In last month's column I recounted how my replication of Stanley Milgram's shock experiments revealed that although most people can be inveigled to obey authorities if they are asked to hurt others, they do so reluctantly and with much moral conflict. Milgram's explanation was an “agentic state,” or “the condition a person is in when he sees himself as an agent for carrying out another person's wishes.” As agents in an experiment, subjects shift from being moral agents in society to obedient agents in a hierarchy. “I am forever astonished that when lecturing on the obedience experiments in colleges across the country, I faced young men who were aghast at the behavior of experimental subjects and proclaimed they would never behave in such a way but who, in a matter of months, were brought into the military and performed without compunction actions that made shocking the victim seem pallid.”
This is an astute observation because research on the motivation of soldiers during combat—well summarized by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman in his deeply insightful book On Killing (Little, Brown, 2009)—reveals that a soldier's primary motivation is not politics and ideology but devotion to his band of brothers. “Among men who are bonded together so intensely,” Grossman explains, “there is a powerful process of peer pressure in which the individual cares so deeply about his comrades and what they think about him that he would rather die than let them down.”
As a social primate species, we modulate our morals with signals from family, friends and social groups with whom we identify because in our evolutionary past those attributes helped individuals to survive and reproduce. We do not just blindly concede control to authorities; instead we follow the cues provided by our moral communities on how best to behave.
The power of identification is emphasized in a reinterpretation of Milgram in a 2012 article in Perspectives on Psychological Science by University of St. Andrews psychologist Stephen D. Reicher, University of Queensland psychologist S. Alexander Haslam and University of Exeter psychologist Joanne R. Smith. They call their paradigm “identification-based followership,” noting that “participants' identification with either the experimenter and the scientific community that he represents or the learner and the general community that he represents” better explains the willingness of subjects to shock (or not) learners at the bidding of an authority. At the start of the experiment, subjects identify with the experimenter and his worthy scientific research program, but at 150 volts the subjects' identification begins to shift to the learner, who cries out “Ugh!!! Experimenter! That's all. Get me out of here, please. My heart's starting to bother me. I refuse to go on. Let me out.”
It is, in fact, at 150 volts that subjects are most likely to quit or protest. “In effect,” Reicher and his colleagues postulate, “they become torn between two competing voices that are vying for their attention and making contradictory demands on them.” This hypothesis better explains subjects' overt moral struggles after 150 volts far better than Milgram's agentic state because the latter encompasses only the subject-authority tie at the exclusion of the obvious subject-victim empathetic bond.
The other shortcoming of Milgram's model is that it lets Nazi bureaucrats off the hook as mere agentic apparatuses in an extermination engine run by Adolf Eichmann, whose actions were famously described by Hannah Arendt as the “banality of evil.” Where is the moral accountability? As historian Yaacov Lozowick noted in his 2002 book Hitler's Bureaucrats, “Eichmann and his ilk did not come to murder Jews by accident, or in a fit of absent-mindedness, nor by blindly obeying orders or by being small cogs in a big machine. They worked hard, thought hard, took the lead over many years. They were the alpinists of evil.”
Examples of Nazi climbers ascending into the thin air of evil abound in a 1992 book entitled The Good Old Days. As explained by one such alpinist, SS Lt. Col. Karl Kretschmer: “It is a weakness not to be able to stand the sight of dead people; the best way of overcoming it is to do it more often. Then it becomes a habit.”
Providentially, learned habits can be unlearned, especially in the context of moral groups.
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN ONLINE
Comment on this article at ScientificAmerican.com/dec2012
This article was originally published with the title The Alpinists of Evil.
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27 Comments
Add CommentThis article is insightful into the actions of followers.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOn the one hand we need to hold followers responsble for atrocities done as (mistaken?) agents for leaders. On the other hand we cannot ignore the pressures from leaders and the agent's group.
Manipulators and bullies must be aware of their own responsibilities for the actions of their followers who are pressured to act against their own interests/morals and to obey the perceived interests/morals of their leaders.
