Education, Discipline, and Morale
The functional direction of "education" has waxed and waned throughout history - it has been an activity to keep children busy while their parents were working, or a method to expand the mind, or a way to learn practical skills. It has not been a continuum of evolution from one form to another, but has been used for various purposes at various times.
The totalitarian perspective on education is covalent: if education teaches people ideas that would cause them to resist control, it is reviled; if it teaches people to be compliant to the totalitarian's will, then it is embraced. This is much in the way that religious groups distribute books that support their world-view and burn books that question it.
Even though a totalitarian is supportive of education that spreads his ideology, it remains a dangerous thing when the totalitarian is inconsistent. His desire is to maintain their loyalty to the whim of the moment, and he doesn't care to be reminded or criticized when what he wants of his subjects today is different from and incompatible with what he demanded of them the day before.
The totalitarian approach to education focuses on teaching dependency and compliance - the student who feels that he is incapable of understanding and must depend on others to interpret has been "well educated" in such a system. Education may teach how to perform basic tasks, but not when - much in the way that a soldier is trained to fire a rifle, but is dependent on his superiors to tell him whom to shoot.
Another common feature of the totalitarian approach is to encourage obsequiousness and a desire to be rewarded. The dull student who seeks to ingratiate himself to the teacher is a pathetic character in an individualistic society, but a perfect role model in a totalitarian one. Rewards are given for being obedient and conforming, punishments for thinking and acting independently, to instill the basic character traits or the loyal and subservient follower.
There's a bit about pseudo-intellectualism: the totalitarian admires the person who can memorize and repeat quotes, not one that can understand them, and especially not the mind that is capable of uttering something quotable. To understand something requires asking questions and trying to make sense - the compliant subject must never ask questions and must accept and obey even when he does not see the sense in doing so.
Morale vs. Discipline
The term "morale" pertains to more than a superficially cheerful attitude; it is a matter of self-confidence and a feeling of empowerment and capability to achieve specific outcomes. But it is not entirely internal to the individual: there must be confidence and trust among members of a group as a whole, including peers, subordinates, and superiors. Morale is usually based on freedom - in that a person feels empowered when they pursue a goal of their own choosing. No-one compelled to do something against their own will is driven by confidence in their ability to succeed, but only by the fear of the consequences of failure.
Even if someone else has given them orders, it is the choice to follow those orders that is the basis of morale. In childhood, all of our goals in life are given us by others - parents, educators, and other authority figures - and the pride we fell in ourselves is in our ability to achieve what others have demanded. As an individual matures, he should begin making goals for himself. "Should" because even in free cultures some people never evolve past the childhood state and constantly are in need of others to direct them even in their adulthood.
Discipline is a sign of the failure of leadership to develop morale. Those who cannot give their subordinates the self-confidence to attempt a task and the self-discipline to see it to completion must stand watch and instead offer punishment for failure rather than reward for success. Discipline is seen as a necessity when dealing with the ignorant and immature, but often becomes the default mode of authorities - particularly when the goals they set for others are flawed.
It is sometimes suggested that discipline is necessary as a teaching method - until a person develops self-confidence in their ability to succeed, they mist be threatened with punishment for failure. However, leaders who take this approach very seldom succeed at building morale and instead must constantly rely upon discipline - it seems the easier path for a leader to take in the short term.
It is for this reason that people who exist under conditions of oppression, whether subjects of a totalitarian government or slaves in the literal sense, remain infantilized: they are never given the opportunity to choose for themselves, and cease even to make an effort to do anything but comply with the order of the day. But at the same time, we can also find those subjects of totalitarian systems who eventually come to choose to support their oppressors - it is the only choice they have, and deceive themselves into believing that they have made of their own free will. Just as there are children who are fiercely loyal to abusive parents, so are there soldiers who are fiercely loyal to totalitarian regimes.
Morale and Brainwashing
It is natural for a person to reciprocate: to protect and care for others (people or institutions) that protect and care for their members. Conversely, it is unnatural for a person to protect and care for others who are hostile and harmful to them. Individuals and institutions who wish to take advantages of others must therefore trick their victims into believing that they are being benefitted by the relationship. In the short term, the tricks of a con artist are enough to swindle a person into taking action - but their loyalty turns to resentment when they discover they have been duped. In the long term, a totalitarian must swindle a person into acting as well as convincing them to ignore the negative consequences - and this requires brainwashing.
In a fundamental sense, brainwashing is an assault on the faculty of perception. The individual is conditioned to ignore or reinterpret the things that they witness so that the feeling of resentment to their exploiter does not arise, as it would if the individual acknowledged the negative consequences. The victim must ignore things that make him miserable - and more, he must believe that these things cause him to be happy, or that they are necessary to obtain other benefits that outweigh his sacrifices.
From the perspective of a group, morale refers to the degree to which the members are willing to undertake personal effort to achieve the group's objectives. From the perspective of the leader, it refers to their willingness to work to achieve his objectives - whether they are his goals for the group or a personal agenda, and quite often a combination of the two.
In democratic western cultures, there is a conflict between self-interest and the interest of the collective, and the individual considers participation to be a transaction in which what he gives to the group is compensated with what he receives in return. In the totalitarian state, there is no such conflict: individuals are expected to eschew all self-interest and give complete loyalty to the party and its leaders, who owe nothing to the individual.
