Holona L. Ochs Andrew B. Whitford
University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas, U.S.A.
INTRODUCTION
Stanley Milgram’s classic experiments, conducted be-tween 1960 and 1963, sought to demonstrate the power of social influence by examining how subjects related to authority. The initial studies were later followed by several variants intended to test the factors mediating the conformity identified in those first experiments. The results of this research agenda are quite robust, having been replicated in numerous cultural contexts and ap-pear to hold up well over time. In short, subjects of many social groups, and even some of arbitrary definition (i.e., men and women, and even Americans, Germans, Euro-peans, and Latinos), exhibit high levels of obedience to authority, and the overall levels of conformity remain relatively stable over time. Milgram shows that authoritar-ianism and conformity are not confined to particular social groups or ‘‘types’’ of people or even to types of situations. In fact, six out of every ten people will kill you if told to do so by someone in authority under a va-riety of circumstances.[1]
Moreover, Milgram’s experiments are important be-cause they have strong implications for ethical behavior on the part of experimenters who study authority relations in controlled settings. Many recent innovations in the protection of human subjects in experimental and other research settings are broadly due to the innovations introduced—and the resulting findings—by Milgram. For example, the American Psychological Association’s Ethical Principles in the Conduct of Research with Human Participants (1982) make direct reference to these experiments and their findings on social authority in controlled settings. Most importantly, Milgram’s experiments have great importance for the study of public policy generally, and public administration specifically.
The current use of human subjects committees is particularly relevant, as well as the more pressing matters of social regulation and control in hierarchical settings.
HISTORICAL CONTEXT OF THE MILGRAM EXPERIMENTS
In the early 1960s a considerable amount of research was being conducted attempting to explain the atrocities of World War II. Generally, researchers sought an explana-tion for the human cruelty exhibited during this period, and there was a tremendous desire to attribute the vio-lence to a readily identifiable characteristic that would allow people to identify that thing that must be something fundamentally different about someone who would participate in such depravity—or at least that the degeneracy of the circumstances produced such behavior in some individuals. Of course, efforts to assign re-sponsibility for the atrocities exacted by the Nazi regime had resulted in many participants being charged during the Nuremberg Trials. The primary defense for the accused was that they were merely following orders. The vast majority of the research examined the authoritarian traits of the German people,[2–5]that is—with the exception of Milgram’s studies.
The central importance of Milgram’s studies[1,6–8] is that they attempted to pit moral values against the demands of authority in an experimental test of human behavior under social pressures to conform.[1] Milgram placed his experiments in the discursive field that linked his research with momentous examples of human barbarism, such as the treatment of the Jews by the Nazis in Germany and the My Lai massacre in Vietnam. He reasoned that most people would exact harsh consequen-ces on others under certain conditions, particularly when given orders by someone in authority. Most importantly, he shows that people have an incredible tendency to conform and that in fact, most people would participate in violence under similar circumstances.
The Milgram experiments profoundly influenced the discourse on human nature, group behavior, ethics, pub-lic popub-licy, and pubpub-lic administration. Specifically, the
Encyclopedia of Public Administration and Public Policy DOI: 10.1081/E-EPAP 120024806 Copyright D 2004 by Marcel Dekker, Inc. All rights reserved.
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findings challenge some widely held beliefs about the capacity for human cruelty. The dispositional view that there must be something in the German character that makes them particularly cruel did not hold up when tested.
Instead, the Milgram experiments undermine notions that human behavior is genetically determined or culturally determined. The results illustrate that human behavior is constrained by individual values to the degree that social influence and the situational characteristics are imposed.
METHODOLOGY
The initial experiment conducted by Milgram on obedi-ence to authority began in a lecture theater where a group made up of psychiatrists, university students, and middle-class adults of various occupations and ages gathered for a lecture on obedience to authority.[8]Here we describe the situation Milgram asked his audience to imagine at the end of the lecture:[9]
In response to a newspaper add offering $4.50 for one hour’s work, you participate in a Yale University psychology experiment investigating memory and learn-ing. You are introduced to a stern looking experimenter in a white coat and a mild-mannered individual introduced as your co-participant. The experimenter explains that the study examines the role of punishment in learning, and one of you will be the teacher and one will be the learner in this experiment. You are randomly assigned to the role of the teacher, and the three of you then proceed to an adjacent room, where the other participant, the ‘‘learner,’’
is strapped into a chair. The experimenter explains that this is to prevent excessive movement during the experiment, but it is also obvious to you that the learner is unable to remove himself from the chair if he so chose.