Automatic self control is replaced by psychological motivations. The follower rationalizes his behavior by "I have no choice". When the whole group is following, this seems to be true.
Certainly in war the soldier is required to think, "What would the officers want?" In civilian organizations an employee's thinking can be similar.
The agent's actions may seem intentional but are they realy his own intent?
Would this apply to gangs of the cities? If so the killings will not stop until this "band of brothers" is addressed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI continue to find Milgram's shock experiments disturbing, ever since I viewed the video of some of those sessions. That unease applies to this article as well.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat if I asked you to pay several strangers to participate in a exercise where they will not only be subjected to intense moral and emotional conflicts, and I mean intense, causing them to believe that they could kill anyone if simply told to--would you? And yes, this will cause the participants serious psychological trauma.
Would you do it? Would you do it in the name of science? Could you then sanctimoniously dissect this kind of torture, discussing in abstract terms those 'obedient agents in a hierarchy'?
The one and only thing those participants did was trust the scientists, that hierarchy, believing that the men and women in the white coats wouldn't ask them to "go on, continue" if it would harm or kill another person.
Milgram's assurances that the participants were given 'psychological support' after his experiments never have assured me. His experiments and dissections of the participants' behavior continue to strike me as not only as horrid, but also a perfect example of his "obedient agents in a hieracrchy" behavior, in this case 'in the name of science'. It does demonstrate reasons not to trust the general benevolence of scientists. They are capable of the same cold-blooded focus and objectification of people as any 'Alpinists of Evil.'
Perhaps "Providentially, learned habits can be unlearned, especially in the context of moral groups"...like psychologists and scientists.
People are conditioned from an early age to set aside their own intents and follow the intents of leaders, teachers, priests, parents, groups, society, etc.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTo imprison blasphemers is against our culture but if it were part of our culture, we would accept it as if it were a natural law. No one would think twice about it.
The inclination to follow is a learned tendency that is conditioned into every child.
I wonder what made M.Shermer choose Mario Wagners illustration. For having qualms in obeying orders, the Nazi Waffen-SS is a particularly bad example, considering what they did while obeying Hiler´s orders. Moreover, do they have to look like a bunch of extraterrestrials? Finally: as the name SS implies, their emblem was a pair of lightning bolts, similar to 2 high voltage signs, rather than a single one.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRoger Lo
For Hiler please read Hitler!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRoger Lo
In any organization a person who will not follow will be excluded and replaced by someone who will follow.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMilgram did the experiment with male victims. In Italy they did another experiment with female victims and very few subjects obeyed the order. This is only to be expected since men are obliged by patriarcal culture to protect women even at the risk of their own lifes. No wonder the study is litle known. It goes against the feminist dogma according to which men are inclined to abuse women; it is just the opposite. Feminist have managed to convince everyone that the exception is the rule.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis will have some harsh things to say about some governments, so it may not be printed or may be removed. This article actually disastrously simplifies a number of situations, to the point of not legitimately representing them at all.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisConsider, for example, the easy "exoneration" of soldiers in battle. The article casually accepts as "authoirtative", and, therefore, unquestionable, Lt. Col. Grossman's "analysis" that "a soildier's primary motivation is not politics and ideology but devotion to his band of brothers".
In fact, to even become a conventional soldier for a nation with a record of colonial aspirations and machinations means you have to already ascribe to a literally depraved set of principles. It's alright to kill. It doesn't matter if the other guy is in the right and you're in the wrong, you work only for your interests. Killing is the only solution to any dispute. This automatically obviates any sense of an "agentic" mentality. Cnventional soldiers of colonial states seem nothing more than homicidal lunatics looking for a way to get their jollies with official sanction and at taxpayer expense. Or individuals too dull to realize they are risking, at best, permanent disability and disfigurement, so some rich swine can have gold faucets on their multi million dollar yacht.
