Milgram ' s Experimental View of Authority
By Stanley
Milgram. (New York: Harper Colophon Books, 1975).
Obedience to Authority: An Experimental View.
n the early 1960s Professor Stanley Milgram then of Yale
I University, conducted a series of experiments on the behavior of
human beings whose purpose was to examine the phenomenon of
obedience to authority. The results were startling, since they showed
that human beings would inflict needless suffering on innocent
fellows simply because an apparently legitimate authority commanded them to do so. These results explained according to
Milgram and other observers how it was possible for Hitler to command the obedience of men to torture, kill, and destroy millions.
The results also showed the consequent necessity for citizens to be
far more careful about obeying the commands of their governments
and, presumably, any other authorities or authority figures.
Milgram's argument, therefore, utilized the results of a scientific experiment and scientific methodology and concepts generally to
prove an explicitly political point about how men ought to regard
authority. This combination of empirical research in the social
sciences and of political philosophizing lends interest to Milgram's
work as well as a certain degree of complexity. The present essay
will explore both the scientific and political aspects, and how they
interact. This will be done under three major headings: Exposition
(I); Responses and Criticisms (II); Authority and Science (III).
(I) Exposition
Obedience to Authority is the record of a series of experiments
carried out over four years, plus commentary and an attempt to explain the phenomena Milgram uncovered. The commentary and explanation are as important as the experiments themselves, or nearly
so, because they reveal, often in ways Milgram does not intend, the
expectation, mind-set and attitude that provide the assumptions and
influence the conclusions of the experiments. That is, because the experiments are supposed to tell us something to do about people and
society, it is necessary to know what non-experimental values and
assumptions Milgram brings to these experiments.
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The book itself is not very long, only 224 pages including two appendices, notes, references, and index. There are 15 chapters; the
first three introducing the experiments, chapters four through nine
describing the experiments themselves and the final six chapters containing explanation and commentary. One of the appendices is worthy of note because it deals with the ethical problems raised by the
methodology of Milgram's experiments with human subjects. There
are also statistical tables, charts, photographs and diagrams
throughout the book but mainly in the experimental chapters.
Despite these and the difficulty of the subject matter, Obedience to
Authority is a well written, remarkably clear and sometimes compelling book.
Chapter 1, "The Dilemma of Obedience" states the rationale for
Milgram's series of experiments and gives a brief overall description
of the experimental procedure. Revealingly, the very first paragraph
puts the problem of obedience in the context of Hitler's destruction
of the European Jews, for Milgram throughout Obedience to
Authority will mix straight description of scientific experiments with
commentary that applies his research findings to what he calls "the
dilemma of obedience." "Obedience," he says, "as a determinant of
behavior, is of particular relevance to our time," (1) because obedience to the orders of totalitarian regimes is what made the Nazi
death camps as well as other monstrous acts of inhumanity and war
possible in the twentieth century.
Milgram's experiments were designed to take a closer look at this
phenomenon of obedience to orders from authority in an experimental setting. In this design, volunteers are asked to take part in an experiment in which the use of pain as a teaching technique is to be
studied. The role of the volunteer is to be a "teacher" who will administer electric shocks to the "learner" every time the learner
answers a question incorrectly. The learner is first given several
matched pairs of words by the teacher, and subsequently the first
word of each pair is repeated to the learner. The learner is expected
to repeat the corresponding word. When he gives an incorrect
answer, the teacher then administers an electric shock by throwing a
switch. After each incorrect answer, the intensity of the shock is increased, until at some point the learner complains. This is the
crucial point of Milgram's experiment, for the real purpose of the experiment is to see if the teacher will stop obeying, i.e. will break off
the experiment when it seems he is inflicting real pain on the
learner. In reality, the learner is an actor who is uncannily good at
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263
simulating the outward expressions of someone in great pain. No
electric shock in fact is being administered to the learner. The real
subject of the experiment is the teacher who must make increasingly
difficult choices of whether to break off the experiment in the face of
the orders from the scientist who has ostensibly arranged the experiment on one hand, and the complaints, protests and finally screams
and pleas of the learner on the other.
According to Milgram, "the results of the experiment are both surprising and dismaying" for most of the "teachers" in fact continued
to administer the shocks to the "learner" despite the learner ' s protests and despite the teachers' own obvious feelings of stress and their
complaints to the authority figure conducting the experiment. Many
subjects will obey the experimenter no matter how vehement the
protest of the person being shocked, and no matter how much the
victim pleads to be let out. (5) The fact that almost two-thirds of the
teachers could be classified as "obedient subjects" strikes Milgram as
remarkable, calling for comment and explanation.
The first point Milgram makes about the untoward results of his
experiments is that there is no avoiding them. The experimental subjects, the "teachers," were not sadists and were in fact a fairly
representative sample of the population at large, i.e., ordinary people. Secondly, even though many of the teachers protested, and
hence knew what they were doing was morally wrong, they continued to administer shocks. From this, Milgram concludes that the
moral sense of the individual is easily overcome by social pressures
and that ethical rules such as the Fifth Commandment are not an inherent part of human psychic structure. On the other hand, it is not
true that the individual loses his moral sense when following orders
that contradict his conscience. Rather, Milgram says, his moral concern shifts from his act itself to how well he does his job, wanting to
live up the expectation of the authority figure. Further, he looks to
the wider context of the purposes of society for legitimizing his actions. One unexpected result of the experiment is that the teachers
blame the learner's stupidity and stubborness for the punishment inflicted on him. Milgram concludes by making the point that evil acts
commanded by social authority today are fragmented in such a way
that no one person is ever fully responsible for them. Rather, a
number of people each take a small part so that there is a long chain
of actions from the initial command to the completion of the evil
act. This tendency which reduces responsibility for evil acts
Milgram sees as the "most common characteristic of socially organized evil in modern society." (11)
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In Chapter 2, "Method of Inquiry," Milgram gives details of how
the experiments were carried out, as well as providing an explanation of the experiments' rationale, which was to simplify the complex phenomena of obedience. To do this he matched the strength of
obedience against a countervailing factor, in this case the moral
principle that one should not inflict suffering on a helpless person
who is neither harmful nor a threat. Since the electric shocks which
the teacher must administer are graded in 30 levels of increasing intensity, ranging from 15 to 450 volts, when and if the teacher breaks
off the experiment, it will be at one of 30 discrete levels. "Behavior
prior to this rupture is termed obedience. The point of the rupture is
termed disobedience." (14) Thus, the procedure allows for quantifiable measurement and for control of variables.
Among the details of the experimental procedure presented are
how participants were obtained for the study, locale of the experiment (at the " elegant Interaction Laboratory of Yale University " ),
the instructions given to the teacher on the pretext that this was an
experiment about learning, and samples of the word pairs which the
learner was supposed to learn. Great attention was paid to
verisimilitude, especially regarding the process of administering the
supposed shock. The shock generator had a series of 30 switches for
inducing increasing levels of shock, with a red light and a buzzer
sound every time a "shock" was administered. The teachers were
each given a sample shock, applied to their wrist, and they were
assured that even though the shocks "can be extemely painful, they
cause no permanent tissue damage." (19) The experimenter under
whose authority the pretextual learning experiment was being run,
wore a laboratory technician's coat, assumed a professional manner
and used a preestablished series of verbal prods to encourage the
teachers when they resisted shocking the victim. Special attention
was also paid to the manner in which the learner answered the questions. He gave approximately three wrong answers for every correct
one, and at the 75 volt level in the series began a pre-set series of
responses, starting with grunts, then proceeding to complaints, then
to demands to be released, then to refusal to cooperate, and finally
"an agonized scream." (23) At the conclusion of the experiment,
each teacher was debriefed and told the learner had in fact not
received any shocks. This was done in a supportive manner so as not
to embarrass the teacher who was also sent a follow-up
questionnaire and a report about the experiment in which he had
been a subject.