Then, conductive gel is applied to an electrode is subsequently attached to the learners arm, and the experimenter explains that this is to prevent burning and blisters. Both you and the learner are shown the electric shock generator that will deliver electric shocks that will serve as punishment for incorrect responses. The gener-ator has 30 switches labeled with a voltage ranging from 15 to 450 volts. Each switch also has a rating, ranging from ‘‘slight shock’’ to ‘‘danger: severe shock,’’ and the final two switches are labeled ‘‘XXX.’’ The other participant assigned to the learner role asks if ‘‘the shocks will hurt’’ to which the experimenter replies, ‘‘although the shocks will be painful, they cause no permanent tissue damage.’’
Your role is to teach the learner a simple association task, but you also are told by the experimenter that you are required to punish the learner for incorrect responses. You
are told that for every incorrect response you must increase the voltage by one more switch (15 volts). You are given a 15-volt shock to check that the generator is functioning adequately and to demonstrate the tingling sensation of 15 volts. The learner makes frequent errors during the experiment, each resulting in a higher voltage shock than the previous one. At 75 volts, 90 volts, and 105 volts, you hear the learner ‘‘grunt’’ through the wall.
At 120 volts, the learner says the shocks are getting pain-ful. At 150 volts, he screams, ‘‘get me out of here! I refuse to go on!’’ His protests continue as the voltage increases.
At any point that you question whether you should continue, the experimenter tells you to keep going, saying,
‘‘you can’t stop now,’’ ‘‘he is getting paid to do this experiment’’ or ‘‘the experiment depends on your continuing compliance.’’ He may even say ‘‘you have no choice,’’ At 300 volts, the learner pounds on the wall and demands to be let out. After 330 volts, there is no longer any response from the learner, at which point the experimenter tells you that the learner’s failure to respond should be interpreted as an incorrect response and to continue increasing the shock level. The experiment concludes when the highest shock level is reached or the learning task is completed.
Following the lecture in which the audience was asked to image the scenario described, each member of the audience was asked to anonymously record how he or she would have responded under the circumstances described.
Members of the audience reported that they would have disobeyed the experimenter early in the experiment because they ‘‘didn’t want to hurt anyone,’’ and no one in the audience reported that he or she would continue beyond 300 V, the level indicating ‘‘danger: severe shock.’’[9]
What we now know is that when Milgram conducted the experiment described to the audience in the prelim-inary study, the ‘‘learner’’ was actually a confederate.[8]
He found that more than 60% of the participants inflicted the maximum level of electric shock, and none of the participants disobeyed before 300 V.[1] Despite the prediction by the psychiatrists in the preliminary study that only ‘‘pathological sadists’’ would administer electric shocks to 450 V, the experiment revealed that ordinary people will inflict pain on another person under the right set of circumstances, particularly when told to do so by a legitimate authority.[8] The study also exemplifies the tendency to overemphasize dispositional factors and underestimate situational factors when making attribu-tions about acattribu-tions, referred to as a fundamental attribution error.[10]For example, people tend to assume that if someone has not done much today, it is because he is lazy; rather than assuming that he is tired or lacks the right resources.
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Milgram conducted several variants of the experiment to test the factors that might mediate conformity, including surveillance by the experimenter and proximity of the learner to the teacher. Several characteristics of the study participants, experimenter characteristics, attributes of the confederate learner, and features of the experimen-tal setting were manipulated in subsequent studies. In one variation, the learner asks for the shock, and not a single participant exceeds the constraints of the test manager.[1]
It is evident that the presence and the demands of legitimate authority define the boundaries of behavior for the participants to a considerable extent.
