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Shocking Masculinity: Stanley Milgram, Obedience to Authority, and the Crisis of Manhood in Cold War America

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Shocking Masculinity: Stanley Milgram, Obedience to Authority, and the Crisis of Manhood in Cold War America ᒳ6KRFNLQJᒴ0DVFXOLQLW\6WDQOH\0LOJUDPᒳ2EHGLHQFHWR$XWKRULW\ᒴDQGWKHᒳ&ULVLVRI 0DQKRRGᒴLQ&ROG:DU$PHULFD $XWKRU V ,DQ1LFKROVRQ 6RXUFH,VLV9RO1R -XQH SS 3XEOLVKHGE\The University of Chicago PressRQEHKDOIRIThe History of Science Society 6WDEOH85/http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/660129 . $FFHVVHG Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. The University of Chicago Press and The History of Science Society are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Isis. http://www.jstor.org “Shocking” Masculinity Stanley Milgram, “Obedience to Authority,” and the “Crisis of Manhood” in Cold War America By Ian Nicholson* ABSTRACT Stanley Milgram’s study of “obedience to authority” is one of the best-known psycho- logical experiments of the twentieth century. This essay examines the study’s special charisma through a detailed consideration of the intellectual, cultural, and gender contexts of Cold War America. It suggests that Milgram presented not a “timeless” experiment on “human nature” but, rather, a historically contingent, scientifically sanctioned “perfor- mance” of American masculinity at a time of heightened male anxiety. The essay argues that this gendered context invested the obedience experiments with an extraordinary plausibility, immediacy, and relevance. Immersed in a discourse of masculinity besieged, many Americans read the obedience experiments not as a fanciful study of laboratory brutality but as confirmation of their worst fears. Milgram’s extraordinary success thus lay not in his “discovery” of the fragility of individual conscience but in his theatrical flair for staging culturally relevant masculine performances. TANLEY MILGRAM’S STUDY OF “OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY” is one of the S most famous psychological experiments of the twentieth century. First published in 1963, the experiments remain a staple of undergraduate education in psychology and the inspiration for ongoing research and debate in a number of disciplines.1 The size and scope of the Milgram-inspired literature is impressive, but such conventional measures of * Department of Psychology, St. Thomas University, Fredericton, New Brunswick E3B 5G3, Canada; [email protected]. Earlier versions of this essay were presented at the joint meeting of Cheiron and the European Society for the History of the Human Sciences, University College, Dublin, June 2007, and at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, Boston, August 2008. Portions of this research were supported by a grant from the Social Science and Research Council of Canada (grant no. 410-2002-1448). Input on previous drafts from the Isis referees was very helpful and much appreciated. 1 The first published account of the obedience to authority experiments is Stanley Milgram, “Behavioral Study of Obedience,” Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 1963, 67:371–378. The significance of Milgram’s work is discussed in Rebecca M. Lemov, World as Laboratory: Experiments with Mice, Mazes, and Men, 1st ed. (New York: Hill & Wang, 2005); Arthur G. Miller, The Obedience Experiments: A Case Study of Controversy in Social Science (New York: Praeger, 1986); and Nestar Russell and Robert Gregory, “Making the Isis, 2011, 102:238–268 ©2011 by The History of Science Society. All rights reserved. 0021-1753/2011/10202-0002$10.00 238 IAN NICHOLSON 239 scholarly renown do not do justice to the iconic status and broad academic and cultural appeal of the obedience experiments. Over the years, a number of scholars have noted that the study has been transformed from a psychological experiment into a cultural reference point of extraordinary reach and power. The social psychologist Lee Ross spoke with particular eloquence in this regard, suggesting that the obedience experiments have become “part of our society’s shared intellectual legacy—that small body of historical incidents, biblical parables, and classic literature that serious thinkers feel free to draw upon when they debate about human nature.”2 This is high praise indeed for a study undertaken by a hitherto unknown twenty-seven- year-old untenured assistant professor, but there is ample evidence that attests to the experiments’ remarkable appeal and mythic aura. The study has been repeatedly refer- enced in connection with one of the most monumental events of the twentieth century: the Holocaust. This connection was made by Milgram himself in his first publication