STUDIES IN PREJUDICE MAX HORKHEIMER H. FLOWERMAN EDITED BY AND SAMUEL THE AUTHORITARIAN PERSONALITY By T. JV. Adorno, Else Frenkel-Brunswik, Daniel]. Le,vinson and R. Nevitt Sanford DYNAMICS A PSYCHOLOGICAL AND OF PREJUDICE SOCIOLOGICAL STUDY OF VETERANS by Bmno Bettelheirn and Morris Janowitz ANTI-SEMITISM AND ECONOMICAL DISORDER A PSYCHOANALYTIC INTERPRETATION by Nathan W. A ckerman and Marie ]ahoda REHEARSAL FOR DESTRUCTION A STUDY OF POLITICAL ANTI-SEMITISM IN IMPERIAL GERMANY by Paul W. Massing PROPHETS OF DECEIT A STUDY OF THE TECHNIQUES OJ.< THE A..'vlERICAN AGITATOR by Leo Lowentbal and Norbert Guterman Other Volumes in Preparation SPONSORED BY THE AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE SOCIAL STUDIES SERIES: PUBLICATION NO. III FOREWORD TO STUDIES IN PREJUDICE At this moment in world history anti-Semitism is not manifesting itself with the full and violent destructiveness of which we know it to be capable. Even a social disease has its periods of quiescence during which the social scientists, like the biologist or the physician, can study it in the search for more effective ways to prevent or reduce the virulence of the next outbreak. Today the world scarcely remembers the mechanized persecution and extermination of millions of human beings only a short span of years away in what was once regarded as the citadel of Western civilization. Yet the conscience of many men was aroused. How could it be, they asked each other, that in a culture of law, order, and reason, there should have survived the irrational remnants of ancient racial and religious hatreds? How could they explain the willingness of great masses of people to tolerate the mass extermination of their fellow citizens? What tissues in the life of our modern society remain cancerous, and despite our assumed enlightenment show the incongruous atavism of ancient peoples? And what within the individual organism responds to certain stimuli in our culture with attitudes and acts of destructive aggression? But an aroused conscience is not enough if it does not stimulate a systematic search for an answer. Mankind has paid too dearly for its naive faith in the automatic effect of the mere passage of time; incantations have really never dispelled storms, disaster, pestilence, disease or other evils; nor does he who torments another cease his torture out of sheer boredom with his victim. Prejudice is one of the problems of our times for which everyone has a theory but no one an answer. Every man, in a sense, believes that he is his own social scientist, for social science is the stuff of everyday living. The progress of science can perhaps be charted by the advances that scientists have made over commonsense notions of phenomena. In an effort to advance beyond mere commonsense approaches to problems of intergroup conflict, the American Jewish Committee in May, 1944, invited a group of American scholars of various backgrounds and disciplines to a two-day conference on religious and racial prejudice. At this meeting, a research program was outlined which would enlist scientific method in the cause of seeking solutions to this crucial problem. Two levels of research were recommended. One was more limited in scope and geared to the recurring problems faced by educational agencies; e.g., the study of public reaction to selected current v Vl FORE"WORD TO STUDIES IN PREJUDICE events, and the evaluation of various techniques and methods such as those involved in mass media of communication as they impinge upon intergroup relationships. The other level suggested was one of basic research, basic in that it should result eventually in additions to organized knowledge in this field. The first level frequently consists of a large number of small studies, limited in scope and focused sharply on a given issue. In practice, we have found that the "goodness" of our smaller studies was proportional to our ingenuity in so devising them that they, too, could contribute basically to knowledge. The chief difference between the two levels of research-some­ times loosely called "short-range" and "long-range" research-seems largely to be due to the immediacy of implementation of findings as program-related or unrelated, rather than to differences in methodology, skills and tech­ niques. On both levels, it is necessary to pursue an interdisciplinary approach to research problems. . To further research on both levels, the American Jewish Committee estab­ lished a Department of Scientific Research, headed in turn by each of us. The department saw its responsibility not only in itself initiating fundamental studies in the phenomenon of prejudice, but aL'io in helping to stimulate new studies. The present series of volumes represent.� the first fruits of this effort. In a sense, the initial five volumes constitute one unit, an integrated whole, each part of which illuminates one or another facet of the phenomenon we call prejudice. Three· of the books deal with those elements in the personal­ ity of modem man that predispose him to reactions of hostility to racial and religious groups. They attempt answers to the question: What is there in the psychology of the individual that renders him "prejudiced" or "un­ prejudiced," that makes him more or less likely to respond favorably to the agitation of a Goebbels or a Gerald K. Smith? The volume on thoritarian Personality Tbe Au­ by Adorno, Frenkel-Brunswik, Levinson and San­ ford, based upon a combination of research techniques, suggests one answer. It demonstrates that there is a close correlation betw�en a number of deep­ rooted personality traits, and overt prejudice. The stUdy h45 also succeeded in producing an instrument for measuring these traits among various strata of the population. Within