From 85208da6d2baf40f7e30e74c63dcc4b7e3686e09 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Silvio Rhatto <rhatto@riseup.net>
Date: Mon, 2 Sep 2019 22:05:05 -0300
Subject: [PATCH] Updates books/sociology/secrecy
---
books/sociology/secrecy.md | 281 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++-
1 file changed, 278 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-)
diff --git a/books/sociology/secrecy.md b/books/sociology/secrecy.md
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--- a/books/sociology/secrecy.md
+++ b/books/sociology/secrecy.md
@@ -1,4 +1,6 @@
-[[!meta title="The Sociology of Secrecy"]]
+[[!meta title="The Sociology of Secrecy and of Secret Societies"]]
+
+By Georg Simmel.
## Excerpts
@@ -32,7 +34,6 @@
knowledge developing with reference to the other party. The
investigation should finally proceed in the opposite direction;
-
[...]
given by the total relationship of the knower to the known.
@@ -478,7 +479,6 @@
more decisive possibility of remaining secret.
While secrecy, therefore, is a sociological ordination which
-
[...]
As a general proposition, the secret society
@@ -487,3 +487,278 @@
the violent pressure of central powers. This is true, not alone in
political relations, but in the same way within the church, the
school, and the family.
+
+ [...]
+
+ Thus the secret society
+ cotinterbalances the separatistic factor which is peculiar to, every
+ secret by the very fact that it is society.
+
+ [...]
+
+ lating will; for growth from within, constructive purposefulness.
+ This rationalistic factor in their upbuilding cannot express itself
+ more distinctly than in their carefully considered and clear-cut
+ architecture. I cite as example the structure of the Czechic secret
+ order, Omlaidina, which was organized on the model of a group
+ of the Carbonari, and became known in consequence of a judicial
+ process in I893. The leaders of the Omladina are divided into
+ "thumbs" and "fingers." In secret session a "thumb" is chosen
+ by the members. He selects four "fingers." The latter then
+ choose another " thumb," and this second " thumb " presents himn-
+ self to the first "thumb." The second "thumb" proceeds to
+ choose four more "fingers"; these, another "thumb;" and so
+ the articulation continues. The first " thumb " knows all the
+ other " thumbs," but the remaining " thumbs " do not know each
+ other. Of the "fingers" only those four know each other who
+ are subordinate to one and the same "thumb." All transactions
+
+ [...]
+
+ of the Omladina are conducted by the first "thumb," the " dicta-
+ tor." He informs the other "thumbs" of all proposed under-
+ takings. The "thumbs" then issue orders to their respective
+ subordinates, the "fingers." The latter in turn instruct the mem-
+ bers of the Omnladina assigned to each. The circumstance that
+ the secret society must be built up, from its base by calculation and
+ conscious volition evidently affords free play for the peculiar
+ passion which is the natural accompaniment of such arbitrary
+ processes of construction, such foreordaining programs. All
+ schematology - of science, of conduct, of society - contains a
+ reserved power of compulsion. It subjects a material which is
+ outside of thought to a form which thought has cast. If this is
+ true of all attempts to organize groups according to a priori prin-
+ ciples, it is true in the highest degree of the secret society, which
+ does not grow, which is built by design, which has to reckon with
+ a smaller quantum of ready-made building material than any
+ despotic or socialistic scheme. Joined to the interest in making
+
+ [...]
+
+ The secret society must seek to create among the cate-
+ gories peculiar to itself, a species of life-totality. Around the
+ nucleus of purposes which the society strongly emphasizes, it
+ therefore builds a structure of formulas, like a body around a
+ soul, and places both alike under the protection of secrecy, because
+ only so can a harmonious whole come into, being, in which one
+ part supports the other. That in this scheme secrecy of the
+ external is strongly accentuated, is necessary, because secrecy is
+ not so much a matter of course with reference to these super-
+ ficialities, and not so directly demanded as in the case of the real
+ interests of the society. This is not greatly different from the
+ situation in military organizations and religious communities.
+ The reason why, in both, schematism, the body of forms, the fixa-
+ tion of behavior, occupies so large space, is that, 'as a general pro-
+ position, both the military and the religious career demand the
+ wvhole man; that is, each of them projects the whole life upon a
+ special plane; each composes a variety of energies and interests,
+ from a particular point of view, into a correlated unity. The
+ secret society usually tries to do the same.
+
+
+ [...]
