized to some extent by both parties to the relationship and third parties. Even when they differ in assessing the fairness and legitimacy of a particular punishment, for what and how adequately it is applied, people in principle recognize the legitimacy of such actions and roles. Where this is not present, there is not punishment, but coercion.

Legitimation is based on the principle of hierarchy, a historically specific vertical of power: the superior, who has power, has the right to punish the inferior, dependent. The boss can punish the subordinate, the winner - the vanquished, the parent - the child, the teacher - the student. The opposite is impossible, it is a rebellion, a violation of not just one of the rules, but the undermining of the entire vertical of power. That is why it is so seductive and always present in the imagination of the punished. Social hierarchies are built in different ways. In boy groups, the foreground is physical strength, V patriarchal family- seniority, birth order (each elder can order each younger and punish him) and / or gender (a boy, as a rule, is more influential than a girl), etc. At the same time, the boundaries of power and methods of punishment are subtly nuanced.

Unlike violence, which can be arbitrary – this is described by the sociological term “anomie” (absence of norms) or the criminal metaphor “lawlessness” – punishment is normative and tends to be systemic and codified (this is especially evident in jurisprudence). However, philosophy, sociology and psychology describe this normativity in different ways and in different terms. In some cases, the implied interests of society, society as a whole come to the fore, in others - the interests of a separate social group or community (families, schools, institutions), in the third - the socio-psychological patterns of dyadic (pair) and group interaction of individuals.

Punishment is a conscious action, the punishing subject always pursues some goal. The range of these goals is very wide. It could be:

a) retribution for material or moral damage caused;

b) intimidation so that the punished person stops the forbidden actions and does not repeat them in the future;

c) long-term change value orientations and motivation of the punished, encouraging him not only to refrain from negative (condemned) actions, but also to do things that his superiors or educators consider correct, desirable (pro-social behavior).

Very important question theory of punishment - what impact does it have not only on the specific punished, but also on other people who are or may be in a similar life situation(punishment as an edifying example).

Philosophy, sociology or psychology of punishment are not self-sufficient. Any theory and practice of punishment is directly or indirectly based on the theory of personality accepted or implicit (tacitly implied) in a given society (culture), including the theory of motivation, the expected degree of independence and individuality, the ratio of punishments (negative reinforcement) and rewards (positive reinforcement) and much more. other.

Therefore, any, both everyday and scientific, assessment of the system of punishments adopted in society and specific cases of their application is multiple and is carried out from different, often conflicting, points of view:

a) from the point of view of the system of philosophical and moral values ​​accepted in a given society, ideas about what can and cannot be done with a person;

b) from the point of view of legality, conformity of punishment the current system rights;

c) from the point of view of everyday norms of justice, including ideas about the proportionality of misconduct and punishments;

d) in terms of their effectiveness - whether the punishments achieve their goals.

The answer to the last question, which is especially important for practical and social pedagogy, is, as a rule, ambiguous. First, the effect of punishment may not be the same in the short and long term. Secondly, punishments, like all other social institutions, have not only explicit, but also hidden, latent, functions. Severe penalties for unauthorized street marches are officially aimed at maintaining public order, but at the same time serve as a means of combating political opposition and suppressing social initiatives that are undesirable for the authorities. Hence the ambiguity of their results. On the one hand, these measures strengthen the government, but on the other hand, they undermine its authority and give any unofficial initiative a potentially destructive character. Weak power, deprived of public support, makes punishment more severe, thereby strengthening resistance and contributing to political radicalism. In other words, the authoritarian power itself cuts the branch on which it sits. The problems of school discipline, which are closer to our topic, can be considered in the same vein.

What does the concept of corporal (or physical) punishment look like in the light of the above?

It is neither philosophically nor psychologically possible to make any strictly scientific distinction between the physical, bodily influence on a person and the mental one, which is directed to his consciousness. Physical punishment is punishment by inflicting pain, but the experience of pain is inextricably linked with the general mental state of the individual, and mental suffering is often more painful than bodily pain.

However, if we consider the issue not in a psycho-physiological, but in a historical-anthropological context, this distinction is by no means meaningless. The problematization of corporal punishment, the emergence of doubts about their legality and the demand for their restriction or prohibition is an important indicator of the level of development and freedom of the individual. And this process begins not with children, but with adults. The image of a child is just a modality, a special case of the normative canon of Man accepted by the culture. As long as it is considered acceptable to physically punish, beat adults, the conversation that children should not be beaten, as a rule, does not even arise. In this sense, the historical evolution of the theory and practice of corporal punishment is extremely instructive.

The empirical history of punishment in general and corporal punishment in particular often focuses on behavioral and instrumental moments, colorfully describing how and with what people were beaten, flogged, tortured, etc. These pictures, which evoke in readers and viewers not only emotional, but also sexual arousal (you don't have to be a sadist or a masochist to experience it) are invariably commercially successful. But the most complex, problematic and historically changeable are not material, but cultural and symbolic aspects of punishment.

"To beat or not to beat?" - the last book of the outstanding Russian social scientist Igor Semenovich Kon, written by him shortly before his death in the spring of 2011. In this book, relying on numerous world and domestic anthropological, sociological, historical, psychological, pedagogical, sexological and other scientific studies, the author tried to present a general picture of corporal punishment of children as a sociocultural phenomenon. What is their social and pedagogical meaning, how effective are they, and why did these venerable thousand-year-old practices suddenly go out of fashion? Or does it just seem to come out? The task of this book, as I.S.Kon himself formulated it, is to help readers, primarily teachers and parents, meaningfully, and not dogmatically, form their own life position on these difficult issues.

About the book

• Name: To hit or not to hit?
• Igor Kon
• Genre: Psychology, Pedagogy
• Series:-
• ISBN: 978-5-9691-0721-2
• Pages: 102
• Translation:-
• Publisher: Time
• Year: 2012

EBook

In the distant post-war years, when I studied at the history department of the Leningrad Pedagogical Institute named after A. I. Herzen, we had a large course in the history of pedagogy. It was read by a well-known specialist in this field, Professor E. Ya. Golant (1888–1971). I read well, emotionally, with excellent knowledge of the matter. All the classics of pedagogy in his presentation were remarkable scientists and great humanists. But at some point in each of his lectures, Evgeny Yakovlevich sighed deeply, became sad and said: “However, he had one limitation - he considered corporal punishment of children inevitable.” Since this was said about almost all the classics of pedagogy (in everything else they differed from each other and without this they would not have become classics!), we laughed that, apparently, this is the only authentically established pedagogical truth, which for some reason is hidden from us.

Everyday life reinforces this impression ...