Collective punishment in schools: global history and harm

This article explores the roots of collective punishment: how it has been defined, justified, resisted, and remembered across cultures and time. From colonial empires to modern school systems, the logic of punishing many for the actions of a few has shaped policy, language, and lived experience.

When seeking to understand the history of collective punishment, the recent article by Geoffrey Laxton, titled “RCMP Investigations into War Crimes”, offers in in depth exploration of the moral and legal issues surrounding collective punishment, particularly within international conflicts. Laxton analyzes investigations by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) into alleged war crimes by dual nationals in foreign militaries, emphasizing ethical challenges around collective guilt and individual accountability. He situates these investigations within the broader context of international law, highlighting the Fourth Geneva Convention’s explicit prohibition against collective punishment.

Collective punishment involves penalizing an entire group for the actions of individuals, a practice ethically condemned and legally banned due to its inherently unfair and indiscriminate nature. Laxton emphasizes the tension between the pursuit of justice and the necessity of safeguarding individual rights, noting how collective punishment can erode legal standards and moral integrity.

Laxton’s analysis resonates beyond international contexts, influencing how we understand similar practices in educational settings, such as schools in British Columbia. For example, the use of blanket punishments in classrooms mirrors the same ethical concerns raised internationally, highlighting critical questions about fairness, justice, and individual rights.

Historical Examples of Collective Punishment

Here’s an analysis of major historical and cultural events that have influenced perceptions of collective punishment across various regions and traditions.

Collective Punishment: Europe and British colonial

• Amritsar Massacre (1919, British India): British authorities collectively punished civilians, perceiving their collective identity as inherently rebellious. The colonial language framed these punishments as “necessary discipline,” embedding this view into imperial discourse. People experienced constant anxiety, internalizing colonial authority as a daily threat.
• Nazi Reprisals during World War II: The Nazis employed the term Sippenhaft (“kin liability”) to justify punishing families and communities collectively. This created widespread fear and compliance through trauma, embedding deep psychological scars in communities.
• Mau Mau Uprising (1952–1960, Kenya): British authorities portrayed collective punishments as measures to protect “civilized order,” embedding racialized perceptions into daily consciousness. The rhetoric shaped identity and behaviour under threat of group reprisal.

Africa

• Colonial Congo (1885–1908): The Belgian administration termed punitive measures as “civilizing missions,” embedding violence into colonial rhetoric and reinforcing racial hierarchy. Communities lived under constant existential threat, internalizing violent rule as daily reality.
• South Africa’s Apartheid (1960s–1980s): Authorities used the language of “security operations” and “counter-insurgency,” embedding systemic fear and collective punishment into everyday life. 
• Rwanda post-genocide (1994 onwards): Authorities now use the language of “unity,” “reconciliation,” and “ubuntu” to reject collective punishment and promote communal healing. 

South America

• Argentina’s Dirty War (1976–1983): State rhetoric around “subversion” and “internal enemies” framed group punishment as protection, creating a culture of suspicion and dread.
• Chile under Pinochet (1973–1990): Discourses of “national purity” and “order” justified mass surveillance, detention, and repression that devastated public trust and private life. 
• Peruvian internal conflict (1980–2000): Language of “cleansing” and “restoration” rationalised violence against entire villages, fracturing national identity and sowing generational trauma. 

Australia

• Stolen Generations (1900–1970): Assimilation policies justified child removals, embedding collective punishment into policy language and intergenerational memory.
• Queensland Native Police (1848–1920): Violence was linguistically framed as “pacification,” normalizing massacre as law enforcement and erasing Indigenous agency.
• Intervention in Northern Territory (2007): Federal discourse framed the measures as “emergency response,” masking discriminatory collective restrictions that degraded dignity and self-determination.

Canada

• Residential Schools (1880s–1996): Framed as education, the system punished Indigenous identity itself. The linguistic sanitization of abuse entrenched a legacy of silence and systemic harm.
• Sixties Scoop (1950s–1980s): Framed as child protection, the policy systematically removed Indigenous children. Its language continues to affect how Indigenous families are treated by state institutions.
• Oka Crisis (1990): The crisis exposed how media and military discourse framed Indigenous self-determination as “lawlessness,” legitimizing military force as a collective response.

Phenomenology and the lived experience of collective punishment

How we experience collective punishment—what it feels like in the body, what it awakens in memory, how it is interpreted and resisted—depends profoundly on the cultural narratives we inherit.

