A social psychologist, sociologist, and amateur physicist. He was the author of several works in which he expounded theories of national traits, racial superiority, herd behavior and crowd psychology. See also 袚褞褋褌邪胁 袥械 袘芯薪
200 n膬m tr瓢峄沜, v膬n h脿o 鈥� tri岷縯 gia Voltaire 膽茫 n贸i m峄檛 c芒u r岷 hay m脿 m矛nh lu么n t芒m 膽岷痗 v脿 ch峄 li锚n t瓢峄焠g 膽岷縩 t峄沬 khi 膽峄峜 xong cu峄憂 s谩ch n脿y: 鈥淚 do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it鈥� (C贸 th峄� t么i kh么ng 膽峄搉g 媒 v峄沬 膽i峄乽 anh n贸i; nh瓢ng t么i s岷� 膽岷 tranh 膽岷縩 c霉ng cho quy峄乶 膽瓢峄 n贸i c峄 anh). V芒ng, s峄� kh谩c bi峄噒 trong 媒 th峄ヽ h峄� hay t么n gi谩o hay b岷 k峄� th峄ヽ g矛 kh谩c kh么ng n锚n khi岷縩 ch煤ng ta xa nhau m峄檛 khi ch煤ng ta v岷玭 c貌n chia s岷� nh峄痭g gi谩 tr峄� v脿 t么n tr峄峮g ph岷﹎ h岷h c峄 nhau !
Definitely a 5+ star-rating book, and a super heavy read to me (I do a lot of extra search while reading). This was an eye-opening experience that not only provides information about one of the most noticeable events in Mid-modern history but also brings multi-dimensional perspectives to the nature as well as pros and cons of the Revolution.
1) Information a. Simplify the Revolution timeline, and its each period's power structure. Note that this period was super chaotic with an overwhelming number of events. b. Brought new information about the Revolution's nature as well as its impact: While the Revolution was fantasized in enormous novels and art works, Le Bon saw it as costly and useless. According to Le Bon, those fantasies were created before poets and artists see the war's ugly motivations and its endless destructions on their nation. By ugly motivations, I refer to the difference between pre-war promises and during-and-post-war actions. By endless destructions, I mean this war was not a just-one-time pain, but its anti-human consequences kept haunting France for a quarter of a century. Gustave Le Bon wrote this book one hundred years after the Revolution, thus he viewed the Revolution less emotionally and more rationally. His conclusion seemed shocking for me at first, but understandable after going through his arguments and evidences. c. A great motivation to seek out for more insights: as mentioned above, this period had a great number of events and activities. Therefore, this book encourages me to reach out to understand it more thoroughly. Psychologically speaking, Le Bon's shocking hypotheses and conclusions motivate me to find evidence to either reject or support him.
2) Arguments and Hypotheses a. Human nature: First and foremost, deep in side, all humans are evil: humans are unconsciously obsessed with sex, violence and envy. Modern humans inherit these traits from their ancient hunting ancestors. In a stable society, those evil natures are restricted by culture, education and social standards, but in war time, those restrictions (Le Bon called them "social breaks") are loosened and humans turns into evils. This theory has been backed up by a great number of books about wars. b. Group psychology (or crowd psychology): According to Le Bon, people are connected by common characteristics. In particular, a group of book readers is interested in sharing knowledge; while a group of fishermen can easily feel connected in fishing-related topics and activities. This psychology exposed its practical influences in some evidences below - A person as an individual and a group participant is different. In other words, being in a group changes one's thinking and actions, as he/she is psychologically influenced by the majority of the crowd. - Most of social changes are violent-oriented: As mentioned in 2a., most people share the same natural traits, no matter if they realize or accept them. Therefore, in order to connect the largest proportion of agreement, taking advantages of their natural traits is the quickest way. The weaker "social break" in audience, the more effective this method proves. About evidence, well, you can look at wars, historical and political events in 1929 - 1933 and even recently,... - A crowd is powerful but not consistent. Because a crowd can't think, it does not take side in a war. Jacobin used the crowd and was killed by the crowd. Therefore the violent crowd is also dangerous whoever uses it, and that explains why violence results in endless violence. c. Three layers of social influencers: philosophical people, elite class and social class (majority) d. In non-political areas, society's daily activities and traditions are resistant against any changes: According to Le Bon, a revolution has a guaranteed success rate when it involves at least 7% of relating population. The reason is even at its best, the Revolution could not attract people from all areas of France. Therefore, the majority of French was still living in their stable social system, with a predicted set of rules and regulations to ensure their well-being. A new government, if any, could not satisfy the needs of these conservative areas in time will raise conflicts and be opposed. Le Bon used this theory to explain why France came back to monarchy after 25 years: a new system was not yet compatible to most existing values and traditions. People could not live without their Kings and Queens
3) Questionable/ Limitations a. Le Bon mentioned "after a while, the crowd gets tired, stops and dismisses", but did not explain why. From my personal observation, there is a need of emotional burst: a nature-traits-connected crowd doesn't think, so its behaviors are not rational-based but emotional-based. Without emotional bursts, a crowd is useless and directionless; and it quickly dismisses. This explains the need of a Single symbolic Leader, who repeatedly delivers emotional messages, on top of the messy crowd.
