(This is an archived extract from the book Patterns of Power: Edition 2)
Peaceful pluralism depends upon people not offending each other, and exhibiting socially-acceptable behaviour as described in the previous section (4.4.2). It evolves naturally as people interact:
· They show each other what is socially acceptable by example.
· They can intervene, to ask someone to behave differently.
· They can express ideas and make recommendations to influence other people’s beliefs and thereby influence their future behaviour (4.3.3).
· If people discuss what is and is not socially acceptable, they can agree to adjust their expectations of each other. It is a form of negotiation.
These influences constitute a form of governance which is present in all interactions between people. With goodwill it is self-sustaining without calling upon any other form of authority. There is, though, a limit to the effectiveness of moral influence: not all interventions to ask someone to change their behaviour will be welcome, and in some circumstances there will be resistance.
It is difficult to determine whether to intervene and how to do so. As an illustration of some of the complexities, consider an adult who attempts to stop one child from bullying another. Intervention could be regarded as socially responsible, irrespective of whether the adult and the children share the same system of beliefs, but it is not as simple as that:
· Firstly, the adults may be putting themselves at risk: if not from the children themselves, from the children’s relatives or from gang members. ‘Passing by on the other side of the road’ and ‘minding one's own business’ will often seem safer – but that will not help the child who is being bullied and nor will it help to educate the bullies about the unacceptability of their behaviour.
· Secondly, in the bullying example, it is not always easy to work out whether what is taking place is actually bullying rather than, say, ‘horseplay’ that the ‘victim’ is quite prepared to go along with. Intervention in such cases would be seen as officiousness rather than help. This risk can be reduced by asking the 'victim' whether help would be welcome.
· It may be tempting to suggest that the law might offer a solution, but moral pressure can change 'normal' behaviour more immediately than a law which, in the case of bullying, could only be invoked after it had taken place, and then only if the circumstances were right for a successful prosecution. A bully's peer group, by contrast, can immediately express distaste for the bad behaviour – which is a much more effective and timely deterrent.
Clearly it is preferable (where circumstances permit) that such intervention comes from within the bully’s peer group or his or her own family: there is less room for doubt about the right of the person to intervene, there is less personal risk attached to the intervention and it is likely to have a more effective educational impact on the bully because the approval of the intervener will matter more to him or her. The widespread and immediate availability of moral influence makes it one of the strongest mechanisms for people to govern each other's behaviour but, as this example has shown, its use is not straightforward. Its impact is strongest within close-knit groups.
It can be argued that a person would not wish to be told how to behave, and that people should therefore leave each other alone because that is likely to be preferable to any form of intervention. This is an argument which might be seen as complying with the Golden Rule, but it is a superficial interpretation of it; people would have no means of avoiding discomfort unless they were able to comment on, or protest against, behaviour which is offending or harming them; they would therefore have to grant other people similar rights, under the principle of reciprocity. Where possible it is often better to use the law, though, rather than risk causing a civil disturbance.
Moral influence may be ineffective in cases where an entire group develops a behavioural norm which is unacceptable to other groups: influence within a group is always stronger than influence from outside the group (4.3.2.2). Applying moral sanctions may only have the effect of strengthening a group’s resistance; and there may be extreme cases where a group simply refuses to negotiate with the rest of society. Refusal to negotiate is a problem which can apply to any of the dimensions of governance and is discussed in the last chapter (9.6).
© PatternsofPower.org, 2014