a more limited range of inquiry, the same question was asked with respect to two specific groups. The study on Dynamics of Prejudice by Bettelheim and Janowitz, considers the connection between personality traits and prejudice among war veterans. Here the investigators were able to examine the impact of the war experience, with its complex anxieties and tensions, as an added factor of major significance affecting tens of millions of people. Anti-Semitism and Emotional Disorder by Ackerman and Jahoda, is based upon case histories of a numbe-r of individuals, from different walks of life, who have received intensive psychotherapy. The special sig- FOREWORD TO STUDIES IN PREJUDICE Vll nificance of this study lies precisely in the analytical source of the material, in the availability of a body of evidence dealing with phenomena beneath the realm of the conscious and the rational, and illuminating the correlation established in more general terms in the basic investigation of the authoritarian personality. The other important factor in prejudice is of course the social situation itself, i.e., the external stimuli to 'vhich the predispositions within the individual have reacted and continue to react. Nazi Germany is the vivid example of the effect of the social situation, and it is to the understanding of the roots of Nazi anti-Semitism and thence to the present task of democratic reorientation in Germany that Rehearsal for Destruction by Massing is directed. As mediator between the world and the individual psyche, the agitator molds already existing prejudices and tendencies into overt doctrines and ultimately into overt action. In the Propbets of Deceit by Lowenthal and Guterman the role of the agitator is studied. The agitator's technique of persuasion, the mechanism of mediation that translates inchoate feeling into specific belief and action make up the theme of that volume. It may strike the reader that "\Ve have placed undue stress upon the personal and the psycholog ical rather than upon the social aspect of prejudice. This is not due to a personal preference for psychological analysis nor to a failure to sec that the cause of irrational hostility is in the la!>'t instance to be found in social frustration and injustice. Our aim is not merely to describe prejudice but to explain it in order to help in its eradication. That is the challenge we would meet. Eradication means re-education, scientifically planned on the basis of understanding scientifically arrived at. And education in a strict sense is by its nature personal and psychological. Once we understand, for example, how the war experience may in some cases have strengthened-personality traits predisposed to group hatred, the educational remedies may follow logically. Similarly, to expose the psychological tricks in the arsenal of the agitator may help to immunize his prospective victims against them. Since the completion of these studies the Department of Scientific Research of the American Jewish Committee has moved ahead into areas of research in which the unit of study is the group, the institution, the community rather than the individual. Fortified by a better knowledge of individual dynamics, we arc now concerned with achieving a better understanding of group dynamics. For we recognize that the indiv:idual in vacuo is but an artifact; even in the present series of studies, although essentially psychological in nature, it has been necessary to explain individual behavior in terms of social antecedents and concomitants. The second stage of our research is thus focused upon problems of group pressures and the sociological determinants of roles in given social situations. We seek answers to such ques- Vlll FOREWORD TO STUDIES IN PREJUDICE tions as: vVhy does an individual behave in a "tolerant" manner in one situation and in a "bigoted" manner in another situation? To what extent may certain forms of intergroup conflict, which appear on the surface to be based upon ethnic difference, be based upon other factors, using ethnic · difference as content? ' The authors of the volumes and the many colleagues upon whose experi­ ence and assistance they have been able to draw have widely differing pro­ fessional interests. This is immediately reflected in the various techniques they have used, even in the way they write. Some of the books are more technical, others more "readable." We have not sought uniformity. A search for the truth conducted in accordance with the best techniques of the contemporary social sciences was our sole aim. Yet through all this diversity of method and technique a significant measure of agreement has been achieved. The problem requires a much more extensive and much more sustained effort than any single institution, or any small group such as ours, could hope to put forth. It was our hope that whatever projects we could undertake would not only be contributions in themselves, but would also serve to stimulate active interest in continued study by other scholars. \Vith deep satisfaction we have watched the steady increase in scientific publications in this field in the past few years. We believe that any study that bears upon this central theme, if carried out in a truly scientific spirit, cannot help but bring us closer to the theoretical, and ultimately to the practical, solution of the problem of reducing intergroup prejudice and hatred. This foreword to Studies in Prejudice ·would not be complete without a tribute to the vision and leadership of Dr. John Sla\vson,\Rxecutive Vice­ President of the American Jewish Committee, who was responsible for call­ ing the conference of scholars and for establishing the Department of Scientific Research. Both editors owe Dr. Slawson a debt of gratitude