This was what I call a "tough" reading, I took this book home thinking it will enlighten me more about the French revolution, it did, but mostly by forcing me to use Google & Wikipedia multiple times! I didn't know it was more of an analysis to the events than being an information provider about it. still, it was useful and shed light on another angle & review of one of the world's biggest uprisings ever. And to anyone whom had or witnessed a revolution in his country, you'll find this book really enlightening & interesting to read!
If you want to read this book, you have to have a good knowledge about the French revolution since a good part of the book is dedicated to it; some chapters of the book even talk specifically about it. It seemed to me more of a philosophical book than a scientific one that explains in terms of psychology and sociology what goes on during revolutions. However, some of what has been stated in this book does remarkably apply to the revolutions that have recently taken place.
But besides the fixed collectivities formed by the peoples, there are mobile and transitory collectivities known as crowds. Now these crowds or mobs, by the aid of which the great movements of history are accomplished, have characteristics absolutely different from those of the individuals who compose them. What are these characteristics, and how are they evolved? This new problem was examined in The Psychology of the Crowd.
So long as psychology regards beliefs as voluntary and rational they will remain inexplicable. Having proved that they are usually irrational and always involuntary, I was able to propound the solution of this important problem; how it was that beliefs which no reason could justify were admitted without difficulty by the most enlightened spirits of all ages.
I arrived at the conclusion that beside the rational logic which conditions thought, and was formerly regarded as our sole guide, there exist very different forms of logic: affective logic, collective logic, and mystic logic, which usually overrule the reason and engender the generative impulses of our conduct.
This fact well established, it seemed to me evident that if a great number of historical events are often uncomprehended, it is because we seek to interpret them in the light of a logic which in reality has very little influence upon their genesis.
When any question gives rise to violently contradictory opinions we may be sure that it belongs to the province of beliefs and not to that of knowledge. We have shown in a preceding work that belief, of unconscious origin and independent of all reason, can never be influenced by reason.
Although in its beginnings a religious or political revolution may very well be supported by rational elements, it is developed only by the aid of mystic and affective elements which are absolutely foreign to reason.
The historians who have judged the events of the French Revolution in the name of rational logic could not comprehend them, since this form of logic did not dictate them. As the actors of these events themselves understood them but ill, we shall not be far from the truth in saying that our Revolution was a phenomenon equally misunderstood by those who caused it and by those who have described it. At no period of history did men so little grasp the present, so greatly ignore the past, and so poorly divine the future.
Although the origin of a revolution may be perfectly rational, we must not forget that the reasons invoked in preparing for it do not influence the crowd until they have been transformed into sentiments. Rational logic can point to the abuses to be destroyed, but to move the multitude its hopes must be awakened. This can only be effected by the action of the affective and mystic elements which give man the power to act. At the time of the French Revolution, for example, rational logic, in the hands of the philosophers, demonstrated the inconveniences of the ancien regime, and excited the desire to change it. Mystic logic inspired belief in the virtues of a society created in all its members according to certain principles. Affective logic unchained the passions confined by the bonds of ages and led to the worst excesses. Collective logic ruled the clubs and the Assemblies and impelled their members to actions which neither rational nor affective nor mystic logic would ever have caused them to commit.
