Q&A Matt James on the Age of Apology

April 22, 2026

Dr. Matt James is a scholar in UVic’s Department of Political Science. His recent paper, “From Maxing to Saming: Historical Injustice Comparison and The New Mnemonic Menace from the Right,” examines two techniques—maxing and saming—that target norms of introspective regret associated with the Age of Apology. 

Q1. How would you describe the Age of Apology?

A period, beginning around the end of the Cold War in the early 1990s, when liberal democratic states began to do something historically unprecedented:  admit to wrongdoing, repudiate it, and offer acknowledgment and compensation to victims of that wrongdoing and/or their descendants. 

The admissions were often grudging and weak, as were the acknowledgment and compensation.  But they did involve a novel approach to the state’s past and its legitimacy:  not stridently patriotic remembrance, but something more self-critical, and with at least some admission that the state maybe had problems with its moral legitimacy.

Q2. Can you please explain the term “maxing” in the context of your research paper on historical injustice?

As states began to acknowledge their past wrongs, people began to use those acknowledgments to point out cases where states were continuing to commit wrongs similar to what they were now apologizing for.  So government leaders and spokespersons were challenged by accusations from rights advocates that they were hypocrites. 

One way authorities responded was by saying, in effect, “no, what we’re doing today isn’t like the injustices of the past.  We reject those injustices, but what we’re doing now is not like that—it is rights-respecting and reflects our learning from earlier injustices.” 

I call this maxing because it uses a past wrong as a maximum benchmark of injustice, in order to then paint as OK anything that can be shown to be “not quite that bad.” 

For example, when US President Trump proposed a plainly racist registry of all Muslims in the US, he said this was “not as drastic” as the Japanese internment camps of WWII.

Q3. Can you please explain the term “saming” in the context of your research paper on historical injustice?

Saming is another kind of rights-abusive response to the Age of Apology, but it usually comes from everyday folks rather than government leaders, at least in liberal democracies.  And instead of trying to defend against criticism, saming is about trying to get attention for complaints of victimhood by saying that some alleged present-day wrong is similar to something  infamous from the past.  But these are not normal comparisons that even a minimally thoughtful person would make.  Instead, saming is really troubling, first, because the comparison is absurd:  saying something is “just the same” as a major injustice when in fact it is strikingly not. 

Worse still, in saming, something pretty sneaky gets added on to the bad comparison itself.  The person makes their bad comparison in a way that actively tries to diminish the social recognition and seriousness of the injustice that they are trying to compare to. 

For example, during the Covid-19 pandemic, some conspiracy-minded critics of public-health measures took to saying that vaccination and masking requirements were “just like Nazi Germany.”  But at the same time they said outlandish things about the “plandemic” and global conspiracies—statements that relied on antisemitic imagery.  

So, saming seems to me to represent a really bad-faith way of trying to capitalize on the social awareness of historical injustice sometimes associated with the Age of Apology.  In the example above, it’s about using the Holocaust to amplify absurd claims while at the same time rejecting any kind of concern with preventing antisemitism or racist scapegoating.  And this kind of far-right attack happens not only with memories of the Holocaust, but with slavery, Canada’s residential schools policy, and more. 

Q4. What is the countermeasure to open democratic dialogue?

The countermeasure to open democratic dialogue is about finding a way to respond to saming, because its weird and outlandish comparisons are so hard to respond to.  Oftentimes, the people who are “saming” are simply peddling hate and trying to sow confusion.  But sometimes, they are just misguided. 

They are angry that their suffering isn’t being recognized, and they are frustrated that communities affected by other, socially infamous past injustices are getting some kind of social attention. 

So they make these bad comparisons that involve expressions of frustration about their position relative to other groups.  There is a chance for democratic dialogue here, I think.  You can say back to that person, “I think maybe the comparison you’re making is a little extreme, and here’s why.” 

 And even more important, you can also say, “the principle you’re trying to rely on here is a good one, I think:  you’re bringing up a past wrong because we are horrified by it, and we remember it because we don’t want evil to thrive and people to suffer.  So try to stick to those concerns and principles when you’re talking about other people’s histories and their sufferings rather than dismissing and even attacking them.” 

And I think some of these encounters really could be democracy-strengthening opportunities.

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