Samuel Oliner

September 13, 2010
Since the publication of the Altruistic Personality, which dealt with goodness, we have been asked what the implications are from our study.  After some thought we decided to write a book titled Toward a Caring Society, which dealt with what in the practical sense can be done to bring about a moral, caring, and compassionate society.  

To further our research in 1992 we met in Poland with the International Conference of Scholars to expand on the notion of altruism and prosocial behavior.  This resulted in a book titled, Embracing the Other: Philosophical, Psychological, and Historical Perspectives on Altruism.  Later, the result of 9/11 in which heroic behavior is evident we published a book, Do Unto Others: Extraordinary Acts of Ordinary People.  This book includes 9/11 heroes, Carnegie heroes, military heroes, as well as acts of moral leaders, and philanthropists. 
 
In order to widen our understanding of heroism I interviewed a heroic Jew by the name of Wilhelm Bachner who pretended to be German and worked for a Nazi firm that moved to Poland and Ukraine.  He came to rescue 50 Jewish people and other victims.  The details of that have been included in Who Shall Live: The Wilhelm Bachner Story, authored by myself as well as Kathleen Lee.  Most recently, we were interested in the world of healing, apology, forgiveness, and reconciliation.  In 2009 I published a book titled, Altruism, Intergroup Apology, Forgiveness, and Reconciliation, which addresses the consequences of anger and indifference to other people’s pain.  We have been able to explain how intergroup apology, that is apology between nations and groups to each other for having harmed and have a positive outcome.  Intergroup apology and forgiveness is a topic whose time has arrived.   

Oliner, Samuel P. 2008. Altruism, Intergroup Apology, Forgiveness and Reconciliation. St. Paul: Paragon House.

Oliner, Samuel P. 2003. Do Unto Others Extraordinary Acts of Ordinary People. Boulder: Westview Press.

Oliner, Samuel and Kathleen Lee. 1996. Who Shall Live The Wilhelm Bachner Story. Chicago: Academy Chicago Publishers.

Oliner, Pearl and Samuel P. Oliner. 1995. Toward a Caring Society. Praeger: Connecticut.

Oliner, Pearl M., Samuel P. Oliner, Lawrence Baron, Lawrence A. Blum, Dennis L. Krebs, and M. Zuzanna Smolenska. 1992. Embracing the Other: 
           Philosophical, Psychological, and Historical Perspectives on Altruism. New York: New York University Press.

Oliner, Samuel and Pearl Oliner. 1988. The Altruistic Personality: Rescuers of Jews in Nazi Europe. New York: The Free Press.