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Chapter 3, "Expected Behavior," describes the results of a survey
in which members of three audiences, one consisting of
psychiatrists, another of college students, and a third of middle class
adults, were asked to predict how the teachers would respond to the
experiment. All three audiences predicted that almost none of the
teachers would complete giving the series of shocks, and that only
one or two percent, a pathological fringe, would give the maximum
levels of shock. Milgram says this survey provided him with a bench
mark to see how much we can actually learn from his experiment on
obedience by contrasting actual with predicted behavior. He also
elaborates on the assumptions that lay behind the predictions given
on the surveys: first, that most people are decent; and second, that
people act in certain ways because they themselves choose to do so,
i.e., their behavior "flows from an inner core of the person," (38)
apart from the physical or social setting.
Chapter 4, "Closeness of the Victim," describes the initial set of
actual experiments that Milgram conducted. There were four such
experiments in which 160 subjects were tested to determine how the
level of obedience varied according to the physical proximity of the
learner to the teacher. The four variable conditions were: first, that
the learner was hidden from the teacher in another room and communicated his pretextual distress by banging on the wall; second,
that the learner was hidden but his voice was relayed by a
microphone; third, that the learner was in the same room as the subject; fourth, that the teacher held the learner's arm while administering the shocks. In general, these experiments showed that
the closer the learner was to the teacher, the less obedient the
teachers were, i.e., they broke off giving shocks earlier in the series
and in greater proportion. Thus, 35% were disobedient-i.e. refused to continue the shocks to the end-when the learner was hidden and could communicate only by banging the wall; 37.5% were
disobedient when they could hear the learner's voice, though not see
him; 60 % were disobedient when the learner was in the room with
them; 70% were disobedient when in physical contact with the
learner.
Milgram offers six possible factors to explain why proximity,
especially physical proximity where the teacher is in the same room
with the learner, increases the level of disobedience, and asserts that
any theoretical model of obedience will have to take this fact into account. (40)
There were two unexpected results from this initial set of ex-
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periments which continued to characterize the remainder as well.
First, the experimental subjects were far more obedient than anyone
predicted, either in the surveys mentioned in the previous chapter or
among observers of the experiment itself. Second, the subjects exhibited a striking degree of emotional tension during the experiment, a fact which they confirmed when they were interviewed
afterward. Milgram points out that this tension was the result of the
conflict between two opposing tendencies-obedience to a person in
authority, and not harming an innocent person. He also points out
that the degree of tension also indicates how real the situation is for
the subject. "Normal subjects do not tremble and sweat unless they
are implicated in a deep and genuinely felt predicament." (8)
Chapter 5, "Individuals Confront Authority," consists of descriptions of five of the subjects who acted as "teachers" in the first set of
experiments described in Chapter 4. Milgram explains that the purpose of focusing on individuals is to provide a personal dimension to
the experiment and to find clues to understanding the process of obedience. However, Milgram warns that since the subject is unaware
of the forces that control him and of the variation in experimental
conditions, the subject lacks a full understanding of the courses of
his behavior. "A line must be drawn between listening carefully to
what a subject says and' mistaking it for the full story." (7)
Each vignette consists of a brief personality sketch of the subject,
along with excerpts from interviews and descriptions of the subject's
responses during the experiment. Milgram also adds his own evaluations. Thus, he notes that the social worker giggled nervously when
he pressed the switches, that the welder who pressed all the switches
to the end indicated that he learned something but "he does not tell
us what" (47), that the industrial engineer who broke off thinks that
psychology is more important than engineering (52), that the professor of "Old Testament liturgy" who broke off the experiment
manifests "excessive fastidiousness" (48), and that the black drill
press operator who pressed all the switches expressed "total faith in
the experimenter." (50)
Chapter 6, "Further Variations and Control," describes seven experiments in which Milgram sought to vary the experimental situation and explore the conceptual limits of his previous experiment on
obedience. In the first of these experiments, two changes were introduced. First, besides the programmed responses which the
learner would already give at various shock levels, he would also
state he had a heart condition before the experiment began and then
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267
claim his heart was bothering him at the 10th, 13th, and 22nd shock
levels. Second, the experiment would move to a different laboratory
setting, a more modest one with bare steampipes and a concrete
floor instead of rugs. The learner was not in the room with the
teacher, but gave his responses via a loudspeaker as in the second experiment in the first set. Despite these alterations there was no
significant difference in results, 26 out of 40 pressing the shock
board to the end for an obedience rate of 65%, compared with 25
out of 40 in the previous experiment. This set of conditions was used,
with alterations, as the base line condition for subsequent experiments.
The second experiment in this group changed the personality
styles of the experimenter who gave the orders to the teacher, and
the learner whom the teacher shocked. A professional and aloof experimenter was replaced by an avuncular, soft man, and an affable
learner was replaced by a man with a hard face "who looked as if he
would do well in a scrap." The results, says Milgram, "indicate that
the change in personnel had little effect, (59) The table which summarizes the results of the experiment in Chapter 6 however shows
that the percentage of the obedient subjects was 50% as opposed to
65% in the previous base line experiment. (60-61)
In the third experiment in this set, orders were given to the
teacher by phone and the experimenter was not physically present.
Obedience dropped sharply to 20.5%; further, several of the
teachers administered lower shocks than were required.
The fourth variation was to use women as teachers only (thus far
the experiment had been confined to male subjects). The results
were virtually identical to the base line experiment, 65% obedience,
although the women subjects manifested a greater level of tension.
The fifth variation introduced the notion of a contract, for the
learner indicated before signing the standard consent forms that
because of his heart condition, he must impose a condition on his
compliance with the experimental procedure; namely, the experimenter must stop when the learner demanded it. There was
some decline in the obedience level, but, writes Milgram, "it could
easily represent a chance variation. " (66) The summary table shows
an obedience level of 40% compared to the base line experiment's
65%.
The sixth variation was to move the experiment entirely out of the
confines and sponsorship of Yale University which some of the
teachers held in respect and even awe. A new laboratory was set up
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in the second story offices of a commercial building in a run-down
shopping area of Bridgeport, and with the name of Yale University
absent as sponsor. The level of obedience, according to Milgram,
"although somewhat reduced, was not significantly lower." (69)
The summary table shows an obedience level of 47.5 % compared to
the base line 65% .
The seventh variation was to allow the teacher to pick any shock
level he wished rather than having to give increasingly more powerful shocks. Only 2.5% pressed the final, most powerful shock, the
remaining 95.5 %o (38 out of 40 teachers) not pressing any shock level
above the 10th level when the learner first vehemently protested.
The result, says Milgram, invalidates the theory that autonomously
generated aggression caused the subjects to press the maximum
shock level.
Chapter 7, "Individuals Confront Authority II" like Chapter 5,
consists of descriptions of five of the teachers who took part in the set
of experiments described in the previous chapter. Again, Milgram
offers evaluations of the responses of the various participants along
with personality sketches and conversations that took place during
the experiment and in subsequent interviews. Of the five vignettes
offered in this chapter, four describe people who pressed all the
switches, and his comments about them are fairly harsh. Typical of
Milgram's evaluation is this one describing the conversation with the
unemployed man who pressed all the switches on the shock board:
"The subject's objections strike us as inordinately weak and inappropriate in view of the events in which he is immersed. He thinks
he is killing someone, yet he used the language of the tea table." (77)
"
Chapter 8, " Role Permutations, describes six experiments in
which Milgram attempted a more radical analysis of the elements
which constituted the experimental situation. Up to now, the relationship and functions among the experimenter, the learner and the
teacher were invariant. Thus, only the experimenter has ordered the
teacher to shock the learners, not the learner himself, or someone
else who is not a researcher. By altering this and other aspects of the
fundamental relationship Milgram hoped to examine the roots of
obedience as a form of social behavior.
In the first of these experiments, after the shock level at which the
learner first protests, the experimenter calls off the experiment, but
the learner demands that it continue. No teacher, however, administered any shocks after the experimenter demands they be
stopped. From this, Milgram concludes that it is not the "substance
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of the command," i.e. the command itself, that is of decisive importance, but its " source in authority " (92), i.e. whether or not a person
in authority issues the command.
In the second experiment, a fourth person enters the experimental
situation, a layman who is an apparent volunteer like the teacher. In
reality, he too is playing a role which is to run the experiment once
the experimenter is called away on a pretext. No orders regarding
shock levels are given by the experimenter before he leaves, and it is
only due to the enthusiasm of the other layman that the experiment
continues in the usual way. That is, he gives the orders, gives prods
to the teacher and, in effect, runs the experiment. The result was a
sharp drop in compliance, only 4 of 20 teachers pressing all the
switches for an obedience rate of 20 % .
