Understanding Universe of Obligation

About This Lesson

This lesson uses resources from Chapter 2 of Holocaust and Human Behavior to prompt students to explore the ways that individuals, groups, communities, and nations define who belongs and who does not. The activities that follow examine what it means to belong by introducing the idea of a “universe of obligation,” the term sociologist Helen Fein coined to describe the circle of individuals and groups within a society “toward whom obligations are owed, to whom rules apply, and whose injuries call for amends.”  ¹

Essential Questions

• How do groups, communities, and nations define who belongs and who does not?
• How do individuals define the continuum of people for whom they feel responsible?  
• What factors influence the extent to which we feel an obligation to help others? How does the way we view others influence our feelings of responsibility toward them?

Learning Objectives

• Students will recognize that a society’s universe of obligation includes those people who that society believes are deserving of respect and whose rights it believes are worthy of protection.
• Students will understand that a society’s universe of obligation often changes, expanding or shrinking depending on circumstances such as peace and prosperity or war and economic depression.

• 1Helen Fein, Accounting for Genocide (New York: Free Press, 1979), 4.

Lesson Plan

Activity 1: Respond to Quotations

• Begin the lesson by asking students to choose one of the following three quotations to write about in their journals:
  • Eighteenth-century philosopher David Hume (as paraphrased by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks): “Our sense of empathy diminishes as we move outward from the members of our family to our neighbors, our society, and the world. Traditionally, our sense of involvement with the fate of others has been in inverse proportion to the distance separating us and them."
  • Nineteenth-century sociologist William Graham Sumner: “Every man and woman in society has one big duty. That is, to take care of his or her own self.”
  • Scholar and social activist Chuck Collins: “Of course, we have to respond to our immediate family, but, once they’re O.K., we need to expand the circle. A larger sense of family is a radical idea, but we get into trouble as a society when we don’t see that we’re in the same boat.” 
• After copying one of these quotations into their journals, students should respond to the following questions about it:
  • What is the author’s vision of community?
  • What responsibilities and obligations do individuals have to each other, according to this author?
  • Do you agree with the author’s statement? Are there any parts of the statement that make you feel uncomfortable?
• After writing in their journals, students should discuss and share their thinking using the Think, Pair, Share teaching strategy.

Activity 2: Illustrate an Individual "Universe of Obligation"

• Read this Universe of Obligation overview with the class. Discuss the Connection Questions that follow the reading, and then give each student a copy of the Universe of Obligation handout. Give students time to follow the instructions and complete the activity on the handout.
• Have students meet in groups of two or three to discuss their experience of trying to illustrate their universes of obligation. In their discussions, they should address the following questions:
  • What was the experience of illustrating your universe of obligation like?
  • What did you think about when deciding where to place certain groups in your universe of obligation? Which decisions were difficult? Which were easy?
  • Under what conditions might your universe of responsibility shift?
  • What is the difference between an individual’s universe of obligation and that of a school, community, or country?

Activity 3: Illustrate a Group's "Universe of Obligation"

Repeat the second activity, above, this time asking each student to choose a group to which he or she belongs—such as a school, neighborhood, or country—and illustrate that group’s universe of obligation. Again, students can conclude the activity by sharing their thinking with two or three classmates and discussing the same questions listed above, this time in relation to the group universe of obligation they illustrated.