Situational deference to authority, not coercion, drives obedience to mass-murder regimes
Evidence
Milgram’s experiments reconceptualized a crucial issue by shifting the focus away from coerced obedience to noncoerced, situationally induced deference to author ity. (In this regard it should be noted that Milgram included the state’s power to legitimize and disseminate ideology as a factor that helped to define the “situation.”) And the fact that his subjects were both randomly selected and non-German lent his conclusions undeniably universalistic implications. — Leonard S. Newman and Ralph Erber (eds.), Understanding Genocide, 46
Categorization
- XREF: The situational account of perpetrator behavior parallels Glick’s situational account of scapegoating — envied outgroups trigger targeting through circumstance, not perpetrator disposition. — connects to: Inferiority alone cannot justify genocide; danger claims are required — Leonard S. Newman and Ralph Erber (eds.), Understanding Genocide: The Social…, 2160; Ordinary people become destructive agents through duty, not hostility — Leonard S. Newman and Ralph Erber (eds.), Understanding Genocide: The Social…, 606; Ordinary, unselected Germans carried out mass killing when asked — Leonard S. Newman and Ralph Erber (eds.), Understanding Genocide: The Social…, 315 (+10 more)
- recurring: this claim recurs 2 times within its source
Broader Connections
- Duty-driven obedience, not personality, predicts cruelty under authority
#corroborates(0.92) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 434 - Authoritarian traits meaningfully shape behavior despite situational influences
#contradicts(0.88) — Bob Altemeyer, The Authoritarian Specter, 591 - Perceived authoritative sanction disinhibits authoritarian aggression.
#qualifies(0.82) — Bob Altemeyer, The Authoritarian Specter, 146 - Mass killing requires ideology to overcome taboos against killing
#contradicts(0.80) — Erin K. Jenne and Promise Frank Ejiofor, Ethnopopulism and genocidal…, 18 - Focusing on obeying subordinates ignores genocidal initiators and degrees of evil
#complicates(0.78) — Leonard S. Newman and Ralph Erber (eds.), Understanding Genocide, 2007 - Mass murder required neutralizing proximity-based moral drives.
#expands(0.76) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 528