Mob rule
| Part of the Politics series |
| Basic forms of government |
|---|
| List of forms · List of countries |
 Politics portal |
Ochlocracy (Template:Lang-el or okhlokratía; Template:Lang-la) or mob rule is government by mob or a mass of people, or the intimidation of constitutional authorities. As a pejorative for majoritarianism, it is akin to the Latin phrase mobile vulgus meaning "the fickle crowd", from which the English term "mob" was originally derived in the 1680s.[1]
Ochlocracy ("rule of the general populace") is democracy ("rule of the people") spoiled by demagoguery, "tyranny of the majority" and the rule of passion over reason, just like oligocracy ("rule of a few") is aristocracy ("rule of the best") spoiled by corruption. Ochlocracy is synonymous in meaning and usage to the modern, informal term "Mobocracy," which emerged from a much more recent colloquial etymology.
Terminology
The term appears to have been coined by Polybius in his Histories (6.4.6).[2] He uses it to name the 'pathological' version of popular rule in opposition to the good version, which he refers to as democracy. There are numerous mentions of the word "ochlos" in the Talmud (where "ochlos" refers to anything from "mob," "populace" to "armed guard"), as well as in Rashi, a Jewish commentary on the Bible. The word is recorded in English since 1584, derived from the French ochlocratie (1568), which stems from the original Greek okhlokratia, from okhlos "mob" and kratos "rule, power, strength"
In ancient Greek political thought ochlocracy was considered as one of the three "bad" forms of government (tyranny, oligarchy and ochlocracy) as opposed to the three "good" forms of government (monarchy, aristocracy and democracy). The distinction between "good" and "bad" was made according to whether the government form would act in the interest of the whole community ("good") or special interests ("bad").
An ochlocrat is one who is an advocate or partisan of ochlocracy. It can also be used as an adjective (ochlocratic or ochlocratical).
The threat of "mob rule" to a democracy is restrained by ensuring the rule of law protects minorities or individuals against short-term demagoguery or moral panic.
Mobs in history
Historians often comment on mob rule as a factor in the rise of Rome and its maintenance, as the city of Rome itself was large—between 100,000 and 250,000 citizens—while the aristocracy and even military was very small by comparison to the citizenry. With weapons also being crude, the military force did not exist that could have dealt with a revolt from the larger populace. There was a constant need to keep people fed, distracted, and in awe of the power of the state. Those who could do this, ruled not only Rome, but the whole of the Roman Empire.
Lapses in this control often led to loss of power, or even the loss of heads, of officials—most notably in the reign of Commodus when Cleander unwisely used the Praetorian Guard against a mob which had come to call for his head. As Edward Gibbon relates it,
The people... demanded with angry clamors the head of the public enemy. Cleander, who commanded the Praetorian Guards, ordered a body of cavalry to sally forth and disperse the seditious multitude. The multitude fled with precipitation towards the city; several were slain, and many more were trampled to death; but when the cavalry entered the streets their pursuit was checked by a shower of stones and darts from the roofs and windows of the houses. The foot guards, who had long been jealous of the prerogatives and insolence of the Praetorian cavalry, embraced the party of the people. The tumult became a regular engagement and threatened a general massacre. The Praetorians at length gave way, oppressed with numbers; and the tide of popular fury returned with redoubled violence against the gates of the palace, where Commodus lay dissolved in luxury and alone unconscious of the civil war... Commodus started from his dream of pleasure and commanded that the head of Cleander should be thrown out to the people. The desired spectacle instantly appeased the tumult...
This followed a previous incident in which the legions of Britain had demanded and received the death of Perennis, the prior administrator. The mob thus realized that it had every chance of success.
The Salem Witch Trials, in which the unified belief of the townspeople overpowered the logic of the law, has also been cited as an example of mob rule.[3] In 1837, Abraham Lincoln wrote about lynching and "the increasing disregard for law which pervades the country--the growing disposition to substitute the wild and furious passions in lieu of the sober judgment of courts, and the worse than savage mobs for the executive ministers of justice."[4]
"Monster Mobs"
Monster Mobs are mobs composed of ignorant, paranoid, and irascible townsfolk or villagers (who often wield torches) who assemble to confront, intimidate, harass, or harm someone whom they perceive to be a literal or figurative monster, often at his or her residence. They are a staple of classic horror movies, and have also been depicted in numerous contemporary contexts, including those cited below:
A Monster Mob is featured in the conclusion of the 1931 film Frankenstein during which Victor Frankenstein leads an enraged band of peasants in a search of the local countryside for The Monster. Frankenstein is eventually separated from the mob and taken by The Monster to an old mill. Frankenstein is reunited with the mob when the peasants hear his cries for help. When they arrive, The Monster hurls Frankenstein to the ground, almost killing him. Some of the peasants take Frankenstein to his home, while the others remain behind and burn the mill in which The Monster is trapped, destroying him in the process.