The third experiment was a variation of the second. In this one
the new volunteer took over administering the shocks himself once
the teacher refused to do so. Out of 16 teachers tested in this experiment, 12 stopped and 4 continued the shocks under the orders of the
new lay person. All of the 12 teachers who stopped the experiment
either protested the continued administering of shocks or physically
attempted to stop the experiment by interfering with the shock
generator or with the actions of the new volunteer himself.
In the fourth experiment, a pretext is found to reverse the roles of
the learner and the experimenter so that the experimenter receives
the shocks while the learner runs the experiment. The experimenter,
however, protests at the 150 volt level just as the learner had in the
previous experiments. The result was that none of the teachers tested
administered shocks beyond the point at which the experimenter,
now in the role of learner, protested. Milgram notes that many
teachers explained their disobedience on humanitarian grounds, not
recognizing that they were "simply following the boss's orders."
(104) Milgram also notes that this and the previous three experiments confirm the essential fact that the teachers are responding
to the authority of the experimenter, not to the order itself. "It is not
what subjects do but for whom they do it that counts." (104)
In the fifth experiment two experimenters instead of one give contrary commands. At the point where the learner first protests, one
directs that the experiment continue, the other directs it to stop. In
all cases, the teachers stopped the experiment, almost always at this
point of conflict of authority. Since conflict between authorities is
far more effective in stopping the experiment than the pleas and
screams of the victim, Milgram concludes that "action flows from
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the higher end of a social hierarchy to the lower." (107) That is, the
subject will respond to signals from persons on a higher level than his
own, but not to those below it. Also, Milgram notes that at the point
of conflict, teachers tried to determine which experimenter had the
greater authority.
In the sixth experiment, there are again two experimenters, but no
learner. Consequently, one of the experimenters volunteers to be the
learner and protests at the usual points in the progression of shock
intensity. The result is striking, because the rate of obedience (65%)
is the same whether the learner is a scientist (as in this experiment)
or a layman (as in the previous experiments). The fact that a person
identified as an experimenter became the learner made no difference
compared to the base line experiment.
Chapter 9, "Group Effects," describes two experiments in which
there are more than one teacher in order to discover the effect of
conformity to peer pressure on the rate of obedience. Milgram
begins the discussion by distinguishing conformity from obedience.
While both conformity and obedience affect a person's behavior,
conformity is implied and voluntary, imitative of the actions of
peers, while obedience is explicit, following the orders of someone in
authority.
In the first experiment, there are three teachers, only one of
whom is a naive subject. One of the teachers who is in on the experiment sits at the shock board with the naive subject who has the job
of pressing the switches. At the 150 volt level, when the learner gives
his first strong protest, the non-naive teacher breaks off participation in the experiment, but stays in the room leaving the naive subject alone at the shock board. The result was that fully 90% of the
naive teachers broke off the experiment before the end, a 10% rate
of obedience. In the second experiment, there are two teachers, one
of them naive, who however, does not have the job of pressing the
switches on the shock board. This instead is done by the second
teacher who is in on the experiment. In this situation, only 3 of 40
subjects tested refused to participate to the end.
From these two experiments, Milgram concludes that "the mutual
support provided by men for each other is the strongest bulwark we
have against the excesses of authority" and that "any factor that will
create distances between the subject and the victim, will . . . lessen
disobedience." (121)
Chapter 10, "Why Obedience? An Analysis," attempts to explain
why the experimental subjects obeyed the demands of the ex-
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perimenter, knuckling under to authority and performing actions
that were callous and severe. Milgram's analysis is theoretical, of a
high level of generality and is comprised of five parts.
Milgram starts with an analysis of the concept of hierarchy, pointing out that dominance structures are found throughout nature
among all kinds of animals. Hierarchy is found among human beings as well, mediated by symbols rather than based on physical
strength. From an evolutionary point of view, hierarchical social
organizations help species survive in coping with the physical environment, warding off attacks from other species, and by defining
clearly the status of each member of the group so that internal conflict is minimized.
From this evolutionary viewpoint, Milgram next proceeds to a
"cybernetic viewpoint" which he maintains will provide us with a
model to alert us to the changes that logically must occur when
hitherto autonomous entities are brought into a hierarchical structure. Automata living in isolation can be described by using a
"homeostatic" model in which the automata comprise an open
system requiring input from their environment to maintain their internal states. A lack or a need felt within the automata makes them
do something to its environment to fill that lack or need, e.g. eating
something when hungry. However, such automata when brought
into a social organization need regulation if they are not to treat
other automata as part of their environment, e.g. eat them. Hence,
the need for " an inhibitor that prevents automata from acting
against each other." (127) If such an inhibitor does not evolve, the
species will perish. In human beings, this inhibitor is their conscience.
A more powerful form of social organization can be achieved by a
hierarchical ordering in which there are subordinate elements controlled by superordinate ones. By combining many such hierarchical
arrangements, we arrive at the typical pyramidal form of social
organization. However, Milgram states, an inhibitor of conscience is
not sufficient to allow control of one automaton by another, so the
conscience itself must be secondary to the need to cede control to the
superordinate element. Conscience, while necessary for autonomous
functioning within a social context generally, cannot override the
demands of the social organization when it becomes hierarchical.
Next, Milgram points out that the variability characteristic of individual organisms, but of human beings especially, must be overcome if the group is to function. That is, it is not a case of limiting
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the activity to the lowest or preferred level of any one of the individuals, but of internally modifying each individual so that they
all operate at the socially ordained level. The basic reason why this
occurs is rooted not in individual but in organizational needs. (131)
There is a process of internal modification Milgram terms "the
agentic shift," which takes place when an individual enters a hierarchical social arrangement, and directs the individual's behavior
toward obedience. An individual is either obedient or not within the
social arrangement according to whether the agentic shift takes
place. Milgram's explanation of obedience is in reality a two-valued
logic. "Where in a human being shall we find the switch that controls the transition from an autonomous to a systematic mode?"
Milgram asks. "Hierarchical inhibitors and disinhibitors alter the
probability of certain neural pathways and sequences being used."
This chemoneurological cause is reflected in an internal
psychological state, for the person entering an authority system no
longer views himself as acting on his own but as an agent executing
the wishes of his superior. This attitude Milgram calls "the agentic
state" which is "the master attitude from which the observed
behavior flows." (133)
Chapter 11, "The Process of Obedience: Applying the Analysis to
the Experiment," is not a detailed analysis of Milgram's series of experiments but of the concept of the agentic state with reference to
the experiments. He considers three aspects: first, the antecedent
conditions that move a person from an autonomous to an agentic
state; second, the consequences of this shift behaviorally and
psychologically for the person himself; third, the binding factors
that keep a person in the agentic state.
There are a number of factors that make up the antecedent conditions of the agentic state, which, in effect, program the individual to
be obedient to authority. In the context of a person's lifetime, these
are family, institutions such as school, employment, and the
military as well as rewards such as job promotions. The net result of
this experience is the internalization of the social order. Within a
specific situation there are more immediate factors that lead to the
agentic state. The individual must perceive that he has entered a
social situation in which an authority figure is appropriate and that
one such figure is identifiably present. Other immediate factors are
the subject's perception that he has entered an authority system, the
coordination of specific commands with the particular purpose of an
authority, and an overarching ideology which justifies the authority
situation.