The sudden political revolutions which strike the historian most forcibly are often the least important. The great revolutions are those of manners and thought. Changing the name of a government does not transform the mentality of a people. To overthrow the institutions of a people is not to re-shape its soul.
Science has not yet discovered the magic ring capable of saving a society without discipline. There is no need to impose discipline when it has become hereditary, but when the primitive instincts have been allowed to destroy the barriers painfully erected by slow ancestral labours, they cannot be reconstituted save by an energetic tyranny.
As a proof of these assertions we may instance an experiment analogous to that undertaken by China; that recently attempted by Turkey. A few years ago young men instructed in European schools and full of good intentions succeeded, with the aid of a number of officers, in overthrowing a Sultan whose tyranny seemed insupportable. Having acquired our robust Latin faith in the magic power of formulae, they thought they could establish the representative system in a country half-civilised, profoundly divided by religious hatred, and peopled by divers races. The attempt has not prospered hitherto. The authors of the reformation had to learn that despite their liberalism they were forced to govern by methods very like those employed by the government overthrown. They could neither prevent summary executions nor wholesale massacres of Christians, nor could they remedy a single abuse.
The real directing forces of a country are the administrations, composed of impersonal elements which are never affected by the changes of government. Conservative of traditions, they are anonymous and lasting, and constitute an occult power before which all others must eventually bow. Their action has even increased to such a degree that, as we shall presently show, there is a danger that they may form an anonymous State more powerful than the official State.
To create a revolution is easy, but to change the soul of a people is difficult indeed.
In the past, built up by slow accumulations of centuries, was formed the aggregation of thoughts, sentiments, traditions, and prejudices constituting the national mind which makes the strength of a race. Without it no progress is possible. Each generation would necessitate a fresh beginning.
Rarely does the crowd understand anything of the revolutions accomplished with its assistance. It obediently follows its leaders without even trying to find out what they want.
These noisy and maleficent crowds, the kernel of all insurrections, from antiquity to our own times, are the only crowds known to the orator. To the orator they are the sovereign people. As a matter of fact this sovereign people is principally composed of the lower populace of whom Thiers said: ``Since the time when Tacitus saw it applaud the crimes of the emperors the vile populace has not changed. These barbarians who swarm at the bottom of societies are always ready to stain the people with every crime, at the beck of every power, and to the dishonour of every cause.'
Such movements are never comprehended by those who imagine that their origin is rational. Political or religious, the beliefs which have moved the world possess a common origin and follow the same laws. They are formed, not by the reason, but more often contrary to reason.
This analysis will show in the first place that the Jacobin is not a rationalist, but a believer. Far from building his belief on reason, he moulds reason to his belief, and although his speeches are steeped in rationalism he employs it very little in his thoughts and his conduct.
All the civilised societies inevitably drag behind them a residue of degenerates, of the unadapted, of persons affected by various taints. Vagabonds, beggars, fugitives from justice, thieves, assassins, and starving creatures that live from day to day, may constitute the criminal population of the great cities. In ordinary times these waste products of civilisation are more or less restrained by the police. During revolution nothing restrains them, and they can easily gratify their instincts to murder and plunder. In the dregs of society the revolutionaries of all times are sure of finding recruits. Eager only to kill and to plunder, little matters to them the cause they are sworn to defend. If the chances of murder and pillage are better in the party attacked, they will promptly change their colours. To these criminals, properly so called, the incurable plague of all societies, we must add the class of semi-criminals. Wrongdoers on occasion, they never rebel so long as the fear of the established order restrains them, but as soon as it weakens they enroll themselves in the army of revolution. These two categories鈥攈abitual and occasional criminals鈥攆orm an army of disorder which is fit for nothing but the creation of disorder. All the revolutionaries, all the founders of religious or political leagues, have constantly counted on their support.
Whatever their origin, revolutions do not produce their full effects until they have penetrated the soul of the multitude. They therefore represent a consequence of the psychology of crowds.