A Monster Mob is featured in the 1974 American comedy film Young Frankenstein, directed by Mel Brooks. In this film, the villager's chief constable, Inspector Kemp, leads the townspeople in a hunt for the Monster. Just as the Kemp-led mob storms the laboratory, Dr. Frankenstein transfers some of his stabilizing intellect to the creature who, as a result, is able to reason with and placate the mob.
A Monster Mob is a key plot point of the 1991 movie Beauty and the Beast by Walt Disney Feature Animation. In this scene, Gaston has manipulated the villagers into forming a mob to confront the Beast at his castle, although Gaston's secret agenda is really to kill the Beast, whom he sees as a rival for Belle's love. While chanting "Kill the Beast", this mob proceeds to ram the door of Beast's castle down in order to allow Gaston access to it in order to kill The Beast.
A Monster Mob is also featured in season three of Desperate Housewives, during which Lynette Scavo (with the help of Karen McCluskey) convinces the neighborhood that their neighbor Art Shepard is a pedophile. The neighborhood's paranoia culminates in protest outside Art Shepard's house that quickly gets out of hand and descends into an angry mob. When Lynn expresses that she hadn't anticipated this, her husband Tom replies ""You tell people Frankenstein's on the loose then you're surprised to see the torch-wielding villagers?". This protest causes Rebecca, Art Shepard's wheelchair-bound sister, to suffer a fatal cardiac arrest, and while escorting her to ambulance, an angry protester throws a rock at his head.
Monster Mobs are also lampooned in a 2008 article from The Onion entitled "Mob Not Angry at Monster, Just Disappointed"[5], in which villagers confront their local monster to express how disappointed they are by his most recent rampage.
"Mobs" used to affect policy
 |
One of the characteristics of a free and open society is that its people retain the right to peaceably assemble and to petition their government for the redress of grievances.
During the French Revolution, the mobs in Paris played a similar function, but were more carefully manipulated by political leaders who sensed that they had the power to dispose of monarchy entirely, as they did, eventually setting up a representative democracy (which in turn fell to Napoleon's model of semi-constitutional monarchy). [citation needed]
The modern theories of civil disobedience and satyagraha can be differentiated from "mob rule" and its mechanics, as these actions forgoes the use of the violence and force that the mob of ancient times employed.
Traditional non-violent protest theory holds that if the demonstrators are restrained and do not do any violence, yet refuse to back down, then they could conceivably win, as they either will be joined by the forces they face, be allowed to defy the law or government openly and peacefully, or be physically attacked, struck down, and made into powerful moral symbols of the lengths to which the agents of the state will go to enforce its laws. However, police forces around the world have become adept at making such gatherings irrelevant by limiting them to areas, in some cases dubbed "free speech zones," sufficiently separate from the object of their discontent, the rest of the public, and the media, to make them easily ignored. Permitting requirements in many jurisdictions effectively make demonstrations without advance police permission illegal. Various efforts to increase demonstrators communal intelligence and mobility using cell phone networks and bicycles have been employed to circumvent crowd control and marginalizing techniques with speed. Flash mobs and Critical Mass style "bike block" actions are examples experimented with, with mixed results, notably during the 2004 Republican National Convention.
Modern theory concludes that since Roman guards, facing crucifixion for disobedience, could be swayed by mobs, it is also possible to sway modern police, even in a police state. The 1986 EDSA Revolution in the Philippines, the Velvet Revolution in former Czechoslovakia, and the resistance to the attempted military coup in the Soviet Union in 1991 that led to the collapse of that state, are situations where it is possible that it was the "mob" which won the day due to defections by authority.
See also
|
References
- Notes
- ^ "Mob". Answers.com. Retrieved 2008-11-01.
- ^ "Polybius, Histories, The Rotation of Polities". www.perseus.tufts.edu. Retrieved 2008-03-29.
- ^ Mob Rule and Violence in American Culture
- ^ Opposition to Mob-Rule. The Writings of Abraham Lincoln, Volume 1
- ^ "Mob Not Angry at Monster, Just Disappointed"
- Bibliography
- Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn (under pseudonym Francis Stuart Campbell), The Menace of the Herd, The Bruce Publishing Company, Milwaukee, 1943. (Note where the term "ochlocracy" is used throughout the book.)
- Chana Shaffer, outline of presentation on ochlacracies for political science society in Touro College. Available on the Touro website www.touro.edu.)
- EtymologyOnLine