It should be noted that a number of complaints about the Milgram experiments—beyond ethical considera-tions—are possible and have been voiced. For example, a central component in all of the Milgram experiments is the incremental shock procedure. By using a graduated series of shocks it may be possible that subjects faced an innocuous beginning that elicited compliance before any of the frightening implications of the procedure were clear to the subject. That means that subjects were not presented with any sort of ‘‘qualitative breakpoint’’ at which they might shift from obedience to disobedience. This procedure is held by some as a fundamental component that should have been varied within the experimental context.[11]Additionally, the studies took place during the epoch of behavioralism in the field of psychology.
Consequently, the criticisms of a strictly behavioral approach are applicable to evaluating the Milgram experiments. In particular, Milgram’s focus on the appearance of authority and the ambiguity of notions of authority and obedience make drawing conclusions about human nature a substantial leap.[12] However, subjects protections put in place because of the original protocol now make it difficult to replicate or extend it in any way that would meaningfully test these complaints.
IMPLICATIONS FOR PUBLIC POLICY AND PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION
Efficient and legitimate institutions can be used for constructive or destructive purposes.[13]
During Adolf Eichmann’s testimony at the Nuremberg Trials, he claimed that he had nothing personal against the Jews or anyone else and stated that he found the concentration camps repugnant, but at the same time he described the meticulous organization of the deportation and extermination of several hundred thousand people.[2]
He contended that he had an obligation to perform the administrative duties as assigned by the Third Reich because had he refused to be obedient and responsive to the political authorities, then every soldier from any army would have the right to disobey any order considered
personally objectionable. In fact, the Holocaust would not have been possible without the obedience and conformity of the public service, implementing the policies of the Nazi regime efficiently through routine practices.[13] In essence, latent tendencies toward dehumanization exist in the routinization of any process.[13]
However, some degree of conformity is necessary for the adequate functioning of any society. It is difficult to conceive of how decisions could be made and enforced—
and actions implemented—without the recognition of some sort of authority. There is a reciprocal nature to the use and acknowledgment of authority. Public trust is essential to acquiring the compliance necessary to accomplishing civic purposes, and public servants are obligated to champion the public interest with empathy, respect, and consideration for future generations to obtain that trust.[14]
Additionally, hierarchy is an implicit component of any social regulatory regime because people vary in their readiness to obey and to extend trust. Useful hierarchical relationships require competence of the authority sys-tem.[1] For example, spectators in a concert hall do not respond to the instructions of the conductor. Authority is considered legitimate only by those who are incorporated into a system supporting that authority’s legitimacy. This point is crucial when it comes to understanding policy and administration because those who are not integrated into the system have no investment in maintaining it. In fact, the alienation of people from society’s institutions, processes, benefits, etc., undermines the legitimacy of the system, threatening the security and stability of the entire social group.
Conformity can also serve society in important ways.[1,15] For example, hierarchically organized groups are tremendously advantageous in addressing dangers or threats to security. Second, organizations provide stability and serve to facilitate cooperation among group members.
Third, contesting hierarchical organization can lead to greater levels of violence. However, resolving the questions that arise when individual values and the demands of authority conflict remains among the central philosophical problems. Determining the nature of man and the role of values in society is integral to developing adequate policies.
Studies of public policy and public administration can draw several insights from the Milgram experiments. For example, Milgram outlines several preconditions for obedience.[1]Some basic attributes—such as the authority structure of parental authority within the family structure—
directly conditions conformity. The larger institutional framework within which we all operate also solicits obedience. Even while institutional settings teach us that one’s opinion is possible and important, for smooth functioning obedience is necessary. Rewards and sanctions
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of various types in a range of settings are structured to elicit conformity. This is essential to easing relations and facilitating transactions between individuals and groups.
In addition, an assortment of policy changes can be attributed to the Milgram experiments. The study itself raised numerous ethical considerations. First, participants volunteered for a learning experiment, a choice that is itself not a test of obedience. Although deception was essential to testing the obedience to authority, participants were not afforded critical information that may have affected their decision to participate, and they were deceived as to the nature of the experiment (i.e., the shocks were not real, and the learner was a confederate).
Second, participants were filmed without their consent, with important implications for current practices about subjects’ consent. Third, the strength of the social pressure made it very unlikely that participants could actually discontinue their participation if they so chose. Fourth, many of the participants exhibited severe and persistent psychological reactions to participating in the experiment.
