Chapter 2
Widespread nepotism

Let's start by specifying why sociology is important to take into account to complete Marx's observations, in order to build a proposal for social organization: it also starts from field observations, and moreover it applies the scientific method, which allows us to verify its assertions by reproducing experiences, instead of being satisfied with theoretical reasoning whose foundations are above all ideological.
In this second chapter, we will address a central aspect of 20th century sociology allowing us to better understand the dynamics of organizations at the collective level. The central individual aspect will be addressed in a third chapter, and illustrated in a fourth. Finally, secondary aspects will be the subject of a fifth chapter.

Definition, origin and consequences of widespread nepotism

Nepotism is the act of promoting the social advancement of family members. We define 'pervasive nepotism' as the fact that there are different concentric circles around each individual, and that the individuals in these different circles are sometimes enemies, sometimes allies when the enemies are those of a larger circle. Thus, an individual fights against the other members of his family to ensure his social position in the family, but then he fights with the other members of his family against the other families of the community, then he fights with the members of his community against other communities, and finally, he fights with the members of his nation against other nations. We find the same pattern with individuals who fight among themselves for advancement within the company, but together against competing companies, which themselves combine to assert their sectoral demands. The same goes for members of a political party who combine to campaign against other parties, then wage a merciless war for control of the party. In short, the slogan of widespread nepotism is 'us against them'.

The document that best presents generalized nepotism in our eyes is the audiovisual report Caribbean primates by Jack Silberman and Jean-Christophe Ribot, although he does not define the term. This paper reports and illustrates the results of scientists who observed the social behaviors of a community of rhesus macaques imported from India in 1938 on the island of Cayo Santiago. The monkeys cannot leave the island, but they are fed and have no predators. However, what the researchers observe is a social functioning where aggressiveness dominates: “While this island could be their paradise, they have made it their own hell. »
Each individual is part of a family, which itself is part of a group, and the island contains three groups at the time of reporting. Individuals exchange peacefully, primarily through grooming activity, and aggressively, through threats, biting, and the like. However, the struggle for social position is almost constant, at all levels. In this sense, peaceful exchanges like grooming can be understood as alliances for future fights. In the dominant group, the monkey at the top of the social hierarchy is called Chester, and is characterized by the fact that he is the most active in the network of peaceful interactions. Conversely, number 3 in the hierarchy, named Tony, is the most active in the network of aggressive interactions. The end of the report relates the fall and then death of Chester, and Tony's takeover, proving in the process that their opposing strategies can both lead to the top of the social hierarchy. At the time of the conclusion, the researchers wonder how the observation of these monkeys could allow us to design more altruistic societies, but leave the question unresolved.

This documentary calls for three very important remarks.
First of all, the concrete translation at the collective level of the struggle for social rank is the tendency to lead clashes on the basis of 'us against them'. Conversely, an 'us versus them' confrontation must be seen above all as the collective expression of personal social ambitions. There is therefore a cause and effect link between the two, which can however be difficult to detect due to the fact that the effect is not always direct, as for example in the case of racism.
Second, widespread nepotism reveals a distinction between friend and enemy that is less stable and permanent than we are morally comfortable with thinking. These are the same individuals who are sometimes friends, sometimes enemies, depending on the circumstances. This raises an important philosophical question, for which we have not found a scientifically established answer: what, at the level of caring social relations, comes from sincere feelings, and what comes from strategy alliance?
Finally, even when Chester is in power, violence dominates within his group. This shows us that, contrary to what we tend to think, what makes a group unhappy is not so much having a malicious leader as opposed to a benevolent leader, but rather the permanent struggle for the social ascension that takes place within the group, independently of the characteristics of the leader.

