Spencer Heath Archive

Item 174

Pencil by Heath on notepad paper.

Written during World War II

 

 

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF RECONSTRUCTION

or

RECONSTRUCTION PSYCHOLOGY

     Any bodily tension that is relieved by action is an emotion. If the bodily tension arises from a situation that menaces — causing hate or fright — the action that follows will be fight or flight, attack or escape. These are psycho-biological, glandular reactions. They may be modified by the higher nerve complexes but do not originate in and are not controlled by them. The menacing situation arouses only negative emotion and this induces only destructive or fugitive reaction. The intensity of the emotion and vigor of the reaction follows directly from the menace of the situation. Whether of an individual or a nation, the energy reserves are released. This is our psychology of war. The sinking of the Maine, of the Lusitania, attack on Pearl Harbor, these released the national adrenalin and all destructive energy. In these initial stages the energy and enthusiasm for war on both sides is at its highest; and both sides now proceed, the one towards victory, the other towards defeat. For one side the menace diminishes, for the other it grows worse. With victory in prospect the winning side relaxes and, with peace assured /?/, bogs down; while the losing side at last in despair accepts defeat.

     The psychology is now all reversed. The high glandular activation is followed by indifference and complacency in victory and national lethargy in defeat.

     These underlying factors are not safely to be disregarded in the prospects for post-war reconstruction.

     This writer remembers vividly his own reactions to the Armistice in 1918. As a producer of vital requisites of war, his projects and responsibilities had constantly and unprecedentedly expanded. Existing and multiplying contracts were in all stages from full completion of the earlier ones to preparatory work on the latest and larger ones and still larger under negotiation. On the one hand, Government applied every aid and pressure for production, on the other almost every obstacle to both production and expansion; yet production and expansion went on.

     Suddenly all was changed, all aims and objectives reversed. In my own case the shock was almost paralyzing. Enthusiasms were gone; only a vast complicated mess to clean up. A state almost of lethargy was followed by a reaction, an almost reckless urge to salvage assets and facilities for peace-time products under an anticipated peace-time demand, taking risks that were as imprudent as they would have been impossible at other times, and the results were, of course, much less than were desired.

     This recklessness on the part of ownership and management was curiously paralleled in the ranks where no risks or responsibilities were involved. Wage earners, no longer under the stimulation of war, became, for the most part, reckless and indifferent to results and consequences. Both discipline and intensity of action were relaxed. The confinement to schedules and production quotas was broken down and no sobering /?/ responsibilities ensued. A spirit of slap-dash abandon prevailed. Money wages were high and rising and there was no spur to pride in craftsmanship or in prudent accumulation. No rainy day was felt or foreseen. And perhaps strangest of all, it was the writer’s observation that men who had been careful and conservative in the use and care of materials and facilities became reckless and, it almost seemed, wanton destroyers of whatever came into their hands. Materials were wastefully consumed, facilities abused. Fragile instruments would be tossed about and thrown down, with little or no care for consequences. Without government inspection or any direct customer control there was a let-down of standards and almost abandonment of excellence.

     This psychological reaction to the peace must have been a large contributing factor in the collapse that followed the immediate post-war inflationary fever. It should not be unanticipated in the peace-time yet to come. How it can be mitigated, if not prevented may be hard to say. A psychological result is likely to have deep-rooted causes. But one fundamental suggestion may at least be advanced.

     War, for the most part, reduces the rank and file of men, industrial as well as military, from a relative condition of independent action to a condition of status under regimentation. Conformity is encouraged; individuality and responsibility is unrewarded, if not repressed. Pressure and discipline takes the place of pride and self-responsibility. When peace comes the pressure is released, but the responsibility remains. Men who were relatively efficient under pressure become irresponsible under relative freedom and a sense of responsibility must be cultivated again — re-education, as it is called. Large enterprises, especially when government operated or controlled, are not conducive to independence and responsibility in the rank and file. Only in small free enterprisers are recompense and responsibility directly joined. The individual enterpriser — proprietor of whatever he administers — has profit tied to performance, penalty tied to default. He is automatically self-disciplined and the more he /the? Check original/ stakes the higher his responsibility; and it is upon him and his associates that large enterprises — even governments — so largely depend for their patronage or support.