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The general consequences of a person entering the agentic state is
that he becomes "something different from his former self, with new
perspectives not easily traced to his usual personality. " (143) The
reasons for this are that once a person is in an authority situation and
subordinate to an authority figure, he tunes into the signals
emanating from the authority figure; he is attentive to each word
and responds willingly to them because the authority situation has
re-defined the circumstances and details in such a way as to effectively dictate reality for the person. As a result, the person experiences a loss of personal responsibility for whatever actions he is
to perform since he is now concerned instead with how well he performs in the authority situation. The person's self-image, Milgram
says, is no longer involved with the actions he is commanded to perform. Commands, which both describe an action to be performed
and demand that it be done, effect the action of obedience in the
person. The agentic state is not just another word for obedience;
rather, it is that state of mental organization which enhances the
likelihood of obedience. Obedience is the behavioral aspect of the
State. (148)
There are necessarily binding agents which keep a person in the
agentic state. Otherwise any disturbances would eliminate the
tendency to obey authority despite internal disagreement with its
orders and produce the tension manifested by some of the subjects in
the experiments. These binding agents are first, the sequential
nature of the actions since once a person starts obeying he becomes
implicated in the procedure and accepts the expectation that he will
continue; second, the fact that disobedience is, in effect, a social
gaffe, which would cause an embarrassing situation to arise between
the person and the authority figure; and third, the anxiety produced
when a person contemplates disobedience.
Chapter 12, "Strain and Disobedience," offers an explanation of
the subjects' choice of obedience or disobedience to the experimenter
in non-moral terms. Instead of choice, the term "strain" is introduced to explain why some subjects were obedient and some were
not. From the cybernetic viewpoint, strain arises because the
demands on an autonomous entity are different when the person is
by himself than when in a hierarchical situation; that is, the "design
requirements of an autonomous unit are quite different from those
of a component . . . designed for systems functioning." (153) In effect, a design compromise has been reached, and the compromise
does not always work very well. Necessarily there will be
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mechanisms for the resolution of strain; disobedience will arise
when the mechanisms are unable to cope and the level of strain overcomes the binding factors that retain a person in the agentic state.
Strain is seen in an actual sense in the tension experienced by the
experimental subjects. The reason they felt tension is that transformation to the agentic state is only partial for some persons. Unlike
the more potent authority systems of totalitarian governments, the
authority system of the laboratory is less pervasive, allowing
"residues of selfhood" to remain beyond the experimenter's authority. The agentic state is like sleep, numbing the capacity for moral
judgment just as sleep numbs the capacity to hear; however, a person may be awakened from both if a stimulant is loud enough. The
experimental subjects experience several sources of strain including
cues of pain from the victim, moral objections to inflicting pain, fear
of retaliation, demands to stop the experiment from the victims, and
a conflict between their actions and their self-image. Features that
reduce the closeness between the subjects' actions and their consequences also reduce the level of strain and are called "buffers." (157)
There are several mechanisms for the resolution of strain, including
avoidance, denial, physical conversion (in which psychological
strain shows as tics, laughter, etc.), minimal compliance such as
pressing the switches for a short period, subterfuge, searching for
reassurance, blaming the victim, and noninstrumental dissent, i.e.,
protesting but obeying anyway. All of those mechanisms, however,
allow the authority relationships to remain intact. Disobedience is
the ultimate means of resolving tension, but is a difficult act, which
arises as a series of stages; inner doubt, externalization of doubt, dissent, threat, and finally disobedience. While it destroys the experiment, disobedience is nevertheless a positive act.
In the next two chapters, Milgram presents objections to the
validity of the experiments and his refutation of them. Chapter 13,
"An Alternative Theory: Is Aggression the Key?," deals separately
with the thesis that the subjects in the experiment obeyed because
the scientific setting allowed the release of their latent aggression.
This explanation is based on Freud's notion that destructive forces
are present in the personality of all individuals but usually remain
suppressed. Presumably, the experiment, by giving legitimacy to the
expression of aggressive behavior, allowed the release of destructive
instincts. Milgram denies the validity of this alternative explanation,
however, stating that obedience and not aggression is the key to why
men kill in war, for example. He also cites experimental evidence for
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275
this view, noting that when the teachers were allowed to choose
their own shock level, very few went beyond the learner's first protest.
In Chapter 14, "Problems of Method," Milgram observes that
many people upon learning of the experiments seek to deny their
validity because they hold an image of man that does not allow for
the kind of behavior exhibited in the experiments. Most people,
these critics assert, would most often disobey authority rather than
hurt an innocent person. Therefore, there must be something wrong
with the experiments. There are three defects usually cited: 1) that
the experimental subjects were not typical, 2) that the subjects did
not believe they were really hurting the victim, and 3) that the
laboratory setting is so special that nothing can be inferred from it
about real life situations. Milgram answers the first objection by
pointing to the wide variety of people who volunteered to be subjects for the experiment. In answer to the charge that the recruitment of volunteers is self-selecting, he cites a study that showed that
people who volunteer for psychological experiments are less
"authoritarian" than people who do not volunteer. Milgram
answers the second objection by citing the results of a questionnaire
given to the subjects a year afterwards which showed that the great
majority of them believed the experiment to be real and the shocks
genuine. He also points out the tension they showed during the experiment.
He answers the third objection by stressing that however
dissimilar the laboratory may be compared to living under Nazi
government, the psychological process of obedience is invariant. In
authority situations, i.e., those composed of subordinate and
superordinate roles, the person responds not because of the content
of what he is ordered to do, but because of his relationship to the
authority figure.
Chapter 15, "Epilog," generalizes on how obedience to authority
lies at the heart of the grossest evils of our time and the consequent
moral dilemmas they produce. The process of obedience to authority
is the same in Nazi Germany, Vietnam and the Andersonville prison
camp. An interview with an American soldier who participated in
the My Lai massacre is included to emphasize these points.
(II) Responses and Criticisms
(A) Responses. Milgram's experiments are possibly the best known
of all those carried out on the behavior of human beings. They have
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a shocking quality, as if a veil has been ripped aside, leaving us to
stare at the stark nakedness of human nature, revealing details
which horrify, shock, and embarrass us. The interest which they
aroused in the world of empirical psychology and social science is
revealed by the number of responses-some critical, some extending
the experimental procedure to other areas-written by scientists
themselves. There has been at least one book triggered by Milgram's
research (besides his own) and many articles have been written
about it. Some of the articles deal with ethical issues raised both by
Milgram's conclusions and by the nature of the experiments
themselves which involved deception of the experimental subjects,
as well as subjecting them to great distress.
More remarkable than the academic response to Milgram's experiments is that they have become known not only to wellinformed people who might be expected to be interested in such
things, but to the general populace at large. There have been no less
than two plays written and produced based on the experiments
described in Obedience to Authority, one in England in a repertory
setting by playwright Dannie Abse, and another in the United States
on network television, starring the erstwhile captain of the starship
"
Enterprise. " There has been an article in Esquire Magazine and
Milgram himself, it should be pointed out, has enlarged the public
knowledge and notoriety of his experiments by lecturing about them
before college audiences and an appearance on NBC television's Today Show.'
There are two basic reasons for the genuine popular interest
shown in Milgram's experiments. In the first place, reports of them
first appeared in psychological journals during the 60s, as did
Milgram's attempts to bring them to popular notice. Since
Milgram 's experiments could readily be interpreted as dire warnings
against obedience to malevolent authority, they fit easily into the
anti-authoritarianism of that time, particularly in the context of opposition to the war in Vietnam. Also Milgram's own presentation
portrayed his experiments as explaining the Nazi phenomenon at a
time when world attention was focussed on the capture, trial, and
execution of Adolf Eichmann. Indeed, the tie-in of his experiments
with Nazism is made so frequently in Obedience to Authority and in
Milgram's popular presentations that it finally becomes impossible
1. Paul Meyer, "If Hitler Asked You to Electrocute a Stranger, Would You?," Esquire,
73 (Feb. 1970), 72 et seq.
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to see his experiments as anything but an anodyne, an attempt to
relieve the pain of the memory of the vast evil of the Nazi holocaust
against the Jews; Milgram mentions the holocaust in the very first
paragraph of his book as if to say once we understand it or once we
can explain it, then we may prevent it from ever happening again.
Another reason for the interest in Milgram's experiments is that
they blatantly reveal a facet of human nature we would deny,
namely, how easily we are influenced by others. It is noteworthy
that most people upon hearing of Milgram's experiments are repelled by them. Denial of their validity or egregious
underestimating of the number of people who will obey are typical
responses, and Milgram is no doubt correct when he maintains that
objections about the ethicality of his experiments would not be half
so vehement if most of the participants had quit them. Our concept
of human nature from the time of the Renaissance is that we are
autonomous and rational, ruled by reason. Lately, we have found
out differently, but enough sense of our independence and individual reason survives in our culture that we are shocked
2
whenever the discoveries of psychology and sociology contradict it.