Let us see to what extent these observations apply to modern man.
It might be reassuring to say that these findings on primates do not apply to humans who are supposedly more civilized. Let’s explore how true this is. In the report, the researchers notice two distinct modes of operation. Normally fights are frequent, but very short-lived. On the other hand, what is singular even before the fall of Chester is that the fights suddenly become long.
In humans, normally, we see relatively few fights. However, it is enough to get any of us to speak to see that the interactions are very often hypocritical, that is to say that the feeling is conflicting, but neutralized by the social conventions which allow, except among young children, to contain latent hatred or anger. This is therefore not expressed in the form of a short-term fight. On the other hand, in times of crisis, for example during the two world wars of the 20th century, we see paroxysmal violence along the lines of 'us against them', which is also expressed through intense and lasting physical confrontations. In The origins of totalitarianism, Hannah Arendt seeks a contextual explanation, invoking capitalism, nationalism and anti-Semitism, to explain the outbreak of violence that took place during these periods.
Our explanation is different: The instinct to constantly struggle to advance in the social hierarchy exists in modern humans exactly as it does in rhesus macaques. Normally, cultural elements allow us, thanks to social conventions, to prevent this instinct from translating into perpetual confrontations. Conversely, the periods of crisis that we see among modern humans, exactly as among primates, are of unprecedented magnitude because they are increased tenfold by our technological capabilities. It is therefore appropriate to reconsider the question of the origin of the problem, which is in fact only the permanent search for social advancement inscribed in our genetic heritage. However, if social conventions have proven their capacity to contain violence in normal times, we see on the one hand that they are not capable of regulating violence during periods of paroxysmal conflict, and on the other hand history shows us that these correspond mainly to periods of change of 'great leader' or to the action of particular great leaders advocating violence. From there, a conclusion seems obvious: a good social system for the 21st must also be effective in containing violence in all circumstances.
Like Marx who wanted to eliminate capital to solve the problems of capitalism, we could consider eliminating the notion of 'great leader' to eliminate the crises which are linked to his personality or his succession. This is what we do in practice in the second part of this book, without asserting, on the contrary, that this solves the problem in its entirety.

Let us clarify that by emphasizing the 'struggle for social rank' aspect, we are absolutely not seeking to deny humans their altruistic capacity, also contained in their genetic heritage. What we are saying is that it is not possible to build a satisfactory social organization without taking into account the aggressive nature of humans; in other words, Rousseauism is a dangerous illusion. Conversely, the altruistic nature of humans does not need to be taken into account when developing a social organization because its natural and unconstrained expression is the most appropriate. Furthermore, technological progress amplifies both the consequences of not controlling our warlike instincts, and the potential benefits of their satisfactory control since nature no longer imposes calamities on us such as famine, for example. Technology gives us control, and therefore responsibility, for our destiny, and perhaps even that of all of the currently most elaborate forms of life, for better and for worse. Science has allowed us to tame nature.
Saint Exupery, The little prince, chapter XXI: “Men have forgotten this truth,” said the fox. But you must not forget it. You become forever responsible for what you have tamed. You are responsible for your rose...
- I am responsible for my rose... repeated the little prince, in order to remember. »

We should also not ignore the bias that leads the majority of us to overestimate the positive and altruistic nature of human relationships, that is to say, literally, to take our desires for realities. For example, we tend to attribute to tolerance an unconditionally positive character. However, a sentence such as "everyone can have their opinion" is in fact only the claim of the right to practice anti-science, which, as we will see in chapter 22, in fact ultimately leads to the The opposite effect, namely an exacerbation of 'us against them', and therefore of social violence. The only effective tolerance at this level is that which agrees to abandon an idea we held when it is contradicted by the facts, and we will see in the next chapter concerning cognitive dissonance that this is far from being the most frequent response. . Then, tolerance is very often nothing more than a simple strategy for optimizing generalized nepotism, namely a way of making casual friends more easily, and therefore of developing one's personal network. Finally, tolerance too often serves as an excuse to avoid opposing injustice or arbitrariness. Let us cite Cynthia Fleury in this regard in The end of courage : “Adaptation strategies are inevitable and signs of maturity, but they are also, unfortunately, the surest path to acceptance and legitimization of the unacceptable. The adaptation of some creates the basis for the abuse of others. »

Let us also note that altruistic attitudes are rare in situations of intense struggle for social rank, whether for example for management positions in the world of work, or for mandates in politics. In these environments, alliances are particularly artificial and fragile. We therefore see that seeking to put in place mechanisms explicitly aimed at limiting the struggle for social rank is a way of encouraging altruistic behavior, while denying, minimizing, or even glorifying this instinct for struggle is a way of discarding the problem, with the consequences on the one hand of ultimately minimizing effective altruistic behavior, and on the other hand of encouraging the emergence of toxic solidarity of the 'us against them' type.To understand that altruism thrives poorly in a hostile environment, we can refer to the book If it's a man by Primo Levi.

