Instincts of the Herd in Peace and WarTrotter, W. (Wilfred)
Science
Instincts of the Herd in Peace and War
Trotter, W. (Wilfred)
Collective behavior; Crowds; Social psychology; World War, 1914-1918 -- Psychological aspects
It would have to be based on a full recognition of the biological
status of man, and to work out the tendencies which as an animal he
is pursuing and must pursue. If we have evidence of the only course
evolution can follow satisfactorily, then it is clear that any social
and legislative effort not in line with that course must be entirely
wasted. Moreover, since we are proceeding on the hypothesis that
direct conscious effort is now a necessary factor in the process,
we must clear our minds of the optimistic determinism which regards
man as a special pet of nature and the pessimistic determinism which
would reduce him to a mere spectator of his destiny. The trained and
conscious mind must come to be regarded as a definite factor in man’s
environment, capable of occupying there a larger and larger area.
Such a statecraft would recognize how fully man is an instinctive
being and how his mental vigour and stability depend entirely upon
instinctive expression being adequate. The tyrannous power of the
social instinct in repressing and distorting instinctive expression
would have to be controlled and directed with the purpose of enlarging
the personal and social effectiveness of the individual to the maximum
extent; the social instinct would no longer be left to operate on the
individual under the random direction of custom and habit, of fashion
and social whim, or for the satisfaction of the jealousy of age. {253}
Perhaps most important of all, a scientific statecraft would understand
that the social instinct itself is as deep and powerful as any, and
hungrily demands intense and positive gratification and expression.
The social instinct drives the individual to seek union with some
community of his fellows. The whole national body is in the present
state of society the smallest unit in which the individual can find
complete and permanent satisfaction. As long as the average man’s sense
of possession in the state is kept so low as it is at present, as long
as the sense of moral inequality between himself and his fellows is
so vigorously maintained, so long will he continue to make his class
rather than his nation the object of social passion, and so long will
society continue to breed within itself a principle of death.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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