Mediating Mercy
Mediating Mercy
The Affective Lifeworlds of Forgiveness Activists
This chapter assesses social workers' diverse approaches to the affective labor that forgiveness work entails. A range of social workers, from pious religious actors to secular anti-death penalty activists, participate in cultivating affective sociolegal spaces, or a lifeworld, for their ethical practices. Through productive social engagements, these agents draw attention to a metaphysical rapture that forbearance affords, both for themselves and for victims' families. Their engagement with a kind of social work that extends directly from the potentialities made possible through Iran's Islamic justice system also serves to underscore a commitment to Islam publicly, whether intentional or not. Social workers' myriad activities also bring attention to and even solidify the rationalization or increased corporatization of otherwise loosely organized local, spiritual, and/or ritual practices.
Keywords: social workers, affective labor, forgiveness work, religious actors, anti-death penalty activists, ethical practices, forbearance, Iran, Islamic justice system, Islam
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