Finally, let us point out that for an alliance to be positive, it is not enough for it to be in benevolent mode. What matters is the purpose of this alliance, in other words: does it serve a project built with reason and in line with the collective interest? We tend to attribute far too much importance to the intention displayed to the detriment of the content, and this is easily explained: the intention displayed, and the non-verbal attitude of the interlocutor are decoded instantly and effortlessly, so that following one's reasoning requires a much greater cognitive effort. Most of the time we simply give in to the easy way out and assume that form reflects substance. Already in Antiquity, rhetoric used this weakness for the purposes of social advancement, but in the modern era, rapid techniques and means of communication have made this bias so efficient, and therefore problematic, that it requires that the new The social organization that we will propose also puts up specific resistance to altruistic presentations whose effective aims are not.

Now let's return for a moment to the question we left unanswered: whether our benevolent social attitudes demonstrate sincere altruism or an alliance strategy. Let us note that from childhood, what is asked of the young student at school is not to love their master or mistress, but to respect their authority. In other words, the fact that this possibly involves adopting a hypocritical attitude poses no problem. At this point we simply see that the basis of education is not the development of sincere caring attitudes, but simply the restraining of violence, possibly by means of hypocrisy. We all understand that hypocrisy consists of taking it upon oneself, accumulating resentment or hatred, which risks spilling out suddenly if it boils over. In other words, our education system is optimized for when everything is going well, but in doing so aggravates the intensity of paroxysmal violence. Is this a reasonable optimization of our nature?
We will see in the next chapter which concerns cognitive dissonance, that our main objective will not be to directly fight against lies in social relations, because we have not found an efficient tool to discern the sincere from the simulated, but no longer to fight against lying to oneself. To do this, we just need to understand that it is above all lying to oneself that prevents simple dialogue from resolving differences. We will return to this again in terms of the moral stated in chapter 22.

A difficult task now remains: to raise awareness of the major importance of what we formulated previously, namely that the misfortune of a group does not come so much from the malevolence of the leader as from the permanent struggle for social advancement. . First, let's see why this question is so difficult to understand. Quite simply, because we have all been conditioned, on the one hand by the stories of our childhood, and on the other hand by the national narrative.
Stories from our childhood generally tell of the clash between good guys and bad guys, and the story ends well, peace returns, if the good guys win. In fact, we get into the habit of equating peace with a benevolent leader.
Concerning the national narrative, we are conditioned by the charter of human rights: men are born free and equal in rights, which is presented as an improvement compared to the Ancien Régime where birth gave everyone their social status . The underlying argument is that freedom is preferable to servitude. Certainly, it is much more equitable, but the other side of the coin is the exacerbation of the struggle for social status, since the good places have to be conquered instead of being allocated at the start. This is what led certain reactionaries to reject the French Revolution not so much to preserve their privileges, but for fear of the disorder that would result from this intensification of social struggles. Enlightenment thinkers largely idealized competition for social status, assuming that the qualities and courage of individuals would take precedence, whereas we have just seen that our instinct pushes us much more towards the game of alliances and the generalized nepotism that entails. results. In fact, the objective of equal opportunities supported at the level of national education is constantly fought by parents, who do everything to favor their offspring, for example by circumventing the school map, and in all cases the system alliances based on 'us against them' take over at the latest upon entry into the world of work.Moreover, what Marx masterfully showed in Capital, is that once privileges are abolished, servitude can in practice continue in the form of a social class, if the social organization - the legislative system in Marx's representation - does not sufficiently limit the appetites of the elites themselves organized as a class as opposed to deserving individuals. The 'us against them' is making a comeback in the form of class struggle, and at the start of the 21st century, the struggle of the people against the elites.

In conclusion, from the moment we decide that men are born free and equal in rights, it becomes necessary for the chosen system of social organization to succeed in: on the one hand limiting the effectiveness of the game of alliances for the conquest of social positions, under penalty of exacerbating 'us against them' and the universal violence that results from it; on the other hand to ensure that servitude does not reappear in the form of social classes which also generate violence of the 'us against them' type, what Marx called class struggle.