The irrational inner urges that direct our personal behavior, and the
fact that social pressures determine most of our opinions are things
we do not wish to know. That men would obey another man simply
because he appears in the guise of an authority figure and thereby
inflict needless pain on another human being is also something that
we would rather not recognize. But Milgram's research has showed
it to us, and in our shock and embarrassment lies also its compelling
interest.
(B) Methodological Questions. The reluctance of many observers
to accept the findings of Milgram's research has led to criticisms
which attempt to deny their validity. Milgram deals with several of
them in his book, but significant questions remain. While we may
readily admit that, as Milgram argued, his experiments are applicable beyond the laboratory and that most of his subjects did
believe they were administering a real shock, some lingering ques2. "What we have learned under the guidance of studies in modern social psychology,
with the dismaying spectacle before us of enlarging masses of insecure individuals seeking communal refuge of one sort or another, is that the rationalist image of man is
theoretically inadequate and practically intolerable . . . . We know no conception of
individuality is adequate that does not take into consideration the myriad ties which
normally bind the individual to others from birth to death." Robert A. Nisbet, The
Quest for Community (New York: Oxford University Press, 1978), 229.
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tions remain about the selection process by which volunteers were
garnered for the experiments. Did they not, in effect, constitute a
self-selected pool more ready to accede to authority than the population at large? Surely, people who volunteer for whatever reason will
more readily go along with what is demanded of them than those
who are forced. That is why particularly dangerous military missions are sometimes put on a volunteer basis and why elite forces
who are required to perform such missions, such as the Green Berets
and the Marines, are volunteer forces. Milgram denies this point,
maintaining that the argument is circular as if it says that those who
are willing to obey are willing to obey. The point is a tricky one but
it is not entirely semantical, for the fact of the volunteering itself by
the participants is the critical point which is beyond experimental
control or observation. Therefore, Milgram cannot say what effect it
has on his experiment and it remains a point for conjecture and
speculation.'
There are several other significant methodological difficulties
which tend to weaken Milgram's conclusions. One of them deals
with the question of what constitutes disobedience. Is it simply the
act of breaking off the experiment and refusing to participate further in it as Milgram would have it? Clearly, the subjects gave many
other signs of distress and extreme tension; they attempted to
subvert the experiment by giving lower shock levels than demanded
when the experimenter was out of the room, they gave shocks as
brief as possible in duration, gave verbal clues to the learner, and
argued with the experimenter. Yet, while Milgram (or his cohorts)
carefully described all of these actions, he classified them as "noninstrumental" and did not include them in his measure of disobedience. In real life, however, such "non-instrumental" acts can lose
a man his job or even his life as they did the Russian poet
Mandelstam. Surely, if such actions count in real life, they ought to
count in some fashion in Milgram's experiment, especially as he
claims the experiment is applicable outside the laboratory.
Another question arises over the experimenters' statement made to
all the teachers in the experiments that no "tissue damage" would
3. The same holds true for research of the type done by Alfred Kinsey in the area of sexual behavior. If questionnaires regarding sexual behavior are randomly handed out,
the population refusing to answer them may be defined by a type of sexual behavior
which they are hesitant to write about, even anonymously, e.g. chastity or homosexuality. This, of course, would invalidate any attempt to generalize from the questionnaire results to the population at large.
MILGRAM AND AUTHORITY
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result from the shocks, which amounted to a guarantee that the experiment was not dangerous. According to Milgram this statement
was made only to lend authenticity to the experiment. Yet it
operates not merely as a detail of Milgram's stage management like
the lights of the shockboard, but also as a factor in the rational decision of at least some of the subjects to remain obedient. We know
this because they said so in their statements which are quoted in
some of the interviews which Milgram provides. For instance, the
"slow" drill press operator who showed far less tension than the
usual subject cited it as a reason why he continued to press all the
switches. He also, not incidentally, himself had experienced a large
electric shock once on his job which, as he explained, had caused
him pain but had not killed him. The point is that the presumed
malevolence of an authority and the immorality of obedience to its
command are of far less degree if carrying out the order causes temporary pain but not permanent damage. Significantly, the statement about "tissue damage" was repeated to encourage recalcitrant
teachers even though it is not listed as one of the four "verbal prods"
of increasing severity to be used by experimenters when the teachers
refused to go on pressing switches. This, in turn, implies that
Milgram himself understood, but chose to ignore, the importance to
the teachers of the guarantee that their actions would not permanently injure the learners.
Another methodolgical issue has to do with Milgram's own discounting of the results of three sets of experiments described in
Chapter Six. In the first one, a stern experimenter and an affable
learner were replaced by a friendly experimenter and a tough looking learner. In the second one, Milgram contracted for an explicit
agreement which defined conditions under which the learner could
discontinue the experiment due to his "bad heart"; in the third, he
changed the experimental setting from Yale to a downtown location.
All three experiments resulted in significant decreases in the obedience rate, from 65% to 50% in the first, from 65% to 40% in the
second, and to 47.5% in the third. Yet Milgram claimed that these
reductions were a matter of statistical indifference, having "little effect" in the first, of "chance variation" for the second, and "not
significantly lower" for the third, even though the first showed a
23% drop in the rate of obedience as defined by Milgram, the second a 38% drop, and the third a 27% drop. In previous experiments, variations of the same range or less were considered
significant as in the experiments described in Chapter Four. These
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effects, particularly of the agreement with the learner, thus weaken
the strength of Milgram's general conclusions about the willingness
of ordinary people to obey malevolent authority, especially when
combined with the effect of the statement that no tissue damage
would result from the experiments.
The net effect of considering the methodological objections to
Milgram's experimental view of authority is to weaken it but not to
invalidate it. That is, while it is true that people are far more compliant to authority (and to social pressure in general) than we might
like to admit, the situation is not as severe as Milgram concludes. Indeed, as we have seen, Milgram in some measure must discount the
results of some of his experiments, ignore certain phenomena, and
define disobedience in very restrictive terms in order to sustain the
degree of menace he sees in men's relationships to social authority.
In fact, his statements constantly placing his experimental results in
a political context, particularly in connection with the Holocaust,
make it apparent that Milgram has a political as well as a scientific
reason for his view of authority. Milgram analyzes a problem, how
can the mad horrors of the twentieth century have happened-the
police state, the gas ovens, the Gulag, the A-bomb, the Cold
War-and reaches the conclusion that we are far too compliant to
authority, which also implies a solution-that men ought not to
obey authority as readily as they do. The problem, he asserts starkly,
is not authoritarianism as a mode of political organization "but
authority itself." (179) But such an analysis either says too much or
too little; too much because, as Milgram admits, we cannot live
without authority, and too little because authority is so diffuse and
omnipresent that we cannot attack it without further refinement of
the issue. Thus, Milgram has, through his experiments, presented us
with a dilemma from which we cannot escape. The result of taking
what Milgram describes as "an experimental view" of obedience to
authority is to condemn human nature for its inherent weakness
while, at the same time, encouraging the human race to a task that
is well beyond its capacity or strength.
(C) Ethical Objections. One response to Milgram's series of experiments, which appeared even before his book appeared and
which was based on reports of the experiments published in
psychological journals, was the appearance of serious ethical objections by Milgram's own colleagues in experimental psychology. It is
apparent from Milgram's own description, as well as the observations of those who have seen films of some of the experiments, that
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281
the teacher/subjects undergo severe stress. Milgram described this
effect, in an earlier paper in a passage that did not appear in his
book.
Many subjects showed signs of nervousness in the experimental situation and especially upon administering the more powerful shocks. In a
large number of cases the degree of tension reached extremes that are
rarely seen in sociopsychological laboratory studies. Subjects were
observed to sweat, tremble, stutter, bite their lips, groan and dig their
fingernails into their flesh. These were characteristic rather than exceptional responses to the experiment. One sign of tension was the
regular recurrence of nervous laughing fits.... The laughter seemed
entirely out of place, even bizarre. Full blown uncontrollable seizures
were observed in three subjects. On one occasion, we observed a
seizure so violently convulsive that it was necessary to call a halt to the
experiment."