The author looks to the kamikaze pilots of Japan as the epitome of the totalitarian citizen, whose loyalty involved complete self-sacrifice for the emperor. Eastern cultures are generally more collectivistic than western ones, but this took self-sacrifice to the ultimate extreme. (EN: Suicide is a tricky topic. It is not always a sacrifice, but is sometimes an exchange. A religious martyr sacrifices his life for a reward he expects to receive in the afterlife. Others are willing to die for the sake of their families. Still others feel that the fame they will get from the circumstances of their death is worth dying for. Others feel that life has no value, and that a meaningful or dignified death is preferable to an unacceptable existence.)
Leadership is critical to creating morale, persuading individuals to accept that achieving the goals of the group are aligned with their self-interest. To his followers, the leader is the embodiment of the organization to which they are expected to give their loyalty. The top leader of the organization is the personification of the organization itself - his confidence inspires the confidence of others. The leader with whom followers interact most often is also a personification, but not as strong: when the front-line leader fails it is his personal failure, not that of the organization. In that sense, the front-line leader is a scapegoat for the organizational leader's failure and misconduct.
The same can be said of the members of a group: they are scapegoats for the party's failure. In some instances, they can be labeled and punished as traitors when the group fails, even though they personally did nothing wrong. Or they may be kept as the "omega" members of the tribe, low-ranking, clownish, and subservient, a handy scapegoat to be used repeatedly. It is often understood that the "black sheep" is being scapegoated - peers will privately express sympathy for the injustice he suffers, but they recognize the need for a scapegoat and will not alienate him, even if it is only for fear that it they get rid of the scapegoat, they may be used to replace him.
There is also the notion that morale is contagious. The individual adopts the attitudes and emotions of his peers, such that a doubtful person becomes confident when surrounded by others who project confidence (and the confident become doubtful when surrounded by those who doubt).
To conclude, the author offers up lists of things that boost morale and things that undermine it ...
- Morale is improved by voluntary participation, empowerment, democratic leadership, clear goals and plans, success and progress, assistance, open communication, consistency and integrity, collaborative spirit, belonging and acceptance, just rewards, and being taken care of by others.
- Morale is degraded by involuntary participation, powerlessness, unclear goals and plans, failure and setbacks, unsanitary and unhealthy conditions, random and arbitrary leadership, unjust punishment and reward, poor communication, lack of consistency and integrity, draconian leadership, autocratic leadership, competition among peers, no sense of social unity, feelings of unimportance or estrangement.
The Breaking Point
There is among leaders an unrealistic expectation that loyalty is instant, permanent, and unwavering - and it is generally true that once a person has fallen into a pattern of behavior (such as "being loyal") they tend to follow it even when circumstances change. But when a person's needs and interests are not being served by their behavior, they will change it. This often seems to be a sudden and dramatic "snap" - whether there is a single outrage or a slow accumulation of minor ones that causes them to recognize that their loyalty is misplaced.
The author recounts a few stories of patients he treated during the second world war - particularly battle-hardened veteran soldiers who seemed suddenly to lose their nerve and panic. When a single, dramatic incident breaks someone it is fairly easy to diagnose. But when a person is worn down over a long period of time, there is not a single incident to pinpoint as the cause, and the therapist is often confused and quite powerless to diagnose and treat the patient. There is not a clear formula for what causes a man to break. While it is generally accepted that all men can be broken, it has been seen that some are more resilient - they stand up to stress and bounce back quickly - but even they will eventually reach their point and, as noted, it's much more difficult to understand.
In this sense, the sudden loss of loyalty may be seen as a kind of mental breakdown: it is a sudden and dramatic departure from a previous way of thinking and acting. In time, the individual may be restored - whether they regain their loyalty to their former leader or attach themselves to a new one - but until then the individual is often panicked and random. What he once believed is no longer true, and he does not know what he should regard as truth.
Both tactic are used in brainwashing. Some individuals can be broken and converted quickly by means of terrorism and torture. Others resist the initial attempt, even when it is extreme, but can be broken and converted more slowly by placing them in facilities that wear them down slowly and over time. The latter are often more effectively and permanently converted than the former (EN: seems to me that it is a factor of the individual: a person whose loyalty is weak is easily subjugated, but their loyalty remains weak and they can just as easily be turned back.)
It's also suggested that all training is brainwashing. When new recruits are brought into an army, they are put through a long and rigorous training program to break down their former loyalties (to self and family) and establish a sense of loyalty to the army. When they are manipulated into supporting a regime we support, we say that they are being "educated" or "trained." When they are manipulated into supporting one we do not support, we say that they are being "brainwashed."
Finally, it's noted that the key to gauging loyalty is to ask people what they expect. If they expect positive outcomes, their loyalty is strong. If their expectations are neutral, their loyalty is weak. If their expectations are negative, they are nearing the breaking point and ready to be turned. From this, it is clear that creating loyalty is simply a matter of giving people positive expectations for what will occur if they support the cause and follow orders. It is making, then keeping, a promise that they will get something for themselves of equal or greater value - just like any commercial transaction.