for the inspiration, guidance, and stimulation which he gave them. MAx HoRKHEIMER SAMUEL H. FLOWERMAN PREFACE This is a book about social discrimination. But its purpose is not simply to add a few more empirical findings to an already extensive body of information. The central theme of the work is a relatively new conceptthe rise of an "anthropological" species we call the authoritarian type of man. In contrast to the bigot of the older style he seems to combine the ideas and skills which are typical of a highly industrialized society with irrational or anti-rational beliefs. He is at the same time enlightened and superstitious, proud to be an individualist and in constant fear of not being like all the others, jealous of his independence and inclined to submit blindly to power and authority. The character structure which comprises these conflicting trends has already attracted the attention of modern philosophers and political thinkers. This book approaches the problem with the means of sociopsychological research. The implications and values of the study are practical as well as theoretical. The authors do not believe that there is a short cut to education which will eliminate the long and often circuitous road of painstaking research and theoretical analysis. Nor do they think that such a problem as the position of minorities in modern society, and more specifically the problem of religious and racial hatreds, can be tackled successfully either by the propaganda of tolerance or by apologetic refutation of errors and lies. On the other hand, theoretical activity and practical application are not separated by an unbridgeable gulf. Quite the contrary: the authors are imbued with the conviction that the sincere and systematic scientific elucidation of a phenomenon of such great historical meaning can contribute directly to an amelioration of the cultural atmosphere in which hatred breeds. This conviction must not be brushed aside as an optimistic illusion. In the history of civilization there have been not a few instances when mass delusions were healed not by focused propaganda but, in the final analysis, because scholars, with their unobtrusive yet insistent work habits, studied what lay at the root of the delusion. Their intellectual contribution, operating within the framework of the development of society as a whole, was decisively effective. I should like to cite two examples. The superstitious belief in witchcraft was overcome in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries after men had come more and more under the influence of the results of modem science. The impact of Cartesian rationalism was decisive. This school of philosophers IX X PREFACE demonstrated-and the natural scientists following them made practical use of their great insight-that the previously accepted belief in the immediate effect of spiritual factors on the realm of the corporal is an illusion. Once this scientifically untenable dogma was eliminated, the foundations of the belief in magic were destroyed. As a more recent example, we have only to think of the impact of Sigmund Freud's work on modem culture. Its primary importance does not lie in the fact that psychological research and knowledge have been enriched by new findings but in the fact that for some fifty years the intellectual world, and especially the educational, has been made more and more aware of the connection between the suppression of children (both within the home and outside) and society's usually naive ignorance of the psychological dynamics of the life of the child and the adult alike. The permeation of the social consciousness at large with the scientifically acquired experience that the events of early childhood are of prime importance for the happiness and work-potential of the adult has brought about a revolution in the relation between parents and children which would have been deemed impossible a hundred years ago. The present work, we hope, will find a place in this history of the interdependence between science and the cultural climate. Its ultimate goal is to open new avenues in a research area which can become of immediate practical significance. It seeks to develop and promote an understanding of social-psychological factors which have made it possible for the authoritarian type of man to threaten to replace the individualistic and democratic type prevalent in the past century and a half of our civilization, and of the factors by which this threat may be contained. Progressive analysis of this new "anthropological" type and of its growth conditions, with an ever-increasing scientific differentiation, will enhance the chances of a genuinely educational counterattack. Confidence in the possibility of a more systematic study of the mechanisms of discrimination and especially of a characterological discriminationtype is not based on the historical experience of the last fifteen years alone, but also on developments within the social sciences themselves during recent decades. Considerable and successful efforts have been made in this country as well as in Europe to raise the various disciplines dealing with man :is a social phenomenon to the organizational level of cooperation that has been a tradition in the natural sciences. What I am thinking of are not merely mechanical arrangements for bringing together work done in various fields of study, as in symposia or textbooks, but the mobilization of different methods and skills, developed in distinct fields of theory and empirical investigation, for one common research program. Such cross-fertilization of different branches of the social sciences and psychology is exactly what has taken place in the present volume. Experts PREFACE XI in the fields of social theo·ry