Such signs of psychological discomfort are obvious indications of
severe mental stress. Several psychologists condemned the research
for this reason, especially Diana Baumrind who pointed out that
stress and embarrassment were frequent results of recent forms of
human research in social-psychology. Milgram's response to this
charge is found in an appendix to Obedience to Authority and in an
exchange of letters published in Dannie Abse's book version of his
play based on Milgram's experiments, The Dogs of Pavlov. He writes
here that the degree of stress was not anticipated, but that once he
began the experiments, he felt impelled to their completion; that
despite their distress at the time of the experiment, the subjects sustained no permanent injury; that many of the subjects said of the experiments that they thought they were good, approved of them, or
had learned something about themselves. Milgram also states that
only the subjects may judge the experiment, and particularly cites
the case of the young man who was a subject and who later refused
military service during the Vietnam war. Another aspect of the
ethical debate is the issue of whether it is fair to lie to the subjects in
effect by telling them that the purpose of the experiment is about
learning rather than obedience. Milgram claims that the deception
is legitimate, no different from a play or a movie.'
4. `Behavioral Study of Obedience," Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 67 (1963),
371-78.
5. Dannie Abse, The Dogs of Pavlov (London: Vallentine-Mitchell, 1973), 37-44,
126-27.
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The real issue however would seem to be whether or how seriously
the subjects were damaged psychologically by going through the experiment. Here, there is some debate, with Milgram claiming that
post-interviews showed no permanent damage. Yet, one of the subjects described by Milgram who was "obedient," i.e., had pressed all
the switches, revealed that after he had described his actions in the
experiment to his wife, she had responded, "You can call yourself
Eichmann." Such announcements from a spouse are not easily
forgotten. As Professor Baumrind wrote, "From the subject's point
of view procedures which involve loss of dignity, self-esteem and
trust in rational authority are probably most harmful in the long run
"8
Whatever the final resolution of the ethical debate, one thing is
certain: Milgram's most obedient subjects acted no worse than he
did. They inflicted imaginary pain at the behest of apparently
legitimate authority; but Milgram, in the name of science, permitted the subjects to undergo real psychic pain at the behest of no one
at all despite the protest of his colleagues.
(III) Authority and Science
(A) Milgram's Scientific Method. Milgram states at the outset of
describing his experiments that, "Simplicity is the key to effective
scientific inquiry" (13) and, indeed, this is true. Like Galileo,
Newton and Darwin, Milgram sought, when confronted with a
highly variable and epistemologically dense set of phenomena, to
reduce them to their empirical essentials. This process of scientific
reduction involves selecting some elements for study and discarding
others, and then explaining the entire set of phenomena in terms of
the selected elements. A good example from the history of biology,
and one easily understood, is that of Mendel's discovery of the
genetic control of somatic characteristics. Among all the variety and
multitude of cases of inherited characteristics, Mendel chose one
plant, the pea plant and seven easily observed and measurable
characteristics including height, color, etc. From a series of experiments in which Mendel carefully controlled the mechanism of
genetic transmission, he derived a series of mathematical laws which
6. Diana Baumrind, "Some Thoughts on Ethics of Research; After Reading Milgram ' s
`Behavioral Study of Obedience,' " American Psychologist, 19 (1964), 421-23. Quoted
in Abse.
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accurately described and predicted how characteristics would be
transformed from one generation to the next. He also inferred an entity, one which he could not see, by which genetic transfer took
place, i.e. the gene. In this way, Mendel reduced the complexity of
genetic phenomena to a set of mathematical laws and posited the existence of a then unobservable element which caused the
phenomena. Mendel's research is nearly an ideal example of how
scientific research proceeds, by reducing chaos to simplicity.
Milgram hoped to do the same thing, but choosing the elements
on which to concentrate is a tricky business. (Mendel was either extraordinarily lucky or possessed of marvelous insight.) Obviously, it
is possible to oversimplify, and this, regrettably, is what Milgram
has in fact done. The use of the laboratory setting itself is, let it be
said, a brilliant stroke, though not entirely original with Milgram.
But, as he notes, critics have doubted the validity of generalizing
from this setting to the world at large, something that is never said
about, e.g., Mendel's experiments with the pea plant. While
Mendel's explanation can be extended from peas to other plants, and
then to animals, Milgram's experiments cannot be extended in like
fashion. The main reason is that the variety of authority relationships far exceeds the variety even of genetic transmissions, and the
modes of disobedience are infinitely variable, as anyone who has
raised an active child can testify. Thus, authority relationships in
child rearing, employment, military, religious, and public order
situations are all very different from each other. While there are
resemblances (or we could not identify them all as authority situations), the differences are tremendous, and the applicability of
Milgram's experiments must be in doubt, unless, that is, Milgram
were to systematically apply his theories to all these kinds of situations, something he does not even attempt to do. As Milgram notes,
"Psychological matter, by its nature, is difficult to get at and likely
to have many more sides to it than appear at first glance." (13)
Milgram's research yields results typical of most research in the
social sciences-theories of a high level of generality that are
mechanical and unconvincing; middle level theories, such as the
agentic shift, which are partially successful as explanations; finally,
low level theories or "laws" which are simply generalizations from
the evidence. Milgram's high level explanation of obedience is a
curious blend of an attitudinal anti-authoritarianism and psychosocial theorizing combined with a clumsy amalgam of various
mechanistic formal explanations, including evolutionary,
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cybernetic, neurological, and chemical. In the end, Milgram contradicts himself by the assertion that, "[a]n element of free choice
determines whether the person defines himself in this way or not," a
statement which comes at the end of the chapter (10) in which he
puts forth his evolutionary, cybernetic, and chemical modes. (134)
But an element of free choice relieves the need for "chemical inhibitors" or any comparable explanation in which human behavior
is driven by non-intentional causes.
Milgram is on somewhat firmer ground when offering theories of
a middle level of generality which more directly rest on empirical
observations. Thus, he posits an "agentic shift" when the individual
yields his conscience into the control of an authority figure which,
Milgram states, must happen as an individual enters a hierarchical
situation. The notion that a person will perfom acts under the command of authority that he would refuse to do otherwise is a perfectly
valid inductive generalization from Milgram's experiments, albeit
one he could have made beforehand. This generalization is the basis
for the theory of the "agentic shift" (which is roughly comparable to
Mendel's "genes") However, while there is some basis for supposing
that such a psychological phenomenon as the agentic shift exists and
while Milgram describes it in some detail, there is no question that
he pictures its operation in terms which are too black and white.
That is, Milgram supposes that before the agentic shift occurs the
person is a fully independent and rational agent, in control of his
faculties, who would refuse to perform any act contrary to his conscience. After the shift occurs, this same person is now ready to perform acts comparable to those performed by the agents of the Nazi
SS. There is no room for qualified assent of the sort that often is the
case when adults obey authority, or for understanding the different
kinds and degrees of obedience one gives, for instance, to policemen,
parents, military officers, government officials, bosses or spouses.
The ancient Stoic obeying the laws of Rome exemplifies the same
empiric law as the actions of a guard at Auschwitz for Milgram.
In short, what is lacking in Milgram's theoretical explanation is
the capacity to explain satisfactorily the nearly infinite degree of
kinds of human relationships, for the authority relationship is not
the same in all social hierarchies, nor is it even the same within a
single hierarchy. Thus, Milgram says that the obedience of the German soldier to his sergeant follows the same empirical laws that
describe the obedience the Nazi generals gave to Hitler. (130) Yet it
is not true, for we know that some Wehrmacht generals not merely
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285
obeyed like automatons, but aided and advised Hitler, and willingly
carried out his orders, while others did not. Thus, General Jodi,
Hitler's Chief of Staff, was tried and shot at the end of the war,
whereas Admiral Doenitz was sentenced to a relatively short prison
term. Finally, it was Prussian military officers, such as Count Von
Stauffenberg, the very archetype of authoritarians, who tried to kill
Hitler, which indicates, if nothing else, the variability of the "agentic shift."