Man, as part of a multitude, is a very different being from the same man as an isolated individual. His conscious individuality vanishes in the unconscious personality of the crowd. Material contact is not absolutely necessary to produce in the individual the mentality of the crowd. Common passions and sentiments, provoked by certain events, are often sufficient to create it.
These various characteristics show that man in the crowd descends to a very low degree in the scale of civilisation. He becomes a savage, with all a savage's faults and qualities, with all his momentary violence, enthusiasm, and heroism. In the intellectual domain a crowd is always inferior to the isolated unit. In the moral and sentimental domain it may be his superior. A crowd will commit a crime as readily as an act of abnegation. Personal characteristics vanish in the crowd, which exerts an extraordinary influence upon the individual which form it.
I have shown elsewhere, making use of certain physiological experiments, that the unconscious collective mind of the crowd seems bound up with the mind of the leader. The latter gives it a single will and imposes absolute obedience.
Many experiments have shown to what point a collectivity may be subjected to suggestion. Among the numerous experiments made to prove this fact one of the most remarkable was performed on the pupils of his class by Professor Glosson and published in the Revue Scientifique for October 28, 1899. ``I prepared a bottle filled with distilled water carefully wrapped in cotton and packed in a box. After several other experiments I stated that I wished to measure the rapidity with which an odour would diffuse itself through the air, and asked those present to raise their hands the moment they perceived the odour. . . . I took out the bottle and poured the water on the cotton, turning my head away during the operation, then took up a stop-watch and awaited the result. . . . I explained that I was absolutely sure that no one present had ever smelt the odour of the chemical composition I had spilt. . . . At the end of fifteen seconds the majority of those in front had held up their hands, and in forty seconds the odour had reached the back of the hall by fairly regular waves. About three-quarters of those present declared that they perceived the odour. A larger number would doubtless have succumbed to suggestion, if at the end of a minute I had not been forced to stop the experiment, some of those in the front rows being unpleasantly affected by the odour, and wishing to leave the hall.''
It is permissible to consider the Revolution as being partly a necessity, but it was above all鈥攚hich is what the fatalistic writers already cited do not show us鈥攁 permanent struggle between theorists who were imbued with a new ideal, and the economic, social, and political laws which ruled mankind, and which they did not understand.
Having broken all human restraints, the men of the Revolution finally discovered that a society cannot live without them; but when they sought to create them anew they saw that even the strongest society, though supported by the fear of the guillotine, could not replace the discipline which the past had slowly built up in the minds of men. As for understanding the evolution of society, or judging men's hearts and minds, or foreseeing the consequences of the laws they enacted, they scarcely attempted to do so.
It is therefore impossible, unless he contents himself with simple chronologies summing up each event with a few words and a date, to produce a truly impartial volume of history. No author could be impartial; and it is not to be regretted. The claim to impartiality, so common to-day, results in those flat, gloomy, and prodigiously wearisome works which render the comprehension of a period completely impossible. Should the historian, under a pretext of impartiality, abstain from judging men鈥攖hat is, from speaking in tones of admiration or reprobation?
Many historians assure us that the Revolution was directed against the autocracy of the monarchy. In reality the kings of France had ceased to be absolute monarchs long before its outbreak.
Despite the apparent authority of the central power, the kingdom, formed by the successive conquest of independent provinces, was divided into territories each of which had its own laws and customs, and each of which paid different imposts. Internal customs-houses separated them. The unity of France was thus somewhat artificial. It represented an aggregate of various countries which the repeated efforts of the kings, including Louis XIV., had not succeeded in wholly unifying. The most useful effect of the Revolution was this very unification.
Although the philosophers who have been supposed the inspirers of the French Revolution did attack certain privileges and abuses, we must not for that reason regard them as partisans of popular government. Democracy, whose role in Greek history was familiar to them, was generally highly antipathetic to them. They were not ignorant of the destruction and violence which are its invariable accompaniments, and knew that in the time of Aristotle it was already defined as ``a State in which everything, even the law, depends on the multitude set up as a tyrant and governed by a few declamatory speakers.''
