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    Conformity: The Power of Social Influences
    Conformity: The Power of Social Influences
    Conformity: The Power of Social Influences
    Audiobook5 hours

    Conformity: The Power of Social Influences

    Written by Cass R. Sunstein

    Narrated by Jonathan Yen

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    About this audiobook

    We live in an era of tribalism, polarization, and intense social division-separating people along lines of religion, political conviction, race, ethnicity, and sometimes gender. How did this happen? In Conformity, Cass R. Sunstein argues that the key to making sense of living in this fractured world lies in understanding the idea of conformity-what it is and how it works-as well as the countervailing force of dissent.

    Lacking information of our own and seeking the good opinion of others, we often follow the crowd, but Sunstein shows that when individuals suppress their own instincts about what is true and what is right, it can lead to significant social harm. While dissenters tend to be seen as selfish individualists, dissent is actually an important means of correcting the natural human tendency toward conformity and has enormous social benefits in reducing extremism, encouraging critical thinking, and protecting freedom itself.

    Sunstein concludes that while much of the time it is in the individual's interest to follow the crowd, it is in the social interest for individuals to say and do what they think is best. A well-functioning democracy depends on it.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTantor Media, Inc
    Release dateMay 28, 2019
    ISBN9781541401204
    Author

    Cass R. Sunstein

    Cass R. Sunstein is the nation’s most-cited legal scholar who, for the past fifteen years, has been at the forefront of behavioral economics. From 2009 to 2012, he served as the administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. Since that time, he has served in the US government in multiple capacities and worked with the United Nations and the World Health Organization, where he chaired the Technical Advisory Group on Behavioral Insights and Sciences for Health during the COVID-19 pandemic. He is the Robert Walmsley University Professor at Harvard Law School. His book Nudge, coauthored with Richard Thaler, was a national bestseller. In 2018, he was the recipient of the Holberg Prize from the government of Norway, sometimes described as equivalent of the Nobel Prize for law and the humanities. He lives in Boston and Washington, DC, with his wife, children, and labrador retrievers.

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    Reviews for Conformity

    3/5

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    • 1/5
      Describing the same old social experiments and then waffling about diversity.
    • 3/5
      Conformity: The Power of Social Influenceby Cass R. Sunstein due 5-28-2019 NYU Press 3.7 / 5.0This book explains to us the influences and influencing factors that increase or decrease our incentive to conform. It also explains how informational and reputational influences produce conformity, cascades and polarization, and the importance of institutions to promote the disclosure of private views, not just popular views, to make an educated and sound decision whose effects apply to everyone.Compelling and informing, I enjoyed reading this study of conformity and hope it will be widely read. It makes valid and important points, especially in today´s world.Thanks to the editor for sending this e-book ARC for review. #netgalley #Conformity
    • 3/5
      Cass Sunstein discovers sheepleThe presence of people colors discussion and decisions. It is a factor that can change the status of anything. In Conformity, Cass Sunstein explores a lot of the risks of being swayed for the wrong reasons.Conformity comes in flavors like cascades and polarization. The cascade effect occurs when others have made their choice. Subconscious pressure makes the last person agree. And this cascade effect can spread everywhere, through whole populations, last forever, and become entrenched in the culture or even in law. This is how we get bad laws.On the other hand, a strong, confident voice going the other way can induce everyone else to change their position, because they think s/he knows better. No matter which way you look, people like to conform to something. And in the absence of their own knowledge, a seeming authority is an acceptable substitute. This how we get bad laws.Then on the third hand, people like to hide. They don’t like to stand out, to risk ridicule or their reputation. No one wants trouble or embarrassment or humiliation. They don’t like it known they were wrong. Since they’re not about to turn the tide, they go with the majority. This is how we get bad laws.We’ve all probably been there: rather than vote against, we’d prefer to be part of the team, not the lone exception, not the wacko, not someone to avoid in the hallway. We see it in Congress, where our electeds can be afraid to vote their conscience in order to avoid the criticism and provide future opponents with ammunition. After all, their votes have been recorded.This leads directly to more extreme decisions (group polarization), as there is no one (known in social science circles a whistleblower) willing to bring the debate back to the center.One of Sunstein’s more interesting examples is binge drinking, which students think is far more widespread than it is. Told the real figures, fewer binge. Nothing else has changed, but the knowledge they are in a disfavored minority is sufficient to change their behavior.The great problem with cascades of conformity, as Sunstein points out numerous times, is that they are not reliable. They may or may not occur. When you most expect them, nothing might happen. Except with political parties.Sunstein focuses on appellate court judges for their confirmation of these theories. In an examination of cases involving the EPA, three judge panels voted more than three quarters of the time against the EPA if all three were Republicans. They adjudicated for the EPA if they were all Democrats. On split panels, the decisions drifted down toward the 50% level. Unanimity leads to extremism, he says. Dissent works wonders. Dissent promotes balance.But I think Sunstein drew the wrong conclusion. It’s not that we have to be careful about conformity situations, it’s that the two party system is anti-democratic and anti-justice. None of those EPA decisions was evaluated for its merits. It wasn’t necessary. It was simply a question of political ideology. That is clearly wrong in a system of blind justice, and the fault is not with conformity but with Democrats and Republicans. They should not bring their party memberships to work, especially if we know how conformity works.Knowing how conformity twists situations, we should seek to isolate as much as we can from the ill effects - of the two party system.David Wineberg