Have any of you wondered why and how people would end up with a dictatorial regime within a country? I mean, key supporters of a country, whether few or many, may or may not actually believe or approve of a authoritarian regime, so why do they comply with the orders of someone else?
Take a gander at this:
Stanley Milgram, who dedicated his life to studying why, how and the powers of obedience to a higher authority. Although conducted in the early 1960s, it shows the ease of how ordinary people can be induced by a seemingly legitimate authority to act with extraordinary cruelty or lack of humanism against innocents.
As Milgram put it, "an authority system ... consists of a minimum of two persons sharing the expectation that one of them has the right to prescribe behaviour for the other", and that "the power of an authority stems not from personal characteristics but from his perceived position in a social structure". Meaning that leaders of men and people, are elected not necessarily due to natural leadership traits, but how high a status the people prescribe him/her to be in society.
He then proceeds to explain the depth and ability of authority to define reality for the governed, a.k.a. the person who accepts this authority, and "that although the subject performs the action, he or she allows authority to define its meaning".
So if Authority is defined by Class,
Class is defined by Power,
and Power is created from perceived Authority,
do dictatorships necessarily lead to power and wealth? Or does mercantilist theories and capitalism lead to dictatorships?
I think thats it comes down to who is perceived as best to rule. In the Dahl reading, he talks about how the best people to rule are only a select few who spend their whole lives learning about how to rule. So people do the same, work out who is best to rule, the upper class, because they must be more knowledgeable, and also because they have the power to do so. Many base their campaign on a legitimising claim to gain support of the people, however, dictators will always be out of touch with the people.
ReplyDeleteJX, I'm not sure I understand your last question about capitalism and mercantilism.
ReplyDeleteOn your first point, the idea is that supporters do get benefits - opportunities for corruption, etc. There was an article recently in the NYTimes detailing how every new minister in Mugabe's government gets a late model Mercedes Benz. Since you cannot be sure you will be included in a challenger's coalition and receive your new cars etc, you may become quite loyal to Mugabe!
Milgram's experiments explain many things, but do you think they are necessary to explain the support of people who benefit from a dictatorship? They seem to explain more why ordinary people obey horrific orders.
Yeah i got a bit lost halfway. Haha
ReplyDeleteDoes it matter the depth of horror the actions that people are commanded to do do? As long as there are people who are dissatisfied or are not willing to perform those actions i think these experiments would apply to those people.