five - Order and disorder

Summary

(Introduction

In 2002 an episode of The Simpsons was broadcast in which Bart Simpson had an infectious illness forcing him to live in a clear plastic bubble. In one scene Bart was told off for slurping his soup. Bart's reply was a simple, “My bubble, my rules”. His response neatly encapsulated the ethical egoism of late modern individualism, where the self is supreme and often blind to its impact on others. According to Michael Hechter and Christine Horne (2009) the basic problem of social order is how this individualism can be reconciled with the necessities of living a social existence:

The problem arises because human beings are both individual and social. If we were each living alone on a private planet, we could do whatever we wanted and would never have to worry about anyone else. … Every individual inhabits a separate physical body and thus each has his or her own emotions, information, feelings, and ambitions. Yet we are not completely independent. (2009: 1)

Individualism – or a lack of regard for others – means it is okay for a single-occupancy car to be parked in a parent and child parking zone because you are just popping into the supermarket; or to push in front of someone queuing for a cinema ticket because you really must see the film; or to take someone's car without permission because it is raining and you don't want to get wet. My bubble, my rules, and to hell with the consequences for anyone else. Yet, if everyone is motivated entirely by self-interest then social order is impossible to achieve. According to Hechter and Horne (2009: 1), for social order to be possible, ‘[p]eople must be able to coordinate their actions and they must cooperate to attain common goals’; as the journalist Lynne Truss once observed, ‘all the important rules surely boil down to one: remember you are with other people; show some consideration ’ (2005: 12, emphasis in original). The former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher once famously declared:

… you know, there's no such thing as society. There are individual men and women and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look after themselves first. It is our duty to look after ourselves and then, also, to look after our neighbours.