The Dilemma of Obedience

Author(s): Stanley Milgram

Source: The Phi Delta Kappan, Vol. 55, No. 9 (May, 1974), pp. 603-606
Published by: Phi Delta Kappa International
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 Stanley Milgram

THE DILEMMA

OF OBEDIENCE
Nazi Germany, one of the most literate nations
in history, exterminated millions of European Jews.
Why did this happen? For two generations the
question has haunted the world's conscience. Now,
in a series of experiments called the most morally
significant in modern psychology, a Yale professor
has a piece of the answer. Two educators react to
this report of his work, beginning on page 607.

^^^bedience is as basic an element in massive scale if a very large number of nary citizens are ordered to destroy
the structure of social life as one can people obeyed orders. other people, and they do so because
point to. Some system of authority is a Obedience is the psychological mech they consider it their duty to obey
requirement of all communal living, and anism that links individual action to orders. Thus, obedience to authority,
it is only the man dwelling in isolation political purpose. It is the dispositional long praised as a virtue, takes on a new
who is not forced to respond, through cement that binds men to systems of aspect when it serves a malevolent
defiance or submission, to the com authority. Facts of recent history and cause; far from appearing as a virtue, it
mands of others. Obedience, as a deter observation in daily life suggest that for is transformed into a heinous sin. Or is
minant of behavior, is of particular many people obedience may be a deeply it?
relevance to our time. It has been ingrained behavior tendency, indeed, a The moral question of whether one
reliably established that from 1933 to prepotent impulse overriding training in should obey when commands conflict
1945 millions of innocent people were ethics, sympathy, and moral conduct. C. with conscience was argued by Plato,
systematically slaughtered on command. P. Snow, in 1961, pointed to its im dramatized in Antigone, and treated to
Gas chambers were built, death camps portance when he wrote : philosophic analysis in every historical
were guarded, daily quotas of corpses epoch. Conservative philosophers argue
When you think of the long
were produced with the same efficiency that the very fabric of society is threat
and gloomy history of man, you
as the manufacture of appliances. These will find more hideous crimes ened by disobedience, and even when
inhumane policies may have originated have been committed in the name the act prescribed by an authority is an
in the mind of a single person, but they of obedience than have ever been evil one, it is better to carry out the act
could only have been carried out on a committed in the name of rebel than to wrench at the structure of
lion. If you doubt that, read
authority. Hobbes stated further that an
William Shirer's Rise and Fall of act so executed is in no sense the
the Third Reich. The German
STANLEY MILGRAM is a Yale Officer Corps were brought up in responsibility of the person who carries
psychologist who has, over recent years,
it out but only of the authority that
the most rigorous code of obedi
developed a series of experiments which ence ... name
orders it. But humanists argue for the
in the of obedience
have been called "the most morally
they were party to, and assisted primacy of individual conscience in such
research in modern
significant
" psychol in, the most wicked large-scale matters, insisting that the moral judg
ogy. In the belief that Milgram fsfind actions in the of the ments of the individual must override
history
ings are interest to edu
of particular world. authority when the two are in conflict.
cators, the Kappan editors have secured
The legal and philosophic aspects of
permission from Harper and Row to
The Nazi extermination of European obedience are of enormous import, but
reprint Chapter 1 of Milgram's new
Jews is the most extreme instance of an empirically grounded scientist even
book, Obedience to Authority, which
summarizes this and have ob abhorrent immoral acts carried out by tually comes to the point where he
work,
tained comments from two authorities thousands of people in the name of wishes to move from abstract discourse
in education, Robert Ebel and Lawrence obedience. Yet in lesser degree this type to the careful observation of concrete
Kohlberg. of thing is constantly recurring: ordi instances. In order to take a close look

MAY 1974 603

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 at the act of obeying, I set up a simple tion engendered by participation in war.
experiment at Yale University. Eventu "To extricate himself from Despite these limitations, I thought it
ally, the experiment was to involve the situation, the subject must worthwhile to start careful observation
more than a thousand participants and of obedience even in this modest situa
make a clear break with au
would be repeated at several univer tion, in the hope that it would stimulate
sities, but at the beginning, the concep thority. The aim of this invest
insights and yield general propositions
tion was
simple. A person comes to a igation was to find when and applicable to a variety of circumstances.

