Beyond ideologies: diving into the daily life of the genocidaires

Tuesday, June 16, 2020

On the occasion of the publication of La vie ordinaire des génocidaires, by Richard Rechtman, CNRS editions (2020), Bertrand Richard, author and editor, spoke with Richard Rechtman, anthropologist and psychiatrist, director of studies at EHESS, in the auditorium without public on 16 June.

How do men manage to kill tens, hundreds, or even thousands of individuals? This is the question that comes back as a leitmotif in the face of mass crimes in contemporary history. For the author, it is not ideologies that kill but men. It is not the most indoctrinated or motivated who offer the daily workforce of the massacres, but those who are the most available. Therefore, it is a question of analyzing the processes of mass extermination from the point of view of men by probing the ordinary life of these small executors.

Learn more

On the occasion of the publication of La vie ordinaire des génocidaires, by Richard Rechtman, CNRS editions (2020), Bertrand Richard, author and editor, spoke with Richard Rechtman, anthropologist and psychiatrist, director of studies at EHESS, in the auditorium without public on 16 June.