Widespread nepotism in the world of work

In the second part of this chapter, we will study how the objective of social advancement, and the generalized nepotism that it produces at the collective level, is expressed in the world of work. To do this, let us call on the work of C. Northcote Parkinson, and more precisely his article Parkinson's Law published in 1955 in the magazine The Economist. Parkinson notes that, during the first half of the 20th century, the number of ships in the Royal Navy decreased considerably, while the numbers did not decrease in the same proportions, and the management staff even increased significantly.
Parkinson finds the cause at two levels. On the one hand, when a person finds himself saturated with work, he is generally not just assisted by a second; she thus becomes the manager of a small department, so the management part increases. On the other hand, when a person lacks work, they tend to look for or invent new activities, generally of a bureaucratic nature, to maintain their position. In fact, the supervision of organizations tends to continually increase over time, gradually reducing the ratio of directly effective work to total work, and therefore the productivity of the whole.
Then, like Marx, Parkinson seeks a rigorous formalism, this time in the form of a formula making it possible to predict the increase in numbers over time. As in the case of Marx, it is not this formal aspect which is the most interesting, but rather the analysis of the causes of the problem observed, namely the continued inflation of staff in the administration. In terms of methodological rigor, Parkinson presents the same requirements and the same limits as Marx: he is not content to observe and denounce. He analyzes the causes, the mechanics that produces this. On the other hand, he does not propose a solution to remedy this.

Nowadays, the effect of Parkinson's law is denounced in books and articles devoted to 'Bullshit jobs', but the interpretation has become ideological, taking the form of an intention to alienate workers by capital, whereas we only see an effect of our genetic heritage expressed in a capitalist environment. The development of this point is postponed to chapter 19 on world trade.

By comparing Parkinson's work with the notion of generalized nepotism that we have just presented, we discover that what Parkinson observes and quantifies is the long-term effect of the struggle for social rank, in an environment where strong social conventions are enough to stop direct manifestations of violence. However, the effect he notes is nothing more and nothing less than the progressive asphyxiation of the organization under the weight of bureaucracy.

Parkinson's work has been too little disseminated to the general public, and above all its failure to take it into account is at the origin of the greatest political error from the 1980s, namely ultra-liberalism.
Milton Friedman notes, like C. Northcote Parkinson, the continual inflation of administration staff during the 30 glorious years, and deduces that the problem is inherent in the notion of administration, and therefore that the solution is widespread privatization. However, the work of Parkinson, then that synthesized by Meyer and Rowan which we will analyze in the next chapter, allows us to understand that private companies are also subject to progressive inflation of staff, at the same level, namely management, and for same reasons, namely the objective of social ascension of individuals. What is supposed to protect private companies from this drift is competition. Again, Meyer and Rowan explain why this doesn't work. Companies standardize their practices out of a need for credibility with their investors, customers and employees. Furthermore, once a certain size is exceeded, the elimination of the least productive companies, called creative destruction in capitalist jargon, ceases more or less because the community decides to save them to avoid the domino effect on subcontracting and other interdependencies.
On the other hand, once we massively privatize, the problem, already denounced by Marx, of progress which is not put at the service of all, is amplified, in particular because economic instability and job insecurity increase. Indeed, in the long term, growth is not accelerated by ultra-liberalism. The exceptional growth seen in Western countries during the 19th and 20th centuries was the product of technical progress, which itself was the result of the application of the scientific method. The economic system only plays a role to the extent that an overly ideological system can hinder this growth, as for example in the case of communism in the USSR. What worked best during this period was social democracy as advocated by Marx in Capital. Conversely, ultra-liberalism, that is to say the market freed from all obstacles, has shown that it generates booms which are inevitably followed by collapses, whether it is the great depression of 1929 or the Lehman Brothers affair in 2008, so the alleged gain does not exist over time. Put simply, the market does not have an endogenous regulatory mechanism. On the other hand, ultra-liberalism does indeed amplify the first criticism formulated by Marx with regard to capitalism, namely the imbalance in the relationship between employer and employee, which has the effect of soaring inequalities. Ultimately, the net effect of ultra-liberalism is not better growth in the long term, but an increase in inequalities.