psychological laboratory and is told to how people defy au

would A initial reaction to the
reader's
carry out a series of acts that come
thority in the face of a clear experiment may be to wonder why
increasingly into conflict with con anyone in his right mind would ad
moral imperative."
science. The main question is how far minister even the first shocks. Would he
the participant will comply with the not simply refuse and walk out of the
experimenter's instructions before re laboratory? But the fact is that no one
fusing to carry out the actions required ever does. Since the subject has come to
of him. the laboratory to aid the experimenter,
But the reader needs to know a little he is quite willing to start off with the
more detail about the experiment. Two procedure. There is nothing very extra

people come to a psychology laboratory ordinary in this, particularly since the

to take part in a study of memory and person who is to receive the shocks
learning. One of them is designated as a seems initially cooperative, if somewhat
"teacher" and the other a "learner." apprehensive. What is surprising is how
The experimenter explains that the ceiving the shock begins to indicate that far ordinary individuals will go in com
study is concerned with the effects of he is experiencing discomfort. At 75 plying with the experimenter's instruc
punishment on learning. The learner is volts the "learner" grunts. At 120 volts tions. Indeed, the results of the experi
conducted into a room, seated in a he complains verbally; at 150 he de ment are both surprising and dismaying.
chair, his arms strapped to prevent mands to be released from the experi Despite the fact that many subjects
excessive movement, and an electrode ment. His protests continue as the experience stress, despite the fact that
attached to his wrist. He is told that he shocks escalate, growing increasingly many protest to the experimenter, a
is to learn a list of word pairs; whenever vehement and emotional. At 285 volts substantial proportion continue to the
he makes an error, he will receive his response can only be described as an last shock on the generator.
electric shocks of increasing intensity. agonized scream. Many subjects will obey the experi
The real focus of the experiment is Observers of the experiment agree menter no matter how vehement the

the teacher. After watching the learner that its gripping quality is somewhat pleading of the person being shocked,
being strapped into place, he is taken obscured in print. For the subject, the no matter how painful the shocks seem
into the main experimental room? and situation is not a game; conflict is to be, and no matter how much the
seated before an impressive shock gener intense and obvious. On one hand, the victim pleads to be let out. This was
ator. Its main feature is a horizontal line manifest suffering of the learner presses seen time and again in our studies and
of 30 switches, ranging from 15 volts him to quit. On the other, the experi has been observed in several universities
to 450 volts, in 15-volt increments. menter, a legitimate authority to whom where the experiment was repeated. It is
There are also verbal designations which the subject feels some commitment, the extreme willingness of adults to go
- to almost any lengths on the command
range from Slight Shock to Danger enjoins him to continue. Each time the
Severe Shock. The teacher is told that subject hesitates to administer shock, of an authority that constitutes the
he is to administer the learning test to the experimenter orders him to con chief finding of the study and the fact
the man in the other room. When the tinue. To extricate himself from the most urgently demanding explanation.
learner responds correctly, the teacher situation, the subject must make a clear A commonly offered explanation is
moves on to the next item; when the break with authority. The aim of this that those who shocked the victim at
other man gives an incorrect answer, the investigation was to find when and how the most severe level were monsters, the
teacher is to give him an electric shock. people would defy authority in the face sadistic fringe of society. But if one
He is to start at the lowest shock level of a clear moral imperative. considers that almost two-thirds of the
(15 volts) and to increase the level each There are, of course, enormous dif fall into the category of
participants
time the man makes an error, going ferences between carrying out the "obedient" subjects, and that they rep
through 30 volts, 45 volts, and so on. orders of a commanding officer during resented ordinary people drawn from
The "teacher" is a genuinely naive times of war and carrying out the orders working, managerial, and professional
subject who has come to the laboratory of an experimenter. Yet the essence of classes, the argument becomes very
to participate in experiment. The learn certain relationships remain, for one
shaky. Indeed, it is highly reminiscent
er, or victim, is an actor who actually may ask in a general way: How does a of the issue that arose in connection
received no shock at all. The point of man behave when he is told by a with Hannah Arendt's 1963 book, Eich
the experiment is to see how far a legitimate authority to act against a mann in Jerusalem. Arendt contended
person will proceed in a concrete and third individual? If anything, we may that the prosecution's effort to depict
measurable situation in which he is expect the experimenter's power to be Eichmann as a sadistic monster was

