Social dominance

“ Control.—The public mirror of the press reveals a third characteristic of social life. Activity and association are both under control. Activity would result in exploitation of the weak by the strong, and finally in anarchy, if there were no exercise of control. Under control activities are co-ordinated, individuals and classes are brought to work in co-operation and not in antagonism, and under an enlightened and sanctioned authority life becomes richer, fuller, and more truly free.
Social control begins in the individual mind. Instincts and feelings are held in the leash of rational thought. ”

“ They are for the most part silent forces that have been modifying the folk-ways in Europe and America. There has been little conception of social obligation or social ideals, little more than a blind obedience to the stimuli that pressed upon the individual and the group. But with the awakening of the social consciousness and a quickening of the social conscience has come telic progress. ”

“ If [113] man’s social nature is to find its correlate, the race must be so completely one, so compact and contiguous in the spirit of fraternity and good will, as to make it possible for each man to share in the work, thought, and virtue of all men. Individuals must be gathered into the network of social relations, so that, instead of separate and isolated units, they shall be known as farmers, merchants, blacksmiths, mechanics, shoemakers, lawyers, doctors, editors, and ministers. The calling of each must relate to the well-being of all. ”

“ In aristocratic societies the nobility of birth and wealth, representing the intelligence of the people, assume the role of social control, while the rest of the population are kept in bondage and ignorance. ”

“ Many other social forces, national character, ideas, customs—the whole inherited ethos of the people—individual peculiarities, love of power, sense of fair dealing, public opinion, conscience, local ties, family connections, civil legislation—all exercise upon industrial affairs as real an influence as personal interest, and, furthermore, they exercise an influence of precisely the same kind. They all operate ethically, through human will, judgment, motives, and in this respect one of them has no advantage over another. ”

“ It forced men into the social state; made social organization inevitable; and has developed the social sentiments. It has stimulated to progressive improvements in production, and to increased skill and intelligence. It is daily thrusting us into closer contact and more mutually-dependent relationships. ”

“ But if, it is impossible to estimate the value of the several elements composing the fabric of society, it is easy to ascertain the dominating idea on which all forms of society are based. That dominating idea, if it may for the moment be called such, is the instinct of self-preservation, and it exercises just as great a power in determining the formation and play of the social organism as it exercises in determining the attitude of the individual to the world around him. ”

“ The social state at any time existing, is the resultant of all the ambitions, self-interests, fears, reverences, indignations, sympathies, &c., of ancestral citizens and existing citizens. The ideas current in this social state must, on the average, lie congruous with the feelings of citizens, and therefore, on the average, with the social state these feelings have produced. ”

“ The doctrine further teaches that the most perfect union, harmony, peace, and good-fellowship are compatible with great diversity of character, rank, occupation, and office; that this diversity, indeed, renders the union and harmony all the more perfect when the different parts in the social body are duly adjusted, and one life pervades them all. It shows us that gradations of rank and character may exist without pride, disdain, or tyranny on the one hand, or envy, jealousy, or humiliation on the other ”

“ Instead of their improvements, and their success and prosperity altogether, producing admiration, if not envy, they have a social discipline, the thought of which reduces these feelings to ridicule and contempt: that is to say, with regard to the mass; with respect to their leaders one's feelings are apt to be stronger. ”

“ The high development of the individual culminating in powerful personality has been an exceptional occurrence, due to special circumstances. A communal social order, often repressing and invariably failing to evoke the higher human faculties, must express its real nature in the language, literature, and customs of the people. ”

“ Can I say our social laws are generally better, or show a nobler insight into the wants of man and woman? I do, indeed, say what I believe, that voluntary association for improvement in these particulars will be the grand means for my nation to grow, and give a nobler harmony to the coming age. ”

“ Each social formation, through each of its material activities, exerts its influence upon the civic whole; and each of its ideas and ideals wins also its place and power. ”

“ As we move beyond civilization onto a more mature and more complicated culture level, we may have a workable system of social priorities, but does our oncoming stream of manpower have the interest, the imagination, the competence, the sense of social responsibility and the staying power necessary to arouse in a series of generations the will and determination to carry out social policy? ”

“ Our age presents us the incredible spectacle that the dependence of the higher social culture on the economic development is not only clearly recognized by social science, but is proclaimed as the ideal. ”

“ The modification of men's moral natures, caused by the continuous discipline of social life, which adapts them more and more to social relations, is therefore the chief proximate cause of social progress. ”

“ In some early states of society, these forces might be, and were, too much ahead of the power which society then possessed of disciplining and controlling them. There has been a time when the element of spontaneity and individuality was in excess, and the social principle had a hard struggle with it. ”

“ How can one in the seclusion of private life accurately measure the force of {278} the influence those are subjected to who live and act in the center of vast and powerful civil and social circles? The more you mix with men the less you will be disposed to quarrel, and the more charitable and liberal will you become. The fact that you do not understand another is quite as likely to be your fault as his. ”

“ If, then, we could elevate such universalized individuals into the position of herd-leaders, spread their secret, persuade society first to imitate them, and then to share their point of view, the real and sane, because love-impelled social revolution might begin. ”

“ The other aims decreed in the fundamental law like the development of personal and collective discipline, civic conscience, vocational skill and social efficiency, should be subordinated to the cultivation of moral character as the handmaiden of an intransigent nationalism. ”

