Blueprints For Bravery
This week something brave and bold happened: Cory Booker, the US Democratic Senator from New Jersey, broke the record for the longest speech / filibuster addressed to the Senate in the entirety of US history. Of course this is an achievement in itself, yet it was Booker’s reason for speaking for over 20 hours that roused the hopeful dissident in me. In fact, Cory Booker is one of the few public figures I have seen taking a very real (and equally symbolic) stand against the Trump administration. During his speech, Booker addressed the myriad of injustices Trump has levelled against immigrants, and against those who protest against him. He goes on at length to outline his fear for the American people and for democracy itself under the current administration, which has made no shortage of chaotic decisions (trying to steal Greenland, bullying Ukraine, suggesting that Gaza should be owned by the US, kidnapping students off the street, illegally deporting and detaining hundreds of Venezuelans in El Salvador, stopping USAid, pulling funding for health research, imposing hefty tariffs…the list goes on), which have rocked the global economy.
World leaders have - generally - been less than eager to publicly denounce Trump (Mark Carney, the Canadian Prime Minister, is worth noting as a key Western exception to this rule). So what does it take for someone to stand up for what they believe is right and just? What is the difference between individuals like Cory Booker, and other senior Democratic Party operatives like Chuck Schumer? I have spoken about integrity in leadership before. This time, we are going to explore what motivates some individuals to put their heads above the parapet - often at great risk or cost to themselves - whilst others bury their heads in the sand.
How can we understand the human motivation to put oneself in the firing line? In many ways it goes against many of our self-defence and survival mechanisms. However, research suggests individuals who do so exhibit a combination of physiological responses, personality traits, moral development, cognitive processes, and social influences, that make them more likely to intervene when they see injustice.
Is it in our genes?
Could it be that some people are more biologically hardwired to fight than others? Cannon’s (1929) theory of ‘Fight or Flight’ encapsulated two key behaviours observable in mammals when faced with a perceived threat -mobilisation to action, or fleeing the threat. In the many years since, researchers have observed several other fear responses. In essence these are acute stress responses - controlled by the central nervous system - which occur automatically when we perceive ourselves to be in a position of danger.
Fight: Confronting the threat with aggression, defensiveness, or assertiveness.
Flight: Escaping or avoiding danger, physically or mentally (e.g., withdrawing or overworking).
Freeze: Becoming immobile or dissociating, feeling stuck, or unable to react.
Fright: Tonic immobility, akin to playing dead, can be seen as panic like response (e.g. seen in individuals with PTSD).
Fawn: People-pleasing to appease the threat, often seen in trauma survivors who prioritise others' needs over their own.
There has been some debate as to whether these responses might occur in an ordered manner (i.e. starting with hyper-vigilance or ‘freeze’ - in which individuals are on high-alert, moving on to an attempt to flee the dangerous situation, before engaging in ‘fight’ if all other responses have failed; Bracha, 2004). Importantly, fear responses differ across individuals, based on their past experiences, e.g. trauma. Interestingly, one’s position in the social hierarchy can serve as a protective factor against stressors, and make one’s stress response more adaptive (Sapolsky, 1994). In this sense we might view Cory Booker’s mobilisation towards action as an adaptive stress response to the perceived threat of Trump, afforded to him in part because of his social dominance within the political world.
Help, I’m feeling existential dread!
Though there may be some physiological mechanisms at play, sometimes fear can elicit psychological and existential responses. Terror Management Theory (TMT; Greenberg et al., 1986) is a comprehensive psychological theory which suggests that our behaviour as humans is greatly influenced by our need to manage death-related anxiety. When we are reminded of our own mortality (often during times of crisis) we experience existential dread and anxiety, which we are motivated to reduce by:
Embracing our cultural worldviews & belief systems
Enhancing our connections to others
Bolstering our self-esteem
These worldviews provide meaning, order, and a sense of symbolic or literal immortality, reducing our fear of death. However, people have divergent responses when they are reminded of their own mortality: some individuals will be positive and proactive, reducing their anxiety by listening to experts, acting in alignment with their values, and standing up for what they believe is morally right (much like Cory Booker). Others may defend their beliefs - yet in a different way; more rigidly, and with an inclination to conform to social norms. Much like our physiological stress responses, our terror management responses vary across individuals, and are likely influenced by a variety of factors. Still, TMT is a particularly useful theory as it helps to explain the rise of prejudice, discrimination, and fascism we are seeing across the US and Europe.