ordered to inflict increasing pain on a considerably less than that of the gener fundamentally wrong, that he came
protesting victim. At what point will the al, since he has no power to enforce his closer to being an uninspired bureaucrat
subject refuse to obey the experi imperatives, and participation in a who simply sat at his desk and did his
menter? psychological experiment scarcely job. For asserting these views, Arendt
Conflict arises when the man re evokes the sense of urgency and dedica became the object of considerable

604 PHI DELTA KAPPAN

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scorn, even calumny. Somehow, it was exquisite articulation and pressing the
felt that the monstrous deeds carried " switches with great care. They want to
[We learned that] :Ordi
out by Eichmann required a brutal, put on a competent performance, but
nary people, simply doing
twisted, and sadistic personality, evil they show an accompanying narrowing
incarnate. After witnessing hundreds of their jobs, and without any of moral concern. The subject entrusts
ordinary people submit to the authority particular hostility on their the broader tasks of setting goals and
in our own experiments, I must con part, can become agents in a I assessing morality to the experimental
clude that Arendt's conception of the terribly destructive process.... authority he is serving.
banality of evil comes closer to the The most common adjustment of
Relatively few people have the
truth than one might dare imagine. The thought in the obedient subject is for
resources needed to resist au
ordinary person who shocked the victim him to see himself as not responsible for
did so out of a sense of obligation ? a thority." his own actions. He divests himself of
?
conception of his duties as a subject responsibility by attributing all initiative
and not from any peculiarly aggressive to the experimenter, a legitimate
tendencies. authority. He sees himself not as a
This is, perhaps, the most funda person acting in a morally accountable
mental lesson of our study: Ordinary way but as the agent of external author
people, simply doing their jobs, and ity. In the postexperimental interview,
without any particular hostility on their when subjects were asked why they had
part, can become agents in a terrible gone on, a typical reply was: "I
destructive process. Moreover, even wouldn't have done it by myself. I was
when the destructive effects of their place in the moral order, they do not just doing what I was told." Unable to
work become patently clear, and they occupy a correspondingly intractable defy the authority of the experimenter,
are asked to carry out actions incom position in human psychic structure. A they attribute all responsibility to him.
patible with fundamental standards of few changes in newspaper headlines, a It is the old story of "just doing one's
morality, relatively few people have the call from the draft board, orders from a duty" that was heard time and time
resources needed to resist authority. A man with epaulets, and men are led to again in the defense statements of those
variety of inhibitions against disobeying kill with little difficulty. Even the forces accused at Nuremberg. But it would be
authority come into play and success mustered in a psychology experiment wrong to think of it as a thin alibi
fully keep the person in his place. will go a long way toward removing the concocted for the occasion. Rather, it is
Sitting back in one's armchair, it is individual from moral controls. Moral a fundamental mode of thinking for a
easy to condemn the actions of the factors can be shunted aside with rela great many people once they are locked
obedient subjects. But those who con tive ease by a calculated restructuring of into a subordinate position in a struc
demn the subjects measure them against the informational and social field. ture of authority. The disappearance of
the standard of their own ability to What, then, keeps the person obeying a sense of responsibility is the most
formulate high-minded moral prescrip the experimenter? First, there is a set of far-reaching consequence of submission
tions. That is hardly a fair standard. "binding factors" that lock the subject to authority.
Many of the subjects, at the level of into the situation. They include such Although a person acting under
stated opinion, feel quite as strongly as factors as politeness on his part, his authority performs actions that seem to
any of us about the moral requirement desire to uphold his initial promise of violate standards of conscience, it would
of refraining from action against a help aid to the experimenter, and the awk not be true to say that he loses his
less victim. They, too, in general terms wardness of withdrawal. Second, a num moral sense. Instead, it acquires a radi

