Personal and Structural Violence (Leaving Cert Religious Education): Revision Notes

Personal and Structural Violence

Violence appears in different forms that can be understood through two main categories: personal violence and structural violence. Both types undermine human dignity and create barriers to achieving justice and peace in society.

Understanding the two types of violence

• Personal violence refers to direct harm that individuals or small groups cause to others through physical force, threats, or psychological abuse. This type of violence is visible and immediate, with clear perpetrators and victims occurring in specific moments.

• Structural violence describes harm that occurs when social systems, laws, or institutional practices are organised in unfair ways. This harm is often indirect and less visible daily, but it becomes embedded in how society distributes power and resources. The concept comes from peace scholar Johan Galtung's widely-used definition.

Personal violence: causes and consequences

Causes of personal violence

• Hostile beliefs and unmanaged emotions: When people interpret situations through anger, fear, jealousy, or prejudice, they may misread threats and choose violent responses. Poor emotional regulation skills - often stemming from stress, learned behaviours, or untreated trauma - make anger escalate more quickly and lower the threshold for using force. Cognitive patterns like dehumanising others ("they are less than us") or feelings of entitlement ("I have the right to control them") reduce moral restraints on violent behaviour.

• Risky contexts that increase opportunity: Certain environments make violence more likely by reducing self-control and increasing opportunities for harm. Substances like alcohol and drugs impair judgement and increase aggression. Social environments that normalise violence - such as peer groups that reward toughness or online spaces celebrating threats - teach that violence "works" as a solution. Easy access to weapons combined with absent support services creates situations where conflicts escalate to lethal levels.

Effects of personal violence

• Physical and psychological harm with ripple effects: Victims experience injuries, disability, or death, alongside psychological trauma including anxiety, depression, and loss of confidence. The harm extends beyond direct victims to affect family members and witnesses, particularly children who may develop fear, school difficulties, and learned aggressive behaviours. Healthcare costs increase and survivors often require long-term support to rebuild safety and trust.

• Cycles of retaliation and community breakdown: Personal violence often triggers revenge, creating ongoing feuds and retaliatory attacks. Fear reduces everyday freedoms as people avoid public spaces, businesses close earlier, and neighbours withdraw from one another. Police and court resources become focused on crisis response whilst underlying issues remain unaddressed, trapping communities in "violence-disruption-violence" cycles.

Structural violence: causes and consequences

Causes of structural violence

• Unjust laws, policies, and institutional practices: When legislation, official procedures, or routine institutional choices treat groups differently, harm occurs even without individual intent. Examples include discriminatory laws, unfair admissions or hiring practices, under-provision of basic services to certain areas, or legal systems that make seeking redress impossible. State violence such as torture or excessive force also fits this category when institutions themselves become vehicles of harm.

• Unequal economic structures and resource distribution: Economic systems that concentrate wealth and opportunities amongst a minority create deprivation for many, despite society having sufficient resources. This occurs through mechanisms like exploitative labour practices, debt traps, or unfair trade arrangements. Public goods including healthcare, education, transport, and housing may be underfunded or priced beyond reach for lower-income groups.

Effects of structural violence

• Long-term deprivation of basic needs and opportunities: Structural violence shortens lives through preventable disease, poor maternal and infant outcomes, and exposure to unsafe environments. Educational and employment opportunities collapse when schools are under-resourced and safe work becomes scarce, creating intergenerational poverty. Affected groups grow increasingly powerless as they lack the time, money, and access needed to challenge harmful systems.

• Social fragmentation and increased conflict risk: When communities perceive that rules are unfairly applied, trust in institutions erodes and people become less likely to cooperate with authorities or participate in civic life. Frustration may develop into protest, which can be met with repression that reinforces violence cycles. Extremist groups often exploit these grievances by promising protection or revenge, potentially moving societies from structural violence towards widespread personal and collective violence.

How personal and structural violence connect

These two forms of violence often reinforce each other in important ways. Neighbourhoods lacking jobs and services (structural violence) become places where stress, substance misuse, and recruitment into violent groups increase (personal violence).

Examples for exam use

Justice and peace implications

Justice requires both accountability for those who commit personal violence and reform of structures that create predictable harm. This includes fair law enforcement, accessible courts, and adequate services for all community members.

Peace means more than simply stopping fights. It requires building conditions where people's basic needs and rights are met, inequalities are reduced, and disputes are resolved through dialogue and fair institutions rather than force.