Pierre Bayle, the true forerunner of Voltaire, recalled in the following terms the consequences of popular government in Athens: ``If one considers this history, which displays at great length the tumult of the assemblies, the factions dividing the city, the seditious disturbing it, the most illustrious subjects persecuted, exiled, and punished by death at the will of a violent windbag, one would conclude that this people, which so prided itself on its liberty, was really the slave of a small number of caballers, whom they called demagogues, and who made it turn now in this direction, now in that, as their passions changed, almost as the sea heaps the waves now one way, now another, according to the winds which trouble it. You will seek in vain in Macedonia, which was a monarchy, for as many examples of tyranny as Athenian history will afford.''
Montesquieu had no greater admiration for the democracy. Having described the three forms of government鈥攔epublican, monarchical, and despotic鈥攈e shows very clearly what popular government may lead to: ``Men were free with laws; men would fain be free without them; what was a maxim is called severity; what was order is called hindrance. Formerly the welfare of individuals constituted the public wealth, but now the public wealth becomes the patrimony of individuals. The republic is spoil, and its strength is merely the power of a few citizens and the license of all.''
Rousseau was one of the very few democratic philosophers of his age, which is why his Contrat Social became the Bible of the men of the Terror. It seemed to furnish the rational justification necessary to excuse the acts deriving from unconscious mystic and affective impulses which no philosophy had inspired. To be quite truthful, the democratic instincts of Rousseau were by no means above suspicion. He himself considered that his projects for social reorganisation, based upon popular sovereignty, could be applied only to a very small State; and when the Poles asked him for a draft democratic Constitution he advised them to choose a hereditary monarch.
A brutal and audacious minority will always lead a fearful and irresolute majority.
Men judge with their intelligence, and are guided by their characters. To understand a man fully one must separate these two elements. During the great periods of activity鈥攁nd the revolutionary movements naturally belong to such periods鈥攃haracter always takes the first rank. In all revolutions, and in particularly in the French Revolution, we observe a small minority of narrow but decided minds which imperiously dominate an immense majority of men who are often very intelligent but are lacking in character.
The successive revolutions which France has suffered have been the consequences of struggles between two portions of the nation whose mentalities are different. One is religious and monarchical and is dominated by long ancestral influences; the other is subjected to the same influences, but gives them a revolutionary form.
The democratic ideas which have so often shaken the world from the heroic ages of Greece to modern times are always clashing with natural inequalities. Some observers have held, with Helvetius, that the inequality between men is created by education. As a matter of fact, Nature does not know such a thing as equality. She distributes unevenly genius, beauty, health, vigour, intelligence, and all the qualities which confer on their possessors a superiority over their fellows. No theory can alter these discrepancies, so that democratic doctrines will remain confined to words until the laws of heredity consent to unify the capacities of men. Can we suppose that societies will ever succeed in establishing artificially the equality refused by Nature? A few theorists have believed for a long time that education might effect a general leveling. Many years of experience have shown the depth of this illusion.
The same phenomenon is to be observed in societies. The forms of democracy which select the better elements of the popular classes finally result in the creation of an intellectual aristocracy, a result the contrary of the dream of the pure theorists, to beat down the superior elements of society to the level of the inferior elements. On the side of natural law, which is hostile to theories of equality, are the conditions of modern progress. Science and industry demand more and more considerable intellectual efforts, so that mental inequalities and the differences of social condition which spring from them cannot but become accentuated.
We therefore observe this striking phenomenon: as laws and institutions seek to level individuals the progress of civilisation tends still further to differentiate them. From the peasant to the feudal baron the intellectual difference was not great, but from the working-man to the engineer it is immense and is increasing daily.
Among the dogmas of democracy perhaps the most fundamental of all and the most attractive is that of universal suffrage. It gives the masses the idea of equality, since for a moment at least rich and poor, learned and ignorant, are equal before the electoral urn. The minister elbows the least of his servants, and during this brief moment the power of one is as great as the others. These same psychological laws also show us that so-called universal suffrage is in reality a pure fiction. The crowd, save in very rare cases, has no opinion but that of its leaders. Universal suffrage really represents the most limited of suffrages.
No one yet seems to understand that individuals and their methods, not regulations, make the value of a people. The efficacious reforms are not the revolutionary reforms but the trifling ameliorations of every day accumulated in course of time. The great social changes, like the great geological changes, are effected by the daily addition of minute causes