The once-rambunctious Arnold Schwarzenegger Photo:© Ken James / Corbis

To Jefferson Powell, a Duke professor of both divinity and law, the prevalence of the public apology signals a "general leeching out of American life of real substance." It also points to a harsh moralizing tone, a reflexive and malicious sanctioning, that has infected public life. "We have a culture that has a kind of intense moralism about it. But it's a moralism that is divorced from a strong connection to any religious tradition. It looks rather bizarre when we tolerate behavior of all sorts that, according to my religious tradition, is intolerable on the part of public officials--for example, bitter and uncharitable attacks on opponents."

The public display becomes "an end in itself, which is often accompanied by anger. That's what you have to expect from this brittle, superficial moralism. It serves as a tool of anger rather than a means of reconciliation and forgiveness."

As both Jones and Powell see it, repentance that doesn't express itself in action is not true repentance. But there's an obligation on the other side: Healthy communities must provide a means of reconciliation. "That's in large measure what my religious tradition is about," Powell says, "finding ways to repair the damage that we all create in our lives and our communities." The dynamic of repentance and forgiveness, for many religious traditions, is part and parcel of moral teaching.

Controlling political damage: from top, Pakistan's explosive Khan, former birthday-party guest Trent Lott, a not-quite-contrite Bill Clinton

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The memorable media coverage of televangelist Jimmy Swaggart's tearful confession, Powell says, points to the culture's problem with understanding authentic religious expression. In 1988, Swaggart admitted in a Sunday-morning sermon that he had engaged in improprieties with a prostitute. "It was very obvious from the tone of the reporting that part of the story was about making fun of these people for being so naÔve and foolish as to think that Swaggart was doing anything other than trying to save his own neck. But Christianity doesn't give you any options other than to forgive; that's what Christianity says you must do. That doesn't mean you're being naÔve. And then if the apology was insincere, the reconciliation of the person with God and the community won't go through. It won't go through because the person hasn't genuinely repented, not because people are unaccepting of the apology and unwilling to forgive."

Other cultures have recent and powerful experiences with forgiveness. "One of the most interesting laboratories in recent years for all of these dynamics has been South Africa and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission there," says Greg Jones. When he was in South Africa several years ago, he interviewed a number of members of the commission. "One of the things over and over again that they said was, 'Find somebody who is candid, forthright, and truthful.' There's a remarkable willingness on the part of victims' families to be forgiving, to say, 'What we really wanted most was the truth.' And so it opens up a new horizon for a new future."

Some of what was confessed was "chilling and horrifying," Jones says. Still, the overwhelming sentiment was, "What we really want is the lying to stop, the uncertainty of what happened to my loved one to be finally answered," he says. There are hugely complicated issues, including questions of reparations. But the first step was the sense of responsibility and truthfulness linked to a genuine contrition. There are some white South Africans whose contrition has become manifest by doing work in economic empowerment of black Africans. If it was an issue of murder, you obviously can't make things right by bringing back the murder victim. But you might be able to help others. You can live in a different way."

Nations, too, can live in a different way. That's been true for Germany since the end of World War II. Among Germans who lived through the Nazi era, there's a denial of individual responsibility, and so of the need for individual apology, says Duke history professor Claudia Koonz, author of the new book The Nazi Conscience. But they have a much different sense of collective responsibility. Germans were caught up at the time in a movement she calls "ethnic revivalism, or ethnic fundamentalism," a celebration of national virtues and national destiny at the expense, it turned out, of a marginalized population.

Paradoxically, Koonz says, "the active pursuit of major perpetrators of war crimes made those who didn't get accused feel that they had nothing to apologize for." Even Nazi loyalists saw their affiliation as "patriotic" rather than "partisan." Almost none of those put on trial at Nuremberg apologized for their actions.

"The whole process, from the beginning of prejudice to persecution to deportation to extermination, was gradual," Koonz says. "It looked legal--measures came down one at a time--and individuals incrementally found themselves collaborating, in small ways. That's why the culture of collective apology is so important in Germany: It's because people individually didn't feel responsible, but they feel horrified at belonging to a country that was responsible."

The German writer Martin Walser has repeatedly urged Germans to adopt a less guilt-ridden sense of national identity. At a ceremony in 1998 where he was awarded the German book trade's prestigious Peace Prize, he declared that he was tired of the "endless parading of shame" and warned against what he called "the instrumentalization of Auschwitz." Still, Koonz says that no country has done more than Germany to apologize for its past and pursue a path of redemption. As one sign of that, she says, Germans remain "intensely interested in the public culture of commemoration." It's a country engaged in "monument mania," as she describes it. "Every town has to have a monument to the Jews who are no longer there. The extent to which every single aspect of every monument is debated in public is really incredible."

Apologies, redemption, and forgiveness have a resonance in the marketplace. Consumers are ready to forgive companies, but only if they think that an apology is sincere and is accompanied by corrective action. That's the assessment of Gavan Fitzsimons, associate professor of marketing at Duke's Fuqua School of Business. "The work I do shows that, basically, at the moment that the recipients of a message pick up on the fact that you're attempting to persuade them through that message--whether it be an advertisement, a public-service announcement, or an apology--its effectiveness diminishes dramatically. And in many cases, you actually get a backlash, a negative effect." In other words, a business apology might be public-relations spin, but its sponsor certainly doesn't want it to be perceived as such.

Fitzsimons says that a model corporate apology came in the early Eighties after a presumed psychopath poisoned Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules. Johnson & Johnson, the manufacturer, ordered a massive recall involving more than 31 million bottles at a cost of more than $100 million, temporarily ceased all production of capsules, and replaced them with tamper-resistant caplets. The company's CEO maintained a high profile throughout the episode. The Washington Post observed at the time that "what Johnson & Johnson executives have done is communicate the message that the company is candid, contrite, and compassionate, committed to solving the murders and protecting the public." With a massive marketing campaign, and a repackaging program, Tylenol staged an impressive comeback.

A contrary example appeared in the late Eighties. Audi, the luxury carmaker, was confronting reports of sudden-acceleration problems when the transmission was shifted out of "Park." CBS' 60 Minutes featured the story of a mother who had run over her six-year-old son; she insisted that she had had her foot on the brake the whole time. When her claim came to court, the jury found no defect in the car. But that jury finding was almost irrelevant to Audi's standing, Fizsimons says. "Audi's response was, 'It's not our fault, it's basically the dumb American driver who's ramming his foot on the gas and running it into his garage.' They didn't say, 'We apologize for the trouble. We're not sure what's at the root of the problem but we're going to do everything in our power to solve it.' Audi basically disappeared from the U.S. marketplace for about ten years."