Lean, as described in the book The Machine That Changed the World by James P. Womack, Daniel T. Jones, Daniel Roos, and Donna Sammons Carpenter, on the other hand, provides a real element of response to the problem raised by Parkinson.
Lean is a reaction movement against Fordism. Fordism is the continuation of what Marx describes in Capital : industrialization brings a shift in the demand for labor from qualified artisans to workers carrying out repetitive work that can be mastered without specific training. These workers do everything that machines cannot yet do, then are replaced by machines, and literally thrown into the street. Alongside this very socially disadvantaged working class, a more privileged class, managers and engineers, is gradually developing. Marx already mentions it in Capital, in a single line. With Fordism, the duality of poor working class and non-production class becomes central, and contradicts the class struggle as envisaged by Marx. Indeed, the major objective of individuals becomes to move from the class of workers to that of management and not to overthrow the system or to fight collectively as recommended by Marx. This development will produce what we call 'the middle classes'. We then arrive at what Parkinson describes. This is where Lean comes in, through an upgrading of the working class, both in terms of remuneration and training and accountability, with the double effect of limiting Parkinson's non-production workforce, therefore ultimately better productivity, and better quality products, because those who produce them know what they are doing throughout the manufacturing chain, whereas a Fordist organization is satisfied with external controls and often at the end of the chain. The spearhead of Lean was the Toyota organization which at the turn of the century produced the most reliable cars in the world.
But Lean does not stop at this response to the problems of Parkinson and Marx. It involves three other changes. The first is the financing of companies by banks more or less integrated into large industrial groups, therefore capable of working over a longer period. The second is the overhaul of the customer / supplier relationship (B to B), with cross-participations, cross-audits, and a balance which is established as a fair distribution of efforts and profits, where a system Fordist establishes balance on the basis of a relationship of force. The third is the overhaul of the producer-consumer relationship (B to C), with the effect of greater loyalty from a customer who is less looking for a good deal, and as an overall effect greater stability of the economy, which in turn ensures another pillar of Lean social balance, namely lifelong employment.
This brings us to the problem raised by Lean: it is a global system for organizing production, which assumes cultural elements present in Japan in the second half of the 20th century. However, its transposition in the West has been reduced to a simple optimization of production processes, therefore one more tool in the service of ultra-liberalism. More precisely, the perverse effect of this distorted application is increased pressure on operational staff, without limiting the inflation of management staff and associated bureaucracy, therefore a system that is ultimately counterproductive to with respect to the issues raised by Marx and Parkinson, with the net effect of a further simple increase in inequalities.

In summary, Parkinson provides us with the tool to understand that when state services no longer seem to match their operating costs, the solution is not to reduce the scope of public services by privatizing and by liberalizing, nor to impose austerity in a purely macro-economic logic, but to strengthen the fight against inflation in non-directly productive positions.
Furthermore, this chapter taught us something else surprising, namely that the bureaucracy of the State on the one hand, and racism or nationalism on the other hand, have the same origin which is the struggle of individuals for their ascension. social which leads on one hand to the proliferation of hierarchical levels, and on the other to the exacerbation of 'us against them' type behavior.

A final remark to better understand the importance of Parkinson's article. The motivation he puts forward for moving from production to management is social prestige. He is absolutely right, and we have just seen that this is linked to our genetic heritage. In other words, the majority of individuals instinctively appreciate their professional value as linked to the size of the pyramid of people under their command.
The most telling illustration, because the most extreme, and therefore the most shocking, is the remuneration of the bosses of large companies. In old industrial sectors such as the automobile industry, the company's bottom line is much more the sum of the extra effort and pay restrictions made by rank-and-file employees and subcontractors than the effect of the genius decisions of the boss. However, the boss does not find it shocking to receive an incredible remuneration compared to the corresponding hourly rate. The explanation is that his evaluation is in fact based on the size of the social pyramid of which he occupies the top, and not on an evaluation of his individual productivity. On the other hand, external observers who are not themselves at the top of a social pyramid, possibly more modest, could make the same evaluation, and therefore find all this normal, since they have the same genetic heritage. However, they are shocked, which shows that as we mentioned in Chapter 1, confidence in the social organization is on the other hand linked to the evaluation of its capacity to make everyone benefit from progress, it is that is to say largely of its capacity to produce a certain social justice.
This proves to us that the motivation to no longer do oneself is extremely strong, so fighting against Parkinson's law is very difficult, and yet absolutely necessary to ensure social cohesion. In the next chapter, we will see how all this translates at the level of individual psychology.