I can’t bear the injustice of it all!
Have you ever felt deeply impacted by the myriad injustices in the world? If so it could be that you are a particularly empathic person, with a sensitivity to unfairness and inequality. I personally resonate with this, and I know that Ella is affected even more profoundly than I. There is no doubt that our multiple marginalised identities and our own experience of discrimination play a key role in shaping our empathic responses to other marginalised communities facing oppression. This resonance can be explained by the Psychological Reactance Theory (Brehm & Brehm, 2013). This theory suggests that when individuals perceive that their freedoms or the rights of similar others are being threatened, they may feel an increased motivation to resist oppression. Marry this with a strong aversion to injustice, and this can lead to moments of moral outrage that propel individuals to act.
Yet does one have to have faced discrimination directly to know that it is wrong? Research would suggest that some individuals have a fierce sense of social responsibility or civic duty (i.e. they care about society, they care about justice, and therefore act with positive citizenship in mind), which can drive them to act against wrongdoing. We could view civic duty as a character strength closely aligned to fairness (Peterson, 2004), and as a behavioural orientation impacted by one’s unique constellation of personality traits (Weinschenk, 2014). We see the propensity towards civic action come to life most starkly during the ‘bystander effect’ - whereby those with a strong sense of social responsibility are more likely to intervene in crises (Latane & Darley, 1968). An even more tangible real-life example is Nicholas Winton, who risked his own life to help Jewish children escape Nazi Germany during WWII. How do we explain such quiet heroism? Batson and colleagues (1991) suggests that some individuals simply have an altruistically-minded personality, which, coupled with high levels of empathy and responsibility spur them on to help others, even when no external rewards exist.
With these ideas in mind we might argue that Cory Booker is a highly empathic individual, whose own marginalised identity has been a catalyst in his decision to speak out. Equally, Booker may have a deep sense of civic duty shaped by an altruistic personality.
So why does this all matter? Well as a psychologist, my interest lies in understanding why people behave the way they do, what motivates them to act and under what circumstances. The wider implications of which are incredibly important - how do we influence more individuals to act in positive ways; to stand up for injustice, to want to create a better society and planet for us all? This is why the singular act of Cory Booker addressing the Senate - as a Democrat, and as a human desperately worried for the future of his country - paves the way for others to make a stand too.
As the eloquent poet, Amanda Gorman reminds us:
“For there is always light.
If only we are brave enough to see it.
If only we are brave enough to be it.”
- Amanda Gorman
Further Reading
Batson, C. D., Batson, J. G., Slingsby, J. K., Harrell, K. L., Peekna, H. M., & Todd, R. M. (1991). Empathic joy and the empathy-altruism hypothesis. Journal of personality and social psychology, 61(3), 413.
Brehm, S. S., & Brehm, J. W. (2013). Psychological reactance: A theory of freedom and control. Academic Press.
Bracha, H. S., Ralston, T. C., Matsukawa, J. M., Williams, A. E., & Bracha, A. S. (2004). Does “fight or flight” need updating?. Psychosomatics, 45(5), 448-449.
Cannon W. B. (1929). Bodily Changes in Pain, Hunger, Fear and Rage: An Account of Recent Research Into the Function of Emotional Excitement, 2nd ed. New York, Appleton-Century-Crofts.
Greenberg, J., Pyszczynski, T., & Solomon, S. (1986). The causes and consequences of a need for self-esteem: A terror management theory. In Public self and private self (pp. 189-212). New York, NY: Springer New York.
Latane, B., & Darley, J. M. (1968). Group inhibition of bystander intervention in emergencies. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 10(3), 215–221.
Peterson, C. (2004). Character strengths and virtues: A handbook and classification (Vol. 3). Oxford University Press.
Sapolsky, R. M. (1994, August). Individual differences and the stress response. In Seminars in Neuroscience (Vol. 6, No. 4, pp. 261-269). Academic Press.
Weinschenk, A. C. (2014). Personality traits and the sense of civic duty. American Politics Research, 42(1), 90-113.