Milgram has been particularly successful in discovering low level
theories or "laws" because his experiments clearly highlight the effects of such causal factors as proximity to the victim, closeness of
authority, divided authority, institutional context, the nature of
commands, and peer rebellion on obedience. His experiments also
show, implicitly but no less clearly, how effective authority based on
science is, since one of the unintended results of Milgram's research
is to have demonstrated experimentally that scientific authority
takes its place alongside political, legal, military and religious
authority in modern society. It is unlikely that the volunteers would
have subjected the victim to presumed shock at the behest of a
minister, policeman or military officer in that context, coming in off
the street, as it were. That is, while people will perform difficult or
even cruel tasks under, e.g. military authority, the indoctrination
into military life is presumed to require an intensive period of "basic
training." But this is not true of scientific authority in this case, for
the teachers in the experiment gave shocks after only a minimal indoctrination.
(B) Milgram's Concept of Authority. Milgram never explicitly
defines his concept of authority, presuming instead that an experimental view will be morally neutral and will present the issue in
contemporary and immediate terms. (xi) Milgram's actual views
about authority and obedience to it are not difficult to discern,
however, for there are attitudinal elements which appear
throughout Milgram's explanation and commentary and which intimate very clearly that Milgram perceives obedience to authority as
a severe danger to our civilization, that he views the exercise of
authority by a social agent as often destructive, and that he virtually
equates the systematic use of authority with a form of fascism. His
many references to Nazis and the concentration camps which appear throughout the book from beginning to end and his specific
statements about the danger of the all-too-human tendency to obey
malevolent authority make his attitude apparent. But a more reveal-
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ing comment appears in his statement about one of the experimental
subjects, the Professor of Old Testament theology. This subject had
stopped giving the victim shocks shortly after the first protest, thus
standing as one of the disobedient subjects. Asked afterwards how
most effectively to strengthen resistance to inhumane authority, the
Professor said, "If one had as one's ultimate authority, God, then it
trivializes human authority." (49) But this insight, worthy of an
Aquinas, a Bonhoeffer, or a Maimonides, is not sufficient for
Milgram's purposes. He comments, "Again, the answer for this man
lies not in the repudiation of authority but in the substitution of
good-that is, divine-authority for bad. (49) Again, what Milgram
seeks is the destruction, apparently, of authority itself. "For the
problem is not `authoritarianism,' as a mode of political organization or a set of psychological attitudes but authority itself." (179)
Although Milgram concedes the need for authority, (212) he does
not in fact really understand or accept its function in human life, for
Milgram's prescientific attitude, i.e., the one he held before he ran
the experiments, is a simple but fervent rejection of authority itself.
The degree to which men are compliant to authority no doubt
frightened him, but his reaction is to portray the condition as far
worse than it is. It is as if Milgram wants to shock his readers by exposing the weakness of human nature itself. Here lies the explanation for the repugnance toward his experiments: Milgram not only
disdainfully exposes the weaknesses of his individual human subjects, but the weakness of our common human nature as well, and
he does this with the attitude of a fifth grade teacher lecturing her
class for writing dirty words on the desk-tops.
What Milgram has missed is how deep the need for authority is,
how important role models, parents, teachers and social authorities
are in the formation of our characters as children, how, even as
adults, we still need to look to bosses, peers, spouses, public figures
and religion for direction and support in the daily business of conducting our lives. As a result, he has egregiously misdiagnosed the
basic causes of the evils of the modern era, for it can be plausibly
argued that the real evil of our time is not that men too willingly
obey authority, but that they are not willing enough to obey it.' The
issue of social authority and the degree to which men do and should
7. As an illustration of this point, the guest interviewed on the "Today Show" the day
after Milgram appeared on it was an expert whose concern was the ominous increase in
the rate of forcible rape. The more immediate danger to society thus came from men
who disobeyed social authorities rather than from those who obeyed them.
MILGRAM AND AUTHORITY
287
obey it is far more complex than Milgram acknowledges or implies.
We cannot settle the question here, but we will add in passing the
view of sociologist Robert Nisbet who argues that it is the destruction of intermediate social authorities which stand between the individual and the state that is the main cause of the evils of modern
times.
We are prone to see the advance of power in the modern world as a
consequence, or concomitant, of the diminution of individual
freedom. But a more useful way would be to see it in terms of the
retreat of authority in many of the areas of society within which
human beings commonly find roots and a sense of the larger whole. 8
The basic human requirement for authority and authority structures that Nisbet points out must somehow be balanced against the
dangers of misuse of authority that Milgram points out. This is the
true dilemma of authority of our time.
'
(C) Anti-Authoritarianism and the Priority of Theory. Milgram s
attitude toward authority has directly influenced his attempt at explaining and evaluating his research results. That is, Milgram's actual procedure has not been to analyze a complex phenomenon by
running a series of experiments and then arriving at theories to explain the results. Rather, he began with a highly defined concept of
authority and then set up his experiments and conducted his
research guided by that attitude. This is not the same as saying that
he set out to prove that his concept of authority was true and twisted
the evidence in any way to suit his preconceived notions. It is to say
that Milgram set up his experiments and read his research results
with a definite attitude toward authority in mind and that it influenced the way he literally saw authority in light of his experiments. For, as we have seen, Milgram began with the idea that
authority was a phenomenon not only somehow mixed up with the
turmoils and vast evils of the twentieth century, but as a primary
cause of those turmoils and evils.
The projection of Milgram's anti-authoritarianism into the processes of the research itself is shown clearly in the manner in which
he treats the results of his observation and experiments, namely, his
anti-authoritarianism has led him to emphasize the degree to which
people in general are compliant to authority. This attitude has led
Milgram in turn to deny the validity of three sets of experiments
8. Nisbet,
op cit.,
xiv.
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which showed how easily disobedience to authority could be increased by a change in personnel, by a prior agreement with the victim and a change of setting from Yale. More significantly, it has also
led him to discount many manifestations of resistance to authority,
denying them even status as evidence in the experiments. These
manifestations were the so-called "non-instrumental" ones such as
verbal protest, not pressing the switch at the next highest level of intensity, or pressing the switches for as short a time as possible. Had
each of these non-instrumental manifestations been given a relative
value and included as evidence of resistance to authority along with
"disobedience" itself-i.e. the act of breaking off the experiment-a
much different picture would emerge, one more subtle and hence
more applicable to the complexities of authority relationships in the
real world, and one more hopeful about the potentialities of human
nature. (For instance, each subject could have been assigned a
"score," 10 for disobedience, 5 for verbal protest, 2 for not pressing
the proper switch level, etc. Then a curve, or sliding scale would
result with relative levels of disobedience, rather than a "sheep versus goat" phenomenon. But this did not fit Milgram's understanding
of how authority works.)
The fact that Milgram had a definite concept or attitude about
authority which influenced the manner in which he ran his experiments and interpreted their results is not unusual. Such a procedure is characteristic of the social sciences, where the phenomena
are complex and highly charged with meaning before the scientist
even approaches them. The social scientist, no less than the layman,
has ideas about such things as war, politics, economics, family life
and authority, which when articulated constitute a theory in scientific terms. This fact is well understood in reference to social science,
but what is not so well understood is that holding the theory before
analyzing the evidence is characteristic of the physical sciences as
well. Indeed, the insight most characteristic of twentieth century
philosophy of science is just this point, that it is the practice of scientists to have a theory in mind before proceeding to experiment and
that, contrary to Bacon, the scientist's mind is not a tabula rasa in
which explanatory conceptions arise only after he has examined his
research results. Scientific observation, wrote N.R. Hanson, is a
"theory-laden" undertaking, for observation of a particular object
in an experiment is shaped by previous knowledge of that object.°
9. Norwood R. Hanson, Patterns of Discovery (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1965), 19. The same point is also made by Popper, Kuhn, Einstein, and Duhem.
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The priority of the theoretical to the particular is true of all fields of
empirical science not just the social sciences, although it stands out
more in the social sciences because the prior theoretical commitments are likely to be ideological or political in nature. But then
this highlights a fundamental dilemma for Milgram and for the
social sciences in general; if experimental research is influenced and
directed by theories held prior to the experiment, and if the experimental results themselves are literally seen in terms of the
theory, then how can Milgram and social scientists in general
guarantee that their research results and the theories explaining
them are true or objective?