+
+ The secret society must seek to create among the cate-
+ gories peculiar to itself, a species of life-totality. Around the
+ nucleus of purposes which the society strongly emphasizes, it
+ therefore builds a structure of formulas, like a body around a
+ soul, and places both alike under the protection of secrecy, because
+ only so can a harmonious whole come into, being, in which one
+ part supports the other. That in this scheme secrecy of the
+ external is strongly accentuated, is necessary, because secrecy is
+ not so much a matter of course with reference to these super-
+ ficialities, and not so directly demanded as in the case of the real
+ interests of the society. This is not greatly different from the
+ situation in military organizations and religious communities.
+ The reason why, in both, schematism, the body of forms, the fixa-
+ tion of behavior, occupies so large space, is that, 'as a general pro-
+ position, both the military and the religious career demand the
+ wvhole man; that is, each of them projects the whole life upon a
+ special plane; each composes a variety of energies and interests,
+ from a particular point of view, into a correlated unity. The
+ secret society usually tries to do the same. One of its essential
+ characteristics is that, even when it takes hold of individuals only
+
+ [...]
+
+Counterpart of the official world, detachment from larger structures in
+which it's contained (the next level of recursion):
+
+ Moreover, through such formalism,
+ just as through the hierarchical structure above discussed, the
+ secret society constitutes itself a sort of counterpart of the official
+ world with which it places itself in antithesis. Here we have a
+ case of the universally emerging sociological norm; viz., struc-
+ tures, which place themselves in opposition to and detachment
+ from larger structures in which they are actually contained,
+ nevertheless repeat in themselves the forms of the greater struc-
+ tures. Only a structure that in some way can count as a whole
+ is in a situation to hold its elements firmly together. It borrows
+ the sort of organic completeness, by virtue of which its members
+ are actually the channels of a unifying life-stream, from that
+ greater whole to which its individual members were already
+ adapted, and to which it can most easily offer a parallel by means
+ of this very imitation.
+
+ -- 482
+
+Freedom and law from the inside:
+
+ In exercise of this freedom a territory is occupied to which the norms of the
+ surrounding society do not apply. The nature of the secret
+ society as such is autonomy. It is, however, of a sort which
+ approaches anarchy. Withdrawal from the bonds of unity which
+ procure general coh,erence very easily has as consequences for the
+ secret society a condition of being without roots, an absence of
+ firm touch with life (Lebensgefiihl), and of restraining reserva-
+ tions. The fixedness and detail of the ritual serve in part to
+ counterbalance this deficit. Here also is manifest how much men
+ need a settled proportion between freedom and law; and, further-
+ more, in case the relative quantities of the two are not prescribed
+ for him from a single source, how he attempts to reinforce the
+ given quantum of the one by a quantum of the other derived from
+ any source whatsoever, until such settled proportion is reached.
+
+ -- 482
+
+Existem a partir de sociedes públicas e de forma exclusiva::
+
+ The secret society, on the other hand, is a secondary structure;
+ i. e., it arises always only within an already complete society.
+
+ [...]
+
+ That they can build them selves up with such characteristics is possible, however, only
+ under the presupposition of an already existing society. The
+ secret society sets itself as a special society in antithesis with the
+ wider association included within the greater society. This anti-
+ thesis, whatever its purpose, is at all events intended in the spirit
+ of exclusion. Even the secret society which proposes only to
+ render the whole community a definite service in a completely
+ unselfish spirit, and to dissolve itself after performing the service,
+ obviously regards its temporary detachment from that totality as
+ the unavoidable technique for its purpose. Accordingly, none of
+ the narrower groups which are circumscribed by larger groiups
+ are compelled by their sociological constellation to insist so
+ strongly as the secret society upon their formal self-sufficiency.
+ Their secret encircles them like a boundary, beyond which there is
+ nothing but the materially, o,r at least formally, antithetic, which
+ therefore shuts up the society within itself as a complete unity.
+ In the groupings of every other sort, the content of the group-
+
+Aristocracy:
+
+ This significance of secret associations, as intensification of
+ sociological exclusiveness in general, appears in a very striking
+ way in political aristocracies. Among the requisites of aristo-
+ cratic control secrecy has always had a place. It makes use of
+ the psychological fact that the unknown as such appears terrible,
+ powerful, and threatening. In the first place, it employs this fact
+ in seeking to conceal the numerical insignificance of the govern-
+ ing class. In Sparta the number of warriors was kept so, far as
+
+ [...]
