Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-l7hp2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T09:07:01.093Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Chapter 2 - Hardwiring inside and outside People

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 January 2023

Fathali M. Moghaddam
Affiliation:
Georgetown University
Get access

Summary

Hardwiring inside individuals (almost exclusively in the brain) has been studied extensively in psychological science, but hardwiring outside individuals has received scant attention. Hardwiring outside individuals consists of the total ways of life of human beings, including the built environment, societal organization, and formal institutions, as well as informal culture, narratives, and all form of communications, leader–follower relations, and cultural carriers. As discussed in this chapter, this external hardwiring is already present when the individual comes into this world, and it continues (with some degree of change) after the individual has departed. Formal hardwiring such as blackletter law and constitutions often continue over centuries, with little change in key areas – for example, through originalist interpretations of constitutions. When revolutionary constitutions are introduced, there is often a huge gap between the aspirations of the constitution and the behavior of the population, which tends to continue as before. Cultural carriers are an important part of external hardwiring, sustaining continuity

Type
Chapter
Information
Political Plasticity
The Future of Democracy and Dictatorship
, pp. 12 - 22
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×