(D) The Authority of Science. One aspect of authority that
Milgram misses is the way that science operates as a kind of authority in comtemporary society. It is deeply ironic that Milgram does not
comment on this fact anywhere in his book because the authority of
science is the effective basis of his experiments. That is, the
motivating "force" which moved the experimental subjects to
"shock" the victim and the force against which they were to rebel in
order to generate a quantifiable measurement of disobedience, was
the authority of empirical science. Indeed, Milgram was meticulous
in reinforcing the impression that the subjects were helping carry
out a scientific experiment, including such details as white
laboratory coats, electric lights on the shockboard, the text of the
newspaper advertisement soliciting test subjects, the laboratory setting and, above all, the actual indoctrination at which the subjects
were told that they were helping carry out an experiment. It was
against this carefully stage-managed array of cues to scientific
authority that the subjects were to rebel or with which they were to
comply.
The use of science as the source of authority was in no way accidental, since it was the one authority that Milgram could most
easily manipulate and the one which was nearest to him. As a bona
fide research scientist, Milgram is an authority figure on a par with
a minister of the Gospel, a high ranking military officer, or a police
official, and thus could influence people's behavior in an experimen
tal context. So deeply does the authority of science root in the mores
of our society that only a cursory indoctrination was necessary to involve the subjects and to get them to perform an act which no other
kind of authority could so quickly and so easily motivate, i.e. inflicting pain on an innocent person. The reason that science was so effective as a source of authority in the experiments did not rest,
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ultimately, on anything Milgram himself did, but was the result of a
long tradition in the West of accepting science as an authority,
which extends back to the Enlightenment of the eighteenth century.
Science was, so to speak, the avatar of reason, the one human activity that could produce intellectual certainty and whose practical
results could improve the lot of mankind. Science and Reason, so
conceived, arose from the release of the human intellect from the
fetters of religion, metaphysics, superstition, fear, tradition and passion, in short from all the forces of irrationality. Science was seen to
be disinterested and benevolent, a model as well as a method for
understanding the nature of man and society. The widespread success of science in the elaboration of theories, in the number and importance of discoveries about the physical universe, and in enabling
man to control his environment reinforced its status as a source of
authority in our culture. It was on this tradition of authority that
Milgram depended for effecting the obedience of his experimental
subjects.
Two contradictions result from Milgram's use of science as the
source of authority in his experiments. The first derives from the implication that science is or can be a malevolent authority, for this
weakens the value of the very authority, namely science, by which
Milgram attempts to prove something about authority. That is,
Milgram seeks to prove that human nature is too compliant towards
authority by means of scientific experimentation, at the same time
that the authority he uses in his experiment is scientific authority. If
we then accept Milgram's conclusion as experimentally proved that
we are too complacent towards authority, we further ought to question the truth of his conclusion, since it assumes our full acceptance
of the authority of science. In conclusion, if we accept Milgram's
premises, then we both ought and ought not to accept his conclusions, which in the purely formal terms of logic means that at least
one of his premises is incorrect. Which of these premises is incorrect
is difficult to say, but most likely Milgram has overstated the utility
of the scientific method in explaining social phenomena such as obedience to authority. In less formal terms, the real effect of Milgram's
series of experiments is to weaken science as an authority source, not
only because they can be interpreted to weaken all authority
sources, but also because of the serious ethical question they raised
as to whether Milgram should have lied to his subjects and put them
through the extreme stress that many of them experienced.
The second contradictory result of Milgram's experiments is that
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291
they revealed something about human behavior which contradicts
the rationalistic tradition in which science plays an important part,
i.e. they revealed that men tend to obey authority even when it
violates their personal notions of morality and that men's values and
identities are more often the result of their social environment than
their personal choice. In short, science as a rational method of
discovery has determined that man's behavior is irrational. This
discovery seems to have depressed and angered Milgram; however it
is worth noting that other research conducted by social scientists
suggests that other aspects of human nature contradict Enlightenment expectations, e.g., that man is aggressive by nature, that he is
territorial, that sex roles and intelligence are genetically influenced
if not determined. Science has authority because we expect that it
tells us the truth. Now science, through the discoveries of
psychology, sociology and anthropology, is re-affirming things
about human nature which Enlightenment rationalism denied, but
which older traditions such as Christian theology and Greek
philosophy affirmed.
(E) Conclusion. The combination of empirical science and
political philosophizing is not new in the history of Western thought
since the Renaissance. Indeed, from Bacon's New Atlantis to Skinner's Walden Two this combination has been a potent mixture in our
culture, our politics, and our thinking. The difference is that in the
twentieth century, the social sciences have developed to the point
where they can sometimes give the same kinds of control and information regarding individual human beings and social institutions
that empirical science had hitherto given us about physical
substances and living matter. Thus, while Hobbes, for example,
could only speculate about how the nature of man and society ap
peared from a scientific point of view, social scientists today have at
their disposal a large amount of precise, empirical knowledge from
which to develop what Milgram calls "an experimental view" of
both man and society. However, what the addition of scientific
theory and experimental information adds to our understanding of
man and society and how science transforms our understanding by
the addition of these elements is still an open question.
Milgram makes the point that while many critics of the social
sciences claim they don't discover anything not already known, that
is not true for his series of experiments. (27) Yet, the facts that individuals are easily influenced by others, and often will obey
malevolent authority was well known prior to Milgram; in fact, they
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were known to the ancients. Milgram's "discovery" that men will
perform deeds under the command of legitimate authority that they
otherwise would not perform-which includes acts of heroism and
bravery, not just cruelty-is but one specific aspect of a more
general fact now amply demonstrated by social psychology, namely,
that individual personality contains large elements that are socially
and culturally induced. To repeat, this contradicts our cherished
Enlightenment illusion that we are both rational and in full command of ourselves, and it is ironic that modern science provides the
contradictory evidence. Yet, it was Aristotle who defined man as a
"social animal" and the fact of our social nature was well known to
those close observers of life in the Greek city-state, Socrates, Plato,
Thucydides, Euripides and the Sophists. Indeed, to the Greeks, men
were simply citizens of their cities, not autonomous individuals
cooly picking and choosing their allegiances according to a logical
rubric.
The re-affirmation of traditional concepts of human sociality in
the social sciences indicates the difference between the physical and
the social sciences. While Aristotle's Physics is a mystery to modern
physicists and of no use in the study of physical phenomena, the
Ethics and Politics are still read today for their insight into social
phenomena. As science has developed since the seventeenth century,
its method has more easily dealt with physical phenomena than
social phenomena and we can speculate that the reason is that the
complexity of science's subject matter has overmatched the range of
its method as it has approached the areas of the social sciences. The
final implication is that if we are to obtain adequate knowledge of
social reality, it must come from other sources as well as from social
science. This is demonstratedkby the fact that the human race has
historically had such knowledge long before the advent of social
science, i.e., before the application of empirical methodology to
social phenomena. An adequate expression of the reality of social
phenomena must be looked for in religion, philosophy, history and
one's own personal experience in addition to empirical science, since
these other accesses to reality are necessary to gain a full and balanced view of social phenomena.
But if men are social animals whose ideals and courses of action
are frequently prescribed by their social environment, then the
dangers of malevolent social authority are intense and severe. Nor is
this merely a deduction; it is an observation only too often made by
citizens of those states subject to the risk of misrule by tyrants,
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293
demagogues and autocrats. Indeed both Aristotle and Plato describe
these dangers in great detail, and both prescribe a remedy, Aristotle
a mixed constitution (really a division and balance of power) and
Plato an education based on ideals for the guardian class. Yet, the
last voice we hear on the subject of the dangers of malevolent
authority, and the all too human ease with which we accede to it,
should be a current one, for while the ancients had their special
travails, we have had ours as well. In this sense, Milgram's experimental view of authority serves us well and makes a positive
contribution. The science may be faulty-the research not correctly
evaluated, the theories incomplete and contradictory-but science is
the idiom of our time, just as myth was for the Greeks. What
Milgram has really done is to illustrate the danger of authority in
properly scientific fashion for our time, for what was well known
throughout recorded history, we will accept only under the authority of science.
Brown University Graduate Center
JOHN C. CAIAZZA