+
+ On the other hand, the democratic principle is
+ bound up with the principle of publicity, and, to the same end, the
+ tendency toward general and fundamental laws. The latter relate
+ to an unlimited number of subjects, and are thus in their nature
+ public. Conversely, the employment of secrecy within the aristo-
+ cratic regime is only the extreme exaggeration of that social
+ exclusion and exemption for the sake of which aristocracies are
+ wont to oppose general, fundamentally sanctioned laws.
+ In case the notion of the aristocratic passes over from the
+
+Freedom, obedience and centralization:
+
+ To this result not merely the correlation of demand
+ from freedom and for union contributes, as we have observed it
+ in case of the severity of the ritual, and in the present instance it
+ binds together the extremes of the two tendencies. The excess of
+ freedom, which such societies possessed with reference to all
+ otherwise valid norms, had to be offset, for the sake of the
+ equilibrium of interests, by a similar excess olf submissiveness
+ and resigning of the individual will. More essential, however.
+ was probably the necessity of centralization, which is the con-
+ dition of existence for the secret society, and especially when,
+ like the criminal band, it lives off the surrounding society,
+ when it mingles with this society in many radiations and
+ actions, and when it is seriously threatened with treachery
+ and diversion of interests the moment the most invariable
+ attachment to one center ceases to prevail. It is conseqeuntly
+ typical that the secret society is exposed to peculiar dangers,
+ especially when, for any reasons whatever, it does not develop
+ a powerfully unifying authority. The Waldenses were in
+ nature not a secret society. They became a secret society in
+ the thirteenth century only, in consequence of the external pres-
+ sure, which made it necessary to keep themselves from view. It
+ became impossible, for that reason, to hold regular assemblages,
+ and this in turn caused loss of unity in doctrine. There arose a
+ number of branches, with isolated life and development, fre-
+ quently in a hostile attitude toward each other. They went into
+ decline because they lacked the necessary and reinforcing attri-
+ bute of the secret society, viz., constantly efficient centralization.
+
+Responsibility:
+
+ Nevertheless, responsibility
+ is quite as immediately joined with the ego - philosophically, too,
+ the whole responsibility problem is merely a detail of the problem
+ of the ego - in the fact that removing the marks of identity of
+ the person has, for the naive understanding in question, the effect
+ of abolishing responsibility. Political finesse makes no less use of
+ this correlation. In the American House of Representatives the
+ real conclusions are reached in the standing,committees, and they
+ are almost always ratified by the House. The transactions of
+ these committies, however, are secret, and the most important
+ portion of legislative activity is thus concealed from public view.
+ This being the case, the political responsibility of the repre-
+ sentatives seems to be largely wiped out, since no one can be
+ made responsible for proceedings that cannot be observed. Since
+ the shares of the individual persons in the transactions remain
+ hidden, the acts of committees and of the House seem to be those
+ of a super-individual authority. The irresponsibility is here also
+ the consequence or the symbol of the same intensified sociological
+ de-individualization which goes with the secrecy of group-action.
+ In all directorates, faculties, committees, boards of trustees, etc.,
+ whose transactions are secret, the same thing holds. The indi-
+ vidual disappears as a person in the anonymous member of the
+ ring, so to speak, and with him the responsibility, which has no
+ hold upon him. in his intangible special character.
+ Finally, this one-sided intensification of universal sociological
+
+ -- 496-497
+
+ [...]
+
+Danger for the rest of society and the existing oficial and central power:
+
+ Wherever there is an attempt to realize
+ strong centralization, especially of a political type, special organi-
+ zations of the elements are abhorred, purely as such, entirely apart
+ from their content and purposes. As mere unities, so to speak,
+ they engage in competition with the central principle.
+
+ [...]
+
+ Accordingly, the secret society seems to be dangerous simply
+ because it is secret. Since it cannot be surely known that any
+ special organization whatever may not some day turn its legally
+ accumulated powers to some undesired end, and since on that
+ account there is suspicion in principle on the part of central
+ powers toward organizations of subjects, it follows that, in the
+ case of organizations which are secret in principle, the suspicion
+ that their secrecy conceals dangers is all the more natural.
+
+ [...]
+
+ Thus the secret society, purely on the ground of its secrecy, appears
+ dangerously related to conspiracy against existing powers.
+
+ [...]
+
+ The secret association is in such bad repute as enemy of central powers that,
+ conversely, every politically disapproved association must be
+ accused of such hostility!
+
+ -- 497-498
--
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