User:ScholarBob/sandbox
The phenomenon of secrecy's mental barriers
[edit]The phenomenon of secrecy's mental barriers is an observation of erecting imaginable walls, which help "the ones in the know" to form an aura of power. Its' presence is strongly felt in political actions of autocrats.
Definition of the term: Mental barriers
[edit]Mental barriers are a well known theory in the field of psychology, but it was already used to describe phenomenons arising in the field of secrecy.
The word: mental should be read as imaginable or only existing in the minds of people. The mental aspect of this phenomenon is very important, because only through lying, deceiving or only telling half-truths, can one achieve the awaited effect.
The barriers should be seen as the processes an individual uses to conceal information, which he wishes to hide. Economically we can say that the more one puts into concealing an information, the more valuable it will seem. Therefore, he could await higher prices for giving it away.
Meaning
[edit]Secrets were not always only gossips, in history, they were used as an important tactical tool. Through secrets sharing, people of different social statuses could meet while they normally would not be able to. Also the leader could use secrets to create a cult of his personality people would worship.
According to how much someone is able to invest into hiding his information, the higher will be the price one will be willing to pay for them. One can also start to accept information after he gets in the leading position, because the holding of important secrets can solely change the persons' social level.
Value of a secret
[edit]The value of a secret can be fluctuant. There are many factors, which helps us to create and then work with secrets. The basic principles are:
- The quantity of secrets one holds
- The quality of secrets one holds
- The means used by an individual to conceal secrets
- The power of a group one can join if he exchanges secrets
The last point is very important given that one of the principles of existence for Social group can be the knowledge of given truths or believes, which can be secret.
Power though secrecy
[edit]The theory of the usage of secrecy as a way to gain power over other individuals has already been studied in the view of both religions and tyrannies. The theories mostly work with the ideas of a sole leader who is omniscient and holds all the truths.
The Nobel prize laureate Canetti argues that, state leaders would form an dark aura around them, which gave their subjects the felling of being under his control.[1]
In religious groups, secrets are used to form a very similar aura, it is not making an individual stronger, however it is making an unknown creature or idea god-like. Process for this is exercising procedures or writing down rules, which the people who believe, need to follow.[2]
Historical background
[edit]People can come across using secrets as a tactical tools already when looking at the politics of Italian states in 14th century. [3]
Then the leaders already knew, that knowledge could be used as a capital. They used mental barriers to withhold certain information from their subjects, but they also gave them the chance to give their state their information through denunciations.
Their subjects then could get the feeling of inclusiveness in the strongest group, which is an basic principle of holding secrets.[4] Nevertheless, the feeling of being in group was only imaginary, because the citizens were only given a part of the whole truth.
As the history went on, the field of secrecy evolved and it became an option for countries to control information and the flow in information. The more it progressed the closer it got to the inner politics of the state itself. Both the democratic and autocratic countries used it because of the variability of importance it could have in the state.[5]
20th century
[edit]To explain the use of secrecy in 20th century, the best example is USSR. Their leaders used fake information and the aura of obscurity to put their citizens in order. The cult of Stalin's cult of personality is one of the best examples. He used his secret agents to gather information from common people, which helped them to give people a feeling of inclusiveness that was already mentioned. This gathering was a modern form of denunciations and together with withholding secret information, they formed the aura around the elites.
The situation in USSR is different in few principles, because a strong feeling of Stockholm syndrome can be observed when studying its' society.[6] Nevertheless, the strongest effect on people's view of their leaders was built up by the secrets which enveloped everyday life of citizens.[7]
Reference
[edit]- ^ Canetti, Crowds and Power, pp. 290–7. See also Jana Costas and Christopher Grey, Secrecy at Work: The Hidden Architecture of Organizational Life (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2016), pp. 21–2
- ^ DULIN, J., COLEMAN,S.,Secrecy, Religion, and the Ethics of Discernment,Pages 411-424,https://doi.org/10.1080/00141844.2020.1765831,
- ^ IORDANOU, Ioanna, Venice’s Secret service, Organizing Intelligence in the Renaissance, Londýn: OXFORD University press,2019, 278s. ISBN: 978-0-19-879131-7
- ^ Simmel, George. “The Sociology of Secrecy and of Secret Societies.” American Journal of Sociology, vol. 11, no. 4, 1906, pp. 441–98. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2762562. Accessed 30 Mar. 2023.
- ^ Mokrosinska, Dorota. “DEMOCRATIC AUTHORITY AND STATE SECRECY.” Public Affairs Quarterly, vol. 33, no. 1, 2019, pp. 1–20. JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/26910007. Accessed 30 Mar. 2023.
- ^ Jean, K. (no date) Why do people follow tyrants?, Psychology Today. Sussex Publishers. Available at: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/culture-shrink/201702/why-do-people-follow-tyrants (Accessed: March 30, 2023).
- ^ PILEVSKY,P.,Captive Continent: The Stockholm Syndrome in European-Soviet Relations,Praeger, 1989,145,9780275930646