and depth psychology, content analysis, clinical psychology, political sociology, and projective testing pooled their experi­ ences and findings. Having worked together in the closest cooperation, they now present as the result of their joint efforts the elements of a theory of the authoritarian type of man in modern society. They are not unmindful that they were not the first to have studied this phenomenon. They gratefully acknowledge their debt to the remarkable psychological profiles of the prejudiced individual projected by Sigmund Freud, Maurice Samuel, Otto Fenichel, and others. Such brilliant insights were in a sense the indispensable prerequisites for the methodological in­ tegration and research organization which the present study has attempted, and we think achieved to a certain degree, on a scale previously unapproached. Institutionally, this book represents a joint undertaking of the Berkeley Public Opinion Study and the Institute of Social Research. Both organiza­ tions had already made their mark in efforts to integrate various sciences and different research methods. The Berkeley Public Opinion Study had de­ voted itself to the examination of prejudice in terms of social psychology and had hit upon the close correlation between overt prejudice and certain personality traits of a destructive nihilistic nature, suggested by an ir­ rationally pessimistic ideology of the intolerant. The Institute of Social Research was dedicated to the principle of theoretical and methodological integration from its earliest days at the University of Frankfurt, and pub­ lished several studies growing out of this basic approach. In one volume, on authority and the family, the concept of the "authoritarian personality" was put forward as a link between psychological dispositions and political lean­ ings. Pursuing this line of thought further, the Institute formulated and published in 1939 a comprehensive research project on anti-Semitism. Some five years later, a series of discussions with the late Dr. Ernst Simmel and Professor R. Nevitt Sanford of the University of California laid the basis for the present project. As finally organized, the research staff was headed by four senior mem­ bers, Dr. R. N. Sanford of the Berkeley Public Opinion Study and vV. Adorno of the Institute of Social Research, who were Dr. T. the directors, and Dr. Else Frenkel-Brunswik and Dr. Daniel Levinson. Their collaboration was so close, perhaps I should say democratic, and the work so evenly di­ vided among them that it became clear at an early stage that they ought to share equally in the responsibility and the credit for the present publica­ tion. The main concepts of the study were evolved by the team as a whole. This is true above all of the idea of the indirect measurement of antidemo­ cratic trends, the F scale. Some division of labor could not be avoided, however, and it proved advisable to have the various chapters signed by individual staff members. The actual writing proce� necessarily involves Xll PREFACE a more intimate occupation with the materials under consideration and thus a measure of more specific responsibility. Nevertheless, the fact remains that each of the four senior members contributed to every chapter and hence that the work as a whole is thoroughly collective. It may be of interest to note the primary assignments of each of the senior !.1:aff members during the actual research process. Dr. Sanford conceived the way the various techniques should be combined and planned the research procedures. Much of his time was devoted to detailed case studies, with special reference to the dynamic etiology of the prejudiced personality. Dr. Adorno introduced sociological dimensions related to personality factors and characterological concepts concomitant with authoritarianism. He also analyzed the ideological sections of the interviews by means of categories of social theory. Dr. Brunswik formulated some of the first personality variables of the research. On the basis of her earlier work, she carried through the systematic, dynamically oriented categorization and quantification of the interview material. Dr. Levinson had primary responsibility for the AS, E, and PEC scales, for the analysis of ideology in psychological terms, for the Projective Question analysis, and for the statistical design and procedure. Three monographic chapters, one an over-all presentation of the methodology and results of one of the main techniques, the Thematic Apperception Test, and two dealing with "critical" groups were written by Betty Aron, Maria Levinson, and William Morrow. All three were permanently on the staff of the study and completely familiar with its progress. The project could not have been realized without the generous and intelligent support of the American Jewish Committee. In 1944 the Committee, feeling the need for a sound research basis for the financial and organizational support it planned to give to cooperative studies, of a type which this book exemplifies, decided to create a Department of Scientific Research. From the first the Department was conceived as a scientific center to stimulate and co-ordinate the work of leading scientists in the sociology and psychology of prejudice and, at the same time, as a laboratory for evaluating action programs. Though the members of the Department's research staff are constantly under pressure to solve problems set up for them by the day-to-day work of an extensive organization fighting for democratic rights on several broad fronts, they have never shirked the responsibility of furthering basic research programs. This volume symbolizes that link between democratic education and fundamental research. MA.."< HoRKHEIMER, Director, Institute of Social Research