know what ought to be done and can ber of adjustments in the subject's cally different focus. He does not re
state their values when the occasion thinking occur that undermine his re spond with a moral sentiment to the
arises. This has little, if anything, to do solve to break with the authority. The actions he performs. Rather, his moral
with their actual behavior under the adjustments help the subject maintain concern now shifts to a consideration of

pressure of circumstances. his relationship with the experimenter, how well he is living up to the expecta
If people are asked to render a moral while at the same time reducing the tions that the authority has of him. In
judgment on what constitutes appropri strain brought about by the experi wartime, a soldier does not ask whether
ate behavior in this situation, they mental conflict. They are typical of it is good or bad to bomb a hamlet; he
unfailingly see disobedience as proper. thinking that comes about in obedient does not experience shame or guilt in
But values are not the only forces at persons when they are instructed by the destruction of a village: Rather, he
work in an actual, ongoing situation. authority to act against helpless in feels pride or shame depending on how
They are but one narrow band of causes dividuals. well he has performed the mission as
in the total spectrum of forces imping One such mechanism is the tendency signed to him.
ing on a person. Many people were of the individual to become so absorbed Another psychological force at work
unable to realize their values in action in the narrow technical aspects of the in this situation may be termed "coun
and found themselves continuing in the task that he loses sight of its broader teranthropomorphism." For decades
experiment even though they disagreed consequences. The film Dr. Strangelove psychologists have discussed the primi
with what they were doing. brilliantly satirized the absorption of a tive tendency among men to attribute
The force exerted by the moral sense bomber crew in the exacting technical to inanimate objects and forces the
of the individual is less effective than procedure of dropping nuclear weapons qualities of the human species. A
social myth would have us helieve. on a country. Similarly, in this experi countervailing tendency, however, is
Though such prescriptions as "Thou ment, subjects become immersed in the that of attributing an impersonal quality
shalt not kill" occupy a pre-eminent procedures, reading the word pairs with to forces that are essentially human in

MAY 1974 605

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 origin and maintenance. Some people and wars. In all likelihood, our subjects shock level on the generator. Predict
treat systems of human origin as if they would have experienced greater ease in ably, subjects excused their behavior by
existed above and beyond any human shocking the victim had he been con saying that the responsibility belonged
agent, beyond the control of whim or vincingly portrayed as a brutal criminal to the man who actually pulled the
human feeling. The human element be or a pervert. switch. This may illustrate a danger
hind agencies and institutions is denied. Of considerable interest, however, is ously typical situation in complex so
Thus, when the experimenter says, "The the fact that many subjects harshly ciety: It is psychologically easy to ig
experiment requires that you continue," devalue the victim as a consequence of nore responsibility when one is only an
the subject feels this to be an imperative acting against him. Such comments as, intermediate link in a chain of evil
that goes beyond any merely human "He was so stupid and stubborn he action but is far from the final conse
command. He does not ask the seeming deserved to get shocked," were com quences of the action. Even Eichmann
ly obvious question, "Whose experi mon. Once having acted against the was sickened when he toured the con
ment? Why should the designer be victim, these subjects found it necessary centration camps, but to participate in
served while the victim suffers?" The to view him as an unworthy individual, mass murder he had only to sit at a desk
wishes of a man - the designer of the whose punishment was made inevitable and shuffle papers. At the same time, the
? have become
experiment part of a by his own deficiencies of intellect and man in the camp who actually dropped
schema which exerts on the subject's character. Cyclon-B into the gas chambers was able
mind a force that transcends the per Many of the people studied in the to justify his behavior on the grounds
sonal. "It's got to go on. It's got to go experiment were in some sense against that he was only following orders from
on," repeated one subject. He failed to what they did to the learner, and many above. Thus there is a fragmentation of
realize that aman like himself wanted it protested even while they obeyed. But the total human act; no one man de
to go on. For him the human agent had between thoughts, words, and the criti cides to carry out the evil act and is
faded from the picture, and "The Ex cal step of disobeying a malevolent confronted with its consequences. The
periment" had acquired an impersonal authority lies another ingredient, the person who assumes full responsibility
momentum of its own. capacity for transforming beliefs and for the act has evaporated. Perhaps this
No action of itself has an unchange values into action. Some subjects were is the most common characteristic of
able psychological quality. Its meaning totally convinced of the wrongness of socially organized evil in modern so
can be altered by placing it in particular what they were doing but could not ciety.
contexts. An American newspaper re
bring themselves to make an open break The problem of obedience, therefore,
cently quoted a pilot who conceded with authority. Some derived satisfac is not wholly psychological. The form
that Americans were bombing Viet tion from their thoughts and felt that - and shape of society and the way it is
- to do with it.
namese men, women, and children but within themselves, at least they had developing have much
felt that the bombing was for a "noble been on the side of the angels. What There was a time, perhaps, when men

