Chris
Matthews, the MSNBC political commentator, is currently the subject
of a number of interviews as he is promoting his new book, Tip and
the Gipper: When Politics Worked. The focus of the book is the
relationship between President Ronald Reagan and Speaker of the House
Tip O'Neill. The common knowledge of how these two leaders
interacted is that even though they seemed to agree on little, they
were able to work out compromises, and during their years as
president and speaker quite a bit was accomplished. One of the
points Mr. Matthews makes about Reagan is that Reagan was feared and
that fear helped him get things done, especially in foreign
relations, particularly in dealing with the Soviet Union. The event
that conveyed the idea that Reagan was not to be taken advantage of
was his breakup of the PATCO1
strike in 1981. According to Matthews, this policy of Reagan's sent
a message around the world in that the President not only ended the
strike, but also prohibited the air controllers who refused to return
to work from ever working for the federal government again. I do
know that all of organized labor has suffered greatly as a result of
that strike because the legitimacy of labor's aims and tactics has
been seriously questioned by the American public.
What
exactly is at stake in situations when a leader or some other person
of power is trying to engender fear? In political terms, fear is an
emotional response to a threatened use of coercive power. Coercive
power occurs when one party gets another party to do something it
would not ordinarily do in order to avoid a punishment – that is,
being deprived of something the second party wants or needs. Usually
the emotion of fear is felt as the affected party – the party whose
behavior is being altered – anticipates or realizes the potential
of the impending punishment. The level of fear corresponds to the
perceived costs inflicted by the punishment. A “slap on the wrist”
does not generate much fear, but a heavy fine or a long prison
sentence or a savage beating would probably cause a great deal of
fear. Punishments come in many forms. There can be physical pain,
financial ruin, lost love, or frustrated ambitions – just to name a
few. Sometimes the onslaught of punishment might reduce fear and
cause a person to feel other emotions such as apathy or the desire
for revenge. It might incite angered responses or despondency or for
some, fear might increase.
It
doesn't take much in life to figure out that fear is a potent emotion
and a powerful weapon for those who can engender it. Matthews cites
the political thinker and writer, Nicole Machiavelli, who wrote in
the Prince: princes should strive to be loved and
feared, but if they have to choose, they should choose being feared
over being loved. Reagan was feared and loved. Whether he was
feared more than loved is subject to historical interpretation, but
when the chips were down, I agree that he was more feared than loved.
But can a leader be feared too much? Is it one of those weapons
that can be overused? Does its overuse cause negative consequences
that might, in the long term, be problematic for the leader who is
guilty of such an excess?
Alan
Greenspan, in an interview on CNBC, stated that in terms of financial
matters, fear is a much stronger emotion than greed or optimism. The
former Federal Reserve chairman said you can see this in the course
of a financial “bubble.” A bubble, which reflects either
optimism or greed – perhaps both – grows slowly over time. The
growth period can last a year or more. But once the bubble bursts –
for whatever reason – the decline in asset values falls
precipitously and of course this reflects fear. So, according to
Greenspan, you can measure the relative strengths of these emotions
as they are expressed by the behavior of investors and he estimated
that fear was at least four times stronger than greed or optimism.
So, one can conclude, at least in relation to these other two
emotions, fear is quite strong and quite memorable.
I
didn't live during the Great Depression, but people my age were
brought up by people who did. A common notion among us war babies
and baby boomers as we reflect about our parents is that the effect
of living through the Depression was long lasting and the one theme
our parents would repeat when speaking of those times was the fear
that they experienced during those years, the fear of not knowing
what the future held. And we also now can compare their behavior
patterns concerning money – their proclivity to count every penny –
to our children and their behavior patterns. We see shows such as
House Hunters on HGTV where young couples look for housing and
demand every new feature not in the future, but right now. If you
are like me, you find yourself asking what mom or dad would think if
they saw these “spoiled” people on TV.
If
we can all agree that fear is a potent force, then what are the
legitimate uses of it and what constitutes going over the top? Does
federalist thinking have anything to add to these concerns? Let me
share what I believe to be the case concerning fear. Inciting fear
is not immoral per se. Surely an effort to cause mental or
untold harm by inciting fear would be immoral, but as a political
strategy that is used only to attain particular aims, then it would
seem the effects would be limited. But even in these more limited
cases, one needs to look at any deliberate use of it by certain
criteria. My bias for federalist thinking suggests to me that
certain considerations should be taken into account even in these
more limited cases in order that its practice be moral and, in the
long term, effective.