And it is crucial and fundamental to remember that each individual is a part of the community they are blaming for their morals! So each has a part in shaping the general moral direction. If each individual is affected by something else and does no contributing to the general direction of thinking, meaning each is controlled by some overriding "community" sense but not contributing to it, what is it that is affecting them?
And how instructive to think that the soldiers described as "protecting our freedoms" are acutally nothing more than myrmidons motivated by soulless ant like group mentalities, and not individual freedom! But, then, remmeber, that is another rule that every conventional soldier of a marauding colonial power ascribes to, namely, you have no individual existence and certainly no right to express yourself in policy, you are just an arm of your group, told by powerful higher ups what actions you are to take that shape the world, and spending the rest of the time in aimless diversions.
Individual free will is surrendered to the organization as an entrance fee. Rebels are unwelcome, excluded.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf I need a job, I cannot afford to be critical of any potential employer.
I know how to follow. I have been taught to follow. Yet some will blame me for my employer's sins.
I am not my employer's agent. I am my employer's servant. Even US law says that I have a master - servant relationship. But I am certainly not equal to the master.
In Germany during the war there were Nazi masters, agents and servants. But there were not obvious rebels. Why was that?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf I can convince you that you will serve or die, you will "choose" to serve.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf I can convince you that you will serve or be excluded, you will also "choose" to serve.
Obviously, you can choose to be excluded (or die) but it is unlikely that you will.
early yesterday morning in a small lane near my home, and just outside a childcare centre, someone dumped a truckload of asbestos-laden building material waste - I found the area taped off as a crime/safety scene.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy would they do this? I'm guessing a low paid truck driver - harrassed by his boss, told to 'just dump it somewhere - or else' - has wanted to keep his job, needed to keep earning money to feed his kids, and justified it to himself that 'the government' will clean it up, so it's kinda like his tax dollars/he's already paying to fix it - right ?
The rational mind has a tremendous skill at post-justification of actions that on the face of it appear unconscionable.
The analysis of the power of the group and loyalty to the group, being willing to even sacrifice one's life not to let ones friends down, is an important insight. But instead of in small evil groups as Eichmann's underlings, what if in large good groups? What if in the largest -- Humanity itself?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow -- integral education, and developing a sense of mutual guarantee. The one purpose that evil has, is to direct us to the good.
There's that Madeleine again. Hello! SciAm! Are you monitoring this site at all? I think you have a phishing expedition in progress here.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHistory and personal experience tells me that there are very few people who are evil or intrinsically good. But most people are cowards and cowards are easily led.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt's amazing what people will do or believe to belong to a group.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJust look at religon where they believe in magical beings that won't show themselves and happily kill others for with a smile of joy on their faces.
I've luckily never fallen in those kind of traps as I always look deeper into why someone is doing, saying something as you can see far more that way than what is actually said.
I noticed early on that religon was a load of bull as was many 'leaders' that only wanted your money, power and make you basically slaves for them.
“It is a weakness not to be able to stand the sight of dead people; the best way of overcoming it is to do it more often. Then it becomes a habit.” ... Kretschmer
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe sight of dead people is not the only inhibition that we are removing from our children by showing gory scenes in movies and TV shows. It also becomes a "habit" to shoot others by glorifying such behavior in movies and video games. Violent and realistic VIDEO games are a prime example of the dangerous habits that we are allowing, even encouraging children to acquire. These "kill-games" are far more dangerous to society than smoking or second-hand smoke; yet the promotion of these perverse products is condoned more than smoking ever was.
In order to heal our society, banning assault weapons is a start; but that will only be effective if we stop teaching children how easy it can be to kill others, not only in the movies and games, but in real life.
It would be interesting to see if soldiers who played violent video ganes were less likely to suffer from PTSD.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am thinking that nothing can prepare a soldier for the real thing like being on a battlefield. But maybe you are right.
