Lecture 13: obedience to authority
Political Psychology
Ryan D. Enos
Harvard University
Department of Government
March 22, 2011
fundamental attribution error
Fundamental Attribution Error (correspondence bias)
Jones and Davis (1967), Ross (1977)
Fundamental Attribution Error (correspondence bias)
Jones and Davis (1967), Ross (1977)
cognitive
Fundamental Attribution Error (correspondence bias)
Jones and Davis (1967), Ross (1977)
cognitive
just-world phenomenon (Lerner 1977)
Fundamental Attribution Error (correspondence bias)
Jones and Davis (1967), Ross (1977)
cognitive
just-world phenomenon (Lerner 1977)
salience
Fundamental Attribution Error (correspondence bias)
Jones and Davis (1967), Ross (1977)
cognitive
just-world phenomenon (Lerner 1977)
salience
cultural
why evil?
“To do evil a human being must
fist of all believe that what he’s
doing is good, or else that it’s a
well-considered act in conformity
with natural law. Fortunately, it
is in the nature of the human
being to seek a justification for
his action”.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The
Gulag Archipelago, 1973
evil as personality
“. . . political, economic, and
social convictions of an individual
often form a broad and coherent
pattern, as if bound together by
a ’mentality’ or ’spirit’, and that
this pattern is an expression of
deep-lying trends of his
personality”.
Adorno, et al, The Authoritarian
Personality, 1950
evil as personality
The Authoritarian Personality (Adorno, et al, 1950)
Conventionalism
Authoritarian submission
Authoritarian aggression
Anti-intraception
Superstition and stereotypy
Power and “toughness’
Destructiveness and cynicism
Projectivity
Sex
evil as personality
Right-wing authoritarianism (Altemeyer, 1981)
Conventionalism
Authoritarian submission
Authoritarian aggression
permanence of behavior
innate
psychosis
permanence of behavior
personality
innate
psychosis
evil as situational
“Three psychological truths
emerge from Escher’s image.
First, the world is filled with both
good and evil – was, is, and
always be. Second, the barrier
between good and evil is
permeable and nebulous. And
third, it is possible for angels to
become devils and, perhaps more
difficult to conceive, for devils to
become angels”.
–Zimbardo, The Lucifer Effect,
2007
situations conducive to evil
obedience to authority
Milgram, 1965
permanence of behavior
personality
innate
psychosis
permanence of behavior
personality
innate
situational
ethics of research
“If in this study an anonymous
experimenter could successfully
command adults to subdue a fifty
year old man and force on him
painful electric shocks against his
protest, one can only wonder
what government, with its vastly
greater authority and prestige,
can command of its subjects”.
–Milgram, 1965
political relevance