Bruno Bettelheim

1903-1990

The Man and a few of his books

Auschwitz and Dachau

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Class on Bettelheim: "Individual and Mass Behavior in Extreme Situations"

I. Three theses: All rest on a notion of the centrality of symbolic acts A. uses of power to change human relations B. Nazis had a purpose C. Lutheran thesis II. The Moral Career of the Inmate A. Structure of the Camps B. Patterns of Disruption 1. actor to acts 2. actor to others 3. actor to self (e.g. suicide) C. Forced translation of all acts into the reference system of the camp

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III. Patterns of Resistance A. the least successful: non-political white middle class B. Bettelheim's approach

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IV. The Moral Career of the Staff V. Application to Prisoner's Dilemma and reinterpretation

RATS ON DOESN’T RATS ON

5

(

P)

III

5 (P)

(

T) 0 10 (S )

IV I

(T) 0 1

(

R

) DOESN’T IV I

1 (R)

I I

10 (S)

IF T emptation to

defect is >

(preferable to)

R eward for cooperation and that

is >

P unishment for cooperation and that

is >

S uckers payoff Then rationality leads to defection

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PD revisited Four situations:

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I. Infliction of injustice

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II .Neither tells: JUSTICE - sense of justice; cooperate; trust; sanctions?

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III. Both tell: Hobbes ’ state of nature (classically) or initial stages of the

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camp -individual rationality:(situation STRUCTURES rationality) IV. suffers injustice III leads to obedience to authority (camp/ Milgram) Question: what do we have to do to get to II II is a particular form of human interaction; it requires a/ some equality b/ some sort of rationality but not purely individual c/ adults (as it were): people who can trust) d/ peer groups It is clear that this is not what the world is made of overall; nor is it the only workable form of social organization (tradition; do what you are told; do what the rules say) but we do have it to some extent.

What is clear is that II behavior requires forms of behavior that are made

impossible by the existence of absolute authority.

Institution that require absolute authority (jails, monasteries, armies, high schools?) must break people of the kinds of things that lead to II What is important about the BB article is that the extreme situations are precisely NOT where there is no society but where a particular form of society exists.