on the obedience experiments, and throughout his career he claimed that his work provided special insight into Nazi crimes. This was and remains a controversial claim, but, as Arthur Miller has noted, “in the intervening decades, countless enthusiasts have endorsed the view that these studies contain vital insights into the Holocaust.” The experiments have also been enshrined in popular culture, appearing in Hollywood films, television shows, plays, and popular music.3 The philosopher C. D. Herrera noted that “Milgram may be the only social psychologist to earn the status of pop-icon.” The experiments’ popularity and standing in American politics and jurisprudence is no less remarkable. In the early 1970s Milgram’s work was used to critique aspects of the Vietnam War, and in the aftermath of Watergate the experiments were used to explain the conduct of President Nixon’s staff. During the famous 1974 trial of Patty Hearst, Milgram’s research was cited to explain how the kidnapped heiress could have come to obey the instructions of the Symbionese Liberation Army. More recently, Milgram’s experiments have been men- tioned in relation to the behavior of American soldiers at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.4 Works of science and culture that attain such extraordinary “celebrity” status are typically sustained by a wide range of popular interests and anxieties. For example, in his Undoable Doable: Milgram, the Holocaust, and Modern Government,” American Review of Public Administra- tion, 2005, 35:327–349. 2 Lee Ross, “Situationist Perspectives on the Obedience Experiments,” Contemporary Psychology, 1988, 33:101–104. Ross’s assessment of Milgram has recently been echoed by the historian Kirsten Fermaglich, who noted that “by 1978, the obedience experiments, along with the Nazi imagery that Milgram invoked to describe them, had become integral to American life”: Fermaglich, American Dreams and Nazi Nightmares (Waltham, Mass.: Univ. Press New England, 2006), p. 83. 3 Arthur Miller, “What Can the Milgram Obedience Experiments Tell Us about the Holocaust?” in Social Psychology of Good and Evil, ed. Miller (New York: Guildford, 2004), pp. 193–239, on p. 194. In 1975 the obedience study was the subject of a full-length film—The Tenth Level—featuring John Travolta in a supporting role and Star Trek’s Captain Kirk—William Shatner—in the role of Milgram. There is also an allusion to Milgram’s study in the film Ghostbusters. In 2008 the experiment was referenced in an episode of Law and Order: Special Victims Unit that featured the actor Robin Williams playing a character trying to dissuade people from mindless obedience. The study has also been featured in the TV shows Malcolm in the Middle and The Simpsons (episode no. 7G04, “There’s No Disgrace Like Home,” which premiered on 28 Jan. 1990). The rock musician Peter Gabriel wrote a song about the experiment entitled “We Do What We’re Told (Milgram’s 37).” In 2006 the psychologist Jerry Burger undertook a partial replication of the obedience study, which was subsequently broadcast on the ABC prime-time series Basic Instincts. 4 C. D. Herrera, “Ethics, Deception, and ‘Those Milgram Experiments,’” Journal of Applied Philosophy, 2001, 18:245–256, on p. 253; Herbert Kelman and Lee Lawrence, “Assignment of Responsibility in the Case of Lt. Calley: Preliminary Report on a National Survey,” Journal of Social Issues, 1972, 28:177–212; Howard Muson, “Blind Obedience: John Dean Meets Milgram, Szasz, and Others,” Psychology Today, 1978, 11:12, 112; William Graebner, Patty’s Got a Gun: Patricia Hearst in 1970s America (Chicago: Univ. Chicago Press, 2008); and Lemov, World as Laboratory (cit. n. 1) (Abu Ghraib). 240 “SHOCKING” MASCULINITY essay on the infamous nineteenth-century hoax the “Cardiff Giant,” Michael Pettit has documented an extensive network of social, intellectual, and religious interests that helped transform a gypsum statue of a large man into an alleged “giant”—an object of intense popular interest and scientific and religious controversy. Although the obedience study has been the subject of considerable discussion, historical analysis of its special charisma and lasting cultural significance has been surprisingly limited. The lengthiest and most thor- oughly researched study of the experiments—Thomas Blass’s biography of Milgram, The Man Who Shocked the World—is a case in point.5 Blass does a commendable job of documenting the biographical details of Milgram’s life and the application of the obedi- ence experiments to the study of the Holocaust. However, his purchase on the wider symbolic register of the obedience study is limited, leaving largely unexamined the American political and gendered context
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