Advance obedience
As anticipation of obedience is called the voluntary anticipation of suspected desired behavior in the context of group dynamics ( peer pressure ). A performance of obedience is then not produced as a result of societal and social pressure , but out of conviction or in order to escape this pressure from the outset.
Possible explanations
This form of obedience is caused by either emotions, diffuse fears or a lack of self-esteem towards suspected authorities , which lead to such submission . Because obedience actually also includes a social limitation, for example in the context of the authority of military discipline . A limitless adaptation (i.e. boundaries are neither anchored in the person nor in the social) makes anticipatory obedience a social danger. This social behavior is described in the satire Duodez by Hermann Löns : “He will soon be ready to serve on the telephone ... [he] gets used to not saying a word to himself or in his sleep, which is offensive could excite. "
A person acting in anticipatory obedience can retain the illusion of acting or having acted voluntarily . Anticipatory obedience avoids the (potentially humiliating ) experience of being forced into something. Experiencing one's own powerlessness is a burden; therefore the acting person suggests to act of his own accord (see also identification with the aggressor ).
Both patterns lead to their own exaggerated action on the suspected unspoken requests, wishes , orders , instructions , commands align others to vague fears conflict situations to avoid or to sign up goodwill to secure the benefit of its own operational framework. This excessive action is often accompanied by an excessively self-confident behavior or demeanor - to protect one's own vulnerability (for example by wearing sunglasses). If the framework for action is based on image and text media, the obedience that is running ahead is self-censorship . The anticipatory obedience also makes politically totalitarian systems possible. In this context, the anticipatory obedience is less cowardice than a lack of moral courage ( submissiveness , creeping , cringing ).
Example: Nazi regime
“ Functionalists ” like Hans Mommsen and Martin Broszat explained the Holocaust from a cumulative momentum that Hitler's anti-Semitic rhetoric (only) triggered in the complex network of conditions of anticipatory obedience, domestic political functionalization and self-created practical constraints.
In his two-part biography of Hitler (1998; 2000), the Briton Ian Kershaw explained Hitler's rise with Max Weber's model of “ charismatic rule” essentially from the “ Führer myth ”, which established Hitler's popularity due to the social conditions after the First World War and his later initial successes. Hitler's power was based on the fact that his supporters and large sections of German society were ready and committed to “work against him in the interests of the Führer”, as NSDAP official Werner Willikens put it in 1934 , even without direct orders .
In connection with the Nazi regime, one speaks of “self- aligning ”.
See also
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Hermann Löns : Duodez . 1911 ( unterstein.net [PDF; 41 kB ]).
- ↑ Hans Mommsen: The turning point to the "final solution". The escalation of the National Socialist persecution of the Jews . In: Jürgen Matthäus, Klaus-Michael Mallmann (ed.): Germans, Jews, Genocide. The Holocaust as Past and Present . Scientific Book Society, Darmstadt 2006, p. 57-72 .
- ↑ Ian Kershaw: Hitler. 1889-1936 . Stuttgart 1998, p. 663 .
- ↑ "Gängelei and Vorheilender Obedience" - ZDFmediathek. Hans Borgelt on freedom of the press in the Nazi regime. In: zdf.de. October 6, 2011, accessed November 8, 2019 .