In
order to be moral, a leader or person of power who tries to instill
fear must be seeking a legitimate goal. That is, the goal needs to
either help procure the society's survival or advance that society
in attaining some aim or goal it sets for itself. This I have
summarily called the value of societal welfare or, to use
constitutional language, an attempt to make a more perfect union.
No, this is not an argument that claims the ends justify the means
because the means is not causing real harm; it is merely causing a
discomfort that one cannot totally avoid in life. Fear springs from
too many sources to count; it is just a condition of life. And if
used legitimately, fear, whether emanating from another person's
threat or from the factors of a situation, serves to motivate
functional behavior on our parts. I lived in Miami, Florida in 1992
and watched the impending hurricane, Andrew, making its way toward my
home. The fear I felt caused me to take prudent steps in trying to
ameliorate the damage of the storm. I might have been hampered by
ignorance, but not by the level of fear the news reports engendered.
Fear can be a good thing.
If
a strategy to engender fear is not legitimate in terms of its aims –
and therefore not moral – then to be effective, the perpetrator
needs to at least be able to give reasons that are accepted as
legitimate by sufficient numbers of people. Reagan stressed in the
PATCO case, for example, that the workers had broken their contracts
and therefore he was within his legitimate power to take the actions
he did. Not only does the goal need to be legitimate, but the
punishment needs to be within the bounds of the reciprocity
principle. That is, it can't overkill or stretch significantly
beyond the harm that is being addressed by the policy. The air
traffic controllers were about to cripple airline passenger service
back in 1981, therefore devastating the business and personal travel
plans of the American people. This action would have seriously
affected millions of people and cost the economy significant amounts
of money. Reagan was able to sell the idea that this was
unacceptable and that it offended the principle that government could
not stop providing an essential service – sort of like soldiers
going on strike. Therefore, it was reasonable to fire the
controllers in order to stop their ability to, in effect, extort the
American people. Reagan wouldn't hear of such a thing and was able
to convince the American public that his decision was, in effect,
being forced on him. It is no secret that Reagan was not friendly to
unions, despite the fact that he had previously been president of an
actors' union, and that the unions in general were not supportive of
Reagan. Ironically, PATCO was one of only two unions who had
supported him in his election campaign. Whether his actions were
moral or not I will leave to you to decide. What the case does
demonstrate is what a leader must do and say when attempting to evoke
fear in a segment of a population and at the top of that list is the
ability to sell both the legitimacy of that threat and its
proportionality.
Equal
to the consideration of not being too harsh, those who are attempting
to incite fear have to make sure that the threatened punishment is
harsh enough – it surely was in the PATCO case. It has to inflict
significant pain. If not, the party at which the strategy is aimed
will lose respect for the leader and might encourage even more
egregious behavior. In settling on the specific threat, one needs to
remember that pain has a relative dimension. What is painful for one
might be simply an inconvenience to another or not painful at all.
Or it can be something avoided or neglected. He who decides to
engender fear needs to know his/her target and other practical
elements surrounding the conditions in which the threat is being
extended. And, as far as observers are concerned, the threat needs
to be transferable to their imagination – they have to feel, boy,
I'm glad I'm not the one being threatened.
Studying
cases in which fear is a factor can be very telling as to the nature
of politics. For example, I think that in the recent standoff
between the Tea Party Republicans and the Democrats in Congress, the
Tea Party members did not instill enough fear in Democrats to be able
to get their way. It wasn't that the potential punishment wasn't
severe enough, but rather that it lacked believability. The target
couldn't imagine the instigators were willing to share in the mutual
pain a default to the debt limit would cause or that those who could
stop this eventuality would not stop it. The result is that the Tea
Party members have lost respect in the eyes of their opponents either
in government or among many citizens.
While
the fear factor did not influence enough controllers in the PATCO
strike – they continued the strike and landed up losing their jobs
– Reagan established his ability to inflict punishment in such a
way that people believed he could and would do so in the future if
the stakes were high enough. While not all of us agree that
President Reagan was the best for this nation, we all must agree he
was able to garner our respect.
1Professional
Air Traffic Controllers Organization – the labor union of the air
traffic controllers
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