[ When reading for the first time, for greater clarity regarding the big picture, you can skip directly to Chapter 3. ]

A derivative theory: transactional analysis

Transactional analysis is largely the result of observing, and classifying, the effects of generalized nepotism, without returning to the origin of the phenomenon, namely generalized nepotism and more precisely the struggle for social rank.
Indeed, at the level of the three ego states, the 'parent' state can be interpreted as the protocol for revalidation of the social hierarchy, exactly like the higher-ranking monkey who awaits the grin of the lower-ranking monkey indicating his acceptance of the established hierarchy. The 'adult' state corresponds to the rational formulation, without reference to social rank. Finally, the 'child' state in response to a 'parent' state corresponds to the refusal of validation of the social hierarchy.

Alternative expressions of social ambition

There are two alternative forms of expression of social ambition.
The first is belonging to a group advocating an ideal. We could cite as an example Freemasonry, the Rotary club, extreme political parties or any religious movement, while making it clear that this in no way implies an equivalence between these different organizations. Their common point is values u200bu200bpresented as superior to what is described as the common standard. The big problem with this form of elitism, as opposed to the artistic expression that we will see right after, is twofold.
On the one hand, it encourages lying to oneself, and therefore does not conform to the morality that we will establish in chapter 22. Indeed, the more elitist the group wants to be, the more its unity presupposes a form of doctrinal purity which implies allegiance to the values u200bu200bof the group, and more broadly to all the associated mythical beliefs concerning the nature of man, of society, of what is natural or not. In fact, the individual has no other alternative than to end up lying to himself in order to conform without experiencing too much cognitive dissonance, or to ultimately be rejected from the group, with more or less subtlety depending on the culture and practices of the group in question. The higher the cultural level of the group, the more the discourse put in place to support mythical beliefs will be elaborated, the tolerance displayed, and the practices refined, therefore lying to oneself will be facilitated. However, the purpose and effect of the general mechanics remains the same.
On the other hand, this form of elitism naturally favors nepotism and its consequence of 'us against them'. This is all the more problematic as the elitist, altruistic or moral dimension will be used to justify the associated violence: “It’s for a good cause! »
Religious wars are only the most violent expression of these two combined factors.
This leads us to be extremely reserved regarding any form of group ideal as long as the group advocates defined values, that is to say something other than submission to facts and the scientific method as a way of understanding them. Refer to Chapter 22 to understand what we mean by 'scientific method'.

The second alternative form of expression of social ambition is art in the general sense.
We first define as art in the general sense any personal aesthetic construction, which includes not only initial forms such as painting or sculpture, but also more abstract forms such as the mathematical theories of Alexandre Grothendieck.
Then, we define sublimation as the expression of an instinct, that is to say of part of our heritage linked to evolution, in a transformed form which makes it possible to avoid a certain number of harmful consequences. linked to its direct expression.
Once these definitions have been established, we can present art in the general sense as the possibility of a sublimated version of social ambition.
The great interest of this sublimated form is that the individual no longer seeks support solely through the power of the group to which he or she gives allegiance, but also through the power of his or her personal creation. We can therefore see art as one or even the individualist form of social ambition. From our point of view, this makes it the most successful version. In fact, the individual is no longer subject exclusively to allegiance to the values u200bu200bof the group, which involves lying to oneself.
In addition, the individualism linked to this form also prevents vital energy from translating into generalized nepotism, 'us against them', and ultimately permanent violence. This unfortunately currently only concerns a minority of individuals deciding to pursue a career in art in the general sense, or simply with art, and this does not prevent a certain violence linked to the 'originality of my creation against that of of all the others'.However, a big question regarding art in the general sense, which we do not know how to answer, remains: do all individuals have significant artistic abilities in the general sense, just waiting to be developed, or is -is this just a donation that only concerns a minority?