“ And this society is not a mere set of wealthy exclusives banded together against the rest of the world; it comprehends everybody.
One sees in the streets abundant evidence of these conditions of social relationship. ”

“ Thus social evolution is a resultant of the interaction of two wholly distinct factors,—the individual, deriving his peculiar gifts from the play of physiological and infra-social forces, but bearing all the power of initiative and origination in his hands; and, second, the social environment, with its power of adopting or rejecting both him and his gifts. Both factors are essential to change. The community stagnates without the impulse of the individual. The impulse dies away without the sympathy of the community. ”

“ By the time we find ourselves here we are caught in a network of customs and attitudes, the major directions of our desires and interests have been stamped on our minds, and by the time we have emerged from tutelage and reached the years of discretion when we might conceivably throw our influence to the reshaping of social institutions, most of us have been so molded into the society [190] and class we live in that we are scarcely aware of any distinction between ourselves as judging, desiring individuals and our social environment. ”

“ Thus Best Society is not a fellowship of the wealthy, nor does it seek to exclude those who are not of exalted birth; but it is an association of gentle-folk, of which good form in speech, charm of manner, knowledge of the social amenities, and instinctive consideration for the feelings of others, are the credentials by which society the world over recognizes its chosen members. ”

“ To the practice of these social amenities is doubtless ascribable the absence of any rancor from the rough contests and collisions of public life, and thus men of every shade of politics and party, differing even in class and condition, formed admirable social elements, and cohered together to perfection. ”

“ For segregated classes develop their own customs, which is to say their own working morals. As long as society is mainly immobile these diverse principles and ruling aims do not clash. They exist side by side in different strata. Power, glory, honor, magnificence, mutual faith here; industry, obedience, abstinence, humility, and reverence there: noble and plebeian virtues. Vigor, courage, energy, enterprise here; submission, patience, charm, personal fidelity there: the masculine and feminine virtues. But mobility invades society. ”

“ The sense of lifelong freedom and self-respect and of the peace and permanence of one’s own home will do much to purify and uplift the personal relations of life, and more to strengthen and extend the social relations. The individual will learn to feel himself an integral part of the social structure, 300in close, direct, permanent connection with the needs and uses of society. ”

“ The social sanction has even more obvious advantages to offer. If you are good, you will be well thought of by society. You will gain reputation, society will give you a "good character," and conformity to social convention will go far to advance your success. ”

“ The success or failure of this effort to assure individual adjustment to the social norm and conformity to its practices varies with the prosilitizing enthusiasm of the society and with the ration of adaptability and self-consciousness of its individual members. ”

“ We still exhibit all these phases of loyalty, in differently diminishing degrees; but we show, also, a larger form of this great virtue peculiar to our age.
276The lines of social relation to-day are mainly industrial. Our individual lives, our social peace and progress, depend more upon our economic relations than upon any other. For a long time society was organized only on a sex-basis, a religious basis, or a military basis, each of such organizations being comparatively transient; and its component individuals labored alone on an economic basis of helpless individualism. ”

“ Each generation, as it arises, matures, and consolidates into another series of social intercourse, bears the impress which society has stamped upon the last; and so powerful is the influence thus derived, that the laws of a nation would be useless in defence of virtue, if the voice of society was raised against it. ”

“ It has supplied for him a social group, persons to talk with, to play with, to work with. Inevitably he takes on their characteristics, and his life will continue to be narrow and to grow conservative and hard, unless he enlarges his experience, broadens his horizon, tries new activities, enjoys new associations, tests new methods of social control, and lets the forces that produce social change play upon his own life. ”

“ The second and higher form of the communication impulse also—namely, the desire to influence other wills and to direct and control public action; in short, to become a social leader—finds full scope in play, which affords good preliminary practice of the art of ruling, just as it is the first school for voluntary subordination to social law. Here the masterful mind learns how to control milder spirits and to identify his own with the common interest, and here awakens the feeling of responsibility and the wish to become by his example an inspiration to his fellows. ”

“ But this equalization of opportunity, by educating the intelligence of the masses and by placing an increased portion of political and social power in their hands, raises up an enemy of social progress. ”

“ The efficiency of the social system, into which the individual thus endowed is born, is tested by its power to shape him, far more thoroughly than his heredity has shaped him, to life in society, by its power to build on the foundation afforded by instinct story after story of obedience and loyalty and public spirit. As soon as societies acquire this power a striking change takes place in the significance of inter-group conflicts. Whereas formerly the group with the more altruistic members survived, now the victory often falls to the society with the better system of artificial control. ”

“ On the whole, they are prepared for the gradual disentanglement of men from the Normal Social Life altogether, and they look for new ways of living and new methods of human association with a certain adventurous hopefulness. ”

“ We shall earnestly endeavor to suppress personal, local, sectional, and national prejudices, all unhealthy rivalry, all selfish ambition. Faithful adherence to these principles will insure our mental, moral, social, and material advancement. ”

“ They find themselves subjected to almost identical conditions in all sections and begin to recognize themselves as a class, regardless of races, nationalities or creeds. Recognition of class generates that sense of duty known as the social conscience—the moral sense of the working class. ”

“ The attainment of a high cultural civilization demands, first, the ideal type of citizen and, then, ideal and adequate social mechanisms wherewith such a citizenry may control the economic and political institutions of such an advanced human society. ”