Duty-driven obedience, not personality, predicts cruelty under authority
Evidence
A particular disquiet and rage were caused by his hypothesis that cruelty is not committed by cruel individuals, but by ordinary men and women trying to acquit themselves well of their ordinary duties; and his findings, that while cruelty correlates but poorly with the personal characteristics of its perpetrators, it correlates very strongly indeed with the relationship of authority and subordination, with our normal, daily encountered, structure of power and obedience. ‘The person who, with inner conviction, loathes stealing, killing, and assault, may find himself performing these acts with relative ease when commanded by authority. Behaviour that is unthinkable in an individual who is acting on his own may be executed without hesitation when carried out under orders. — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 434
Categorization
- XREF: Core mechanism for the Islamophobia toolkit: how ordinary subjects perform exclusion purely by fulfilling assigned duties within a power structure. — connects to: Unchecked power over others, not participant nature, drives cruelty — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 475; Rationalized social organization structurally enables cruelty by mediating responsibility — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 441; Obscuring the causal link between action and suffering sharply raises obedience — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 440 (+12 more)
Related
- Obscuring the causal link between action and suffering sharply raises obedience (similarity 0.85)
- Unchecked power over others, not participant nature, drives cruelty (similarity 0.81)
- Ordinary people become destructive agents through duty, not hostility (similarity 0.79)
- Milgram’s obedience theory locates harsh action in situational authority pressure, not internal hatred. (similarity 0.79)
- Solidarity degenerates into fear-driven obedience when followers forfeit independent judgment (similarity 0.78)
- Bureaucracy shifts moral concern from targets onto superiors’ judgment (similarity 0.78)
Broader Connections
- Unchecked power over others, not participant nature, drives cruelty
#corroborates(0.95) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 475 - Rationalized social organization structurally enables cruelty by mediating responsibility
#expands(0.80) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 441 - Obscuring the causal link between action and suffering sharply raises obedience
#expands(0.80) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 440 - Continuous responsibility shifting across a hierarchy creates free-floating responsibility that incapacitates moral authority
#expands(0.78) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 463 - Moral inhibition is neutralized by making victims remote and invisible
#expands(0.78) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 550 - Duty-based moralities subordinate the individual to maintenance of social norms.
#expands(0.72) — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality, 553 - Duty-based moral cultures suppress cost-sensitivity in prosocial decisions.
#expands(0.72) — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality, 558 - Military obedience can mask a private rebellion against authority itself
#complicates(0.72) — Julien Gracq, Balcony in the Forest, 258