cause" and thus was justified. Similarly, they failed to realize is that subjective were able to give a fully human response
must subjects in the experiment see feelings are largely irrelevant to the to any situation because they were fully
their behavior in a larger context that is moral issue at hand so long as they are absorbed in it as human beings. But as
benevolent and useful to society ? the not transformed into action. Political soon as there was a division of labor
pursuit of scientific truth. The psy control is effected through action. The among men, things changed. Beyond a
chological laboratory has a strong claim attitudes of the at a concentra certain point, the breaking up of society
guards
to legitimacy and evokes trust and tion camp are of no consequence when into people carrying out narrow and
confidence in those who come to per in fact they are allowing the slaughter of very special jobs takes away from the
form there. An action such as shocking innocent men to take before human quality of work and life. A
place
a victim, which in isolation appears evil, them. Similarly, so-called "intellectual person does not get to see the whole
?
acquires a totally different meaning resistance" in occupied Europe in situation but only a small part of it, and
when placed in this setting. But allowing which persons by a twist of thought felt is thus unable to act without some kind
an act to be dominated by its context, that they had defied the invader ? was of overall direction. He yields to
while neglecting its human conse
merely indulgence in a consoling authority but in doing so is alienated
quences, can be dangerous in the ex mechanism. are from his own actions.
psychological Tyrannies
treme.
perpetuated by diffident men who do George Orwell caught the essence of
At least one essential feature of the not possess the courage to act out their the situation when he wrote :
situation in Germany was not studied beliefs. Time and again in the experi
? As I write, highly civilized hu
here namely, the intense devaluation ment people disvalued what they were man are
beings flying overhead,
of the victim prior to action against doing but could not muster the inner trying to kill me. They do not feel
him. For a decade and more, vehement resources to translate their values into any me as an in
enmity against
anti-Jewish propaganda systematically action. dividual, nor I against them. They
prepared the German population to A variation of the basic experiment are only "doing their duty," as

accept the destruction of the Jews. Step depicts a dilemma more common than the saying goes. Most of them, I
are
by step the Jews were excluded from the one outlined above: The subject was have no doubt, kind-hearted
men who would never
the category of citizen and national, and not ordered to push the trigger that law-abiding
dream of committing murder in
finally were denied the status of human shocked the victim, but merely to per
devaluation of the form a subsidiary act (administering the private life. On the other hand, if
beings. Systematic one of them succeeds in blowing
victim provides ameasure of psychologi word-pair test) before another subject me to with a well-placed
pieces
cal justification for brutal treatment of actually delivered the shock. In this he will never any the
bomb, sleep
the victim and has been the constant situation, 37 of 40 adults from the New worse for it.
accompaniment of massacres, pogroms, Haven area continued to the highest D

I_,_

606 PHI DELTA KAPPAN

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