An example of how environment modulates behavior may be the rape of Lucretia by the son of Tarquin, the then Etruscan King of Rome; she suffered the assault under the threat of a sword, just to suicide the day after with a dagger. If she'd resisted the violation the day before, she'll have died too, but saved her honour. The nazi times are among the saddest episodes of mankind, at least in recent times, but considering that the organizations that endorsed some of their beliefs dissapeared in May 1945, that an US Army psychiatrist that was there these days proposed to administer an electroshock to any German being 14 years old or more at the time of the end of WWII, and that some people seem to use these crimes as a weapon to reinforce attitudes that may be called "Zyon supremacism", it would be wise to leave the subject sleep for some 50 years more.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPeople follow authority even when it doesn't make sense. The Black-Scholes equation is a good example of how authority can lead us a-sway. Most of us know, subconsciously if not consciously that making bets on bets is a bad idea. All the same, the sub-prime mortgage game’s engine hummed seamlessly until everything fell apart in 2008. We do what authority tells us to because it is how we learn to play the game, fit in, and succeed. Socialization is an important element of civilization, for without it, humanity would still be gatherers and hunters. We learn much from authority. We learn how to use tools, cooperate, and thrive. Going against authority or our socializers is asking for it. To rebel is to be thrown in jail, to be ostracized, and to be penniless. Therefore, it is no surprise to me that Milgram’s test subjects favored authority over their empathy. Following authority is usually rewarded, and following empathy is usually punished. With that said, the fact that social psychology is growing as a field, and that we are discussing the differences between following authority and empathy at all is a step in the right direction. Maybe someday humanity will uncover the reason for incongruous behaviors. Until then, I hope we always keep searching.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPeople follow authority even when it doesn't make sense. The Black-Scholes equation is a good example of how authority can lead us a-sway. Most of us know, subconsciously if not consciously that making bets on bets is a bad idea. All the same, the sub-prime mortgage game’s engine hummed seamlessly until everything fell apart in 2008. We do what authority tells us to because it is how we learn to play the game, fit in, and succeed. Socialization is an important element of civilization, for without it, humanity would still be gatherers and hunters. We learn much from authority. We learn how to use tools, cooperate, and thrive. Going against authority or our socializers is asking for it. To rebel is to be thrown in jail, to be ostracized, and to be penniless. Therefore, it is no surprise to me that Milgram’s test subjects favored authority over their empathy. Following authority is usually rewarded obedience, and following empathy is usually punishable rebellion. With that said, the fact that social psychology is growing as a field, and that we are discussing the differences between following authority and empathy at all is a step in the right direction. Maybe someday humanity will uncover the reason for our incongruous behaviors. Until then, I hope we always keep searching.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIs there something of this in the survivalist ideology with which Adam Lanza was indoctrinated?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow many members of the nazi party, and how many germans were actually personally involved in the crimes that lead to many members of these groups ending hung? Few know this, but some years before the start of WWII, the so called 3d Reich issued laws regarding experiments in human beings that made out of law the 42 experiments conducted on concentration camps imprisoned persons. It's not law, but human nature and how we handle it, what makes a place worth or safe for living or not.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes, an old Dutch saying mentions this: [translated], you will speak the word of him who feeds you. (Wiens brood men eet, diens woord men spreekt).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes there were, Evangelische Kirche protested.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"...ilk did not come to murder Jews by accident, or in a fit of absent-mindedness, nor by blindly obeying orders or by being small cogs in a big machine. They worked hard, thought hard, took the lead over many years. They were the alpinists of evil.”
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy were so many Nazis (the evil persons) born in Nazi period only? Why are not Nazi babies born now? If the society and leaders of the Nazi period influenced them to do so then they did evil things by 'accident' or by being 'cogs in a big machine'. Now the society is influencing them to use their capability of hard thinking for 'non-evil' purposes.
It is a natural tendency to feel revengeful and punish somebody when we feel someone has done something wronged our loved ones. The research (“Ugh!!! Experimenter! That's all. Get me out of here,...)in above article is guided by / interpreted through such emotions.