For those shaped by Jewish ethical traditions, even subtle forms of collective blame may trigger a visceral response: an instinctive sense of injustice, sharpened by ancestral memories of scapegoating, exile, and law built on individual accountability.

In African communities where ubuntu remains a living principle, collective outcomes may be interpreted less as violations than as invitations to reconcile and repair. But this can also produce pain when state or institutional punishment mimics communal logic without reciprocal relational care.

Among descendants of colonised peoples—such as Irish, Indigenous, or African diasporic communities—collective punishment may carry the weight of ancestral surveillance, land theft, or erasure. It may feel not just unjust, but existentially threatening.

These embodied histories affect how a student responds to being punished for a classmate’s behaviour, how a parent reads a suspension notice, how a teacher interprets dissent. In each case, the legacy of collective punishment is not abstract—it is intimate, lived, and charged with unspoken lineage. Understanding these responses requires not only law and policy but a moral anthropology: a reckoning with what punishment means when filtered through memory, language, and culture.

Language and the cultural codification of collective punishment

Across cultures, the language used to describe collective punishment is more than terminology—it encodes worldviews, reveals moral architecture, and situates the self in relation to the group. In Jewish law, the commandment lo yumsu avot al banim—“parents shall not be put to death for their children” (Deuteronomy 24:16)—establishes an unambiguous rejection of inherited guilt.

“Parents shall not be put to death for their children, nor shall children be put to death for their parents; only for their own crimes may persons be put to death.”

Deuteronomy 24:16

Many African philosophies, especially those shaped by ubuntu—“I am because we are”—approach wrongdoing not through guilt, but through disruption of relational harmony. Accountability is communal, but its goal is restoration, not punishment. 

Weaponisation of “left-wing extremism”

In recent years, the phrase left-wing extremism has been deployed as a rhetorical cudgel—one that silences inquiry, delegitimises dissent, and equates moral scrutiny with ideological danger. It is increasingly used to discredit those who speak against state violence, collective punishment, or structural injustice. The effect is chilling: people who raise urgent questions about ethics, accountability, or the human cost of militarised policy are smeared as radical and dangerous.

This is not accidental. Labelling someone a left-wing extremist allows the speaker to avoid grappling with the actual critique being made. It replaces engagement with dismissal, concern with suspicion. The conversation no longer centres on whether the state is harming civilians, or whether a policy perpetuates systemic inequity—it centres instead on whether the critic is too radical to be heard. This is a form of epistemic violence: it frames reasoned moral analysis as extremism simply because it challenges entrenched power.

In the context of collective punishment, this dynamic is particularly insidious. To question the morality of punishing many for the actions of a few should not be radical—it should be foundational. And yet, those who oppose collective punishment, especially in the context of occupied territories, police violence, or school discipline, are often accused of taking an extreme stance. The word extremist becomes a shield for the status quo, a barrier that prevents ethical self-examination.

We must resist this framing. Questioning power is not extremism. Naming injustice is not radicalism. Demanding dignity, nuance, and accountability in how we respond to harm is not a threat to democracy—it is democracy. When a government, institution, or public figure uses the language of extremism to shut down dissent, it is not protecting the public. It is protecting itself.

Let us be clear: there is nothing extreme about opposing collective punishment.

Contemporary Reflections in Canada

These cross-cultural examples illustrate how collective punishment shapes public perception through language and lived experience. In Canada, they continue to inform debates over school discipline, criminal justice, and reconciliation policy.

Phenomenologically, communities carry daily traces of trauma rooted in collective punishments. Linguistically, shifts toward terms like “restorative justice” and “community healing” reflect our attempt to align justice with dignity. But these shifts are incomplete. The legacy remains visible—in classrooms, institutions, and public memory. Recognizing that is the first step toward meaningful change.

Share your story

We’re gathering personal reflections on how people from different cultural backgrounds understand collective punishment—especially in the context of neurodiversity, disability, education, and parenting.

Maybe you grew up in a place where collective responsibility was seen as normal, even necessary. Maybe you’ve lived with the pain of being punished for things you didn’t do. Maybe you’re still unpacking how ideas about fairness, guilt, or “being good” shaped your understanding of yourself—or your children.

We’re especially interested in hearing from neurodivergent people and families, but all perspectives are welcome—as long as they’re shared with care. We believe in open-hearted conversation, not debate. This isn’t the place to argue whether collective punishment is “necessary.” We’re here to learn from each other’s lived realities. You don’t need to have the right language. You don’t need to agree with us. But we do ask for respect.

What does collective punishment mean to you? How has it shown up in your life, your culture, or your body?