It is important to point out that the experiment itself exemplifies the principles under investigation. A study inquiring on the cruelty of humanity was continued through numerous trials despite the knowledge that there are detrimental effects on participants.
Eventually, the experiments were discontinued, and standards were developed for research that involved human subjects. The resulting policy requires research proposals to be reviewed by a human subjects committee.
Only research meeting the standards for the treatment of human subjects is approved by the committee and capable of being carried out. The authority of human subjects committees and the standards of research practice hold considerable legitimate authority, and there are very high degrees of conformity to those standards in the United States. The federal policy for the protection of human subjects is implemented by the Department of Health and Human Services and is integrated into the procedural process of every public and private organization conduct-ing research involvconduct-ing human subjects in the United States. Further, information about the federal human subjects research guidelines can be found at the United States Office for Human Research Protections (http://
ohrp.osophs.dhhs.gov/index.htm).
CONCLUSION
Because the results of Milgram’s research agenda are quite robust, having been replicated in numerous cultural contexts and over time (see Ref. [16]), we now have a fundamentally different understanding about how author-itarianism and conformity are not confined to particular social groups or ‘‘types’’ of people or even to types of situations. We have also discussed the strong implications for ethical behavior on the part of experimenters who
study authority relations in controlled settings, and recent innovations in the protection of human subjects in experimental and other research settings are broadly due to the innovations introduced—and the resulting find-ings—by Milgram. Readers seeking more information about the Milgram experiments should consult the works cited here, and general studies such as Ref. [17] but a most instructive introduction is located at the Milgram Reenactment (http://www.milgramreenactment.org/
pages/index.xml), an online resource about the experi-ments and their lasting contribution to our understanding of authority, in all its forms.
REFERENCES
1. Milgram, S. Liberating effects of group pressure. J. Pers.
Soc. Psychol. 1965a, 1, 127 – 134.
2. Adorno, T.W. The Authoritarian Personality; Harper: New York, 1950.
3. Studies in the Scope and Method of ‘The Authoritarian Personality’; Christie, R., Jahoda, M., Eds.; Free Press:
Glencoe, IL, 1954.
4. Scharrner, B. Father Land; A Study of Authoritarianism in the German Family; Columbia University Press: New York, 1948.
5. Shaver, J.P.; Hofmann, H.P.; Richards, H.E. The author-itarianism of American and German teacher education students. J. Soc. Psychol. 1971, 84 (2), 303 – 304.
6. Milgram, S. Behavioral study of obedience. J. Abnorm.
Soc. Psychol. 1963, 67, 371 – 378.
7. Milgram, S. Some conditions of obedience and disobedi-ence to authority. Human Relat. 1965b, 18, 57 – 75.
8. Milgram, S. Obedience to Authority: An Experimental View; Harper-Collins: New York, 1974.
9. Adapted and Abridged from the Stanley Milgram Papers. Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University Library.
10. Kelley, H.H. Attribution in social psychology. Neb. Symp.
Motiv. 1967, 15, 192 – 238.
11. Gilbert, S.J. Another look at the Milgram obedience studies: The role of the gradated series of shocks. Personal.
Soc. Psychol. Bull. 1981, 7 (4), 690 – 695.
12. Helm, C.; Morelli, M. Stanley Milgram and the obedience experiment: Authority, legitimacy, and human action.
Polit. Theory 1979, 7 (3), 321 – 345.
13. Adams, G.B.; Balfour, D.L. Unmasking Administrative Evil; Sage Publications: London, 1998; p. xxix.
14. Lewis, C.W. The Ethics Challenge in Public Service: A Problem-Solving Guide; Jossey-Bass: San Francisco, 1991.
15. Zimbardo, P.G.; Lieppe, M.R. The Psychology Of Attitude Change And Social Influence; Temple University Press:
Philadelphia, 1991.
16. Smith, P.B.; Bond, M.H. Social Psychology Across Cultures: Analysis and Perspectives; Allyn and Bacon:
Boston, MA, 1994.
17. Miller, A.G. The Obedience Experiments: A Case Study of Controversy in Social Science; Praeger: New York, 1986.
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