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Because this elite status is associated with social reproduction, Sciences Po launched an "Equal Opportunity Programme" in 2001, to increase the representation of working class families, which as of 2013, make up 9% of students.Sciences Po has been described as a school prioritising professional networks over expertise. It diversification beyond political science and history in the 1990s would have resulted in limited expertise on each subject. As a result, the school is nicknamed "Sciences Pipeau" (pronounced and sometimes spelled "Sciences Pipo", "pipeau" meaning "scam" in colloquial French) by the general public and within the school.
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One of the courses related to the Law have been nicknamed "Legal Bullshit" by students due to the lack of content.The school has therefore been criticized by outside observers and students for not having them acquire an actual expertise. The sociologist Nicolas Jounin, alumnus of Sciences Po, talked about an "intellectual imposture" in an op-ed called "it is time to be done with Sciences Po". The journalist at France Culture Guillaume Erner stated that the institution is "only advertisement and artifice".
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According "Le Monde", students in the school would be sometimes "disillusioned" after having "fantasized" about the school.The institute has been described as having low expectations from its students. According to Le Monde, "when students educated in a faculty of social science join a master at Sciences Po, their academic level is often higher than those who followed multi-disciplinary education at an institute of political science". The Law courses at Sciences Po have also received criticism for holding lower standards than those at full law degrees; a student both at Sciences Po and at Paris II told L'Express: "In Law (at Paris II), I spend three days on an essay and I have 8 (out of 20); at Sciences Po, I spend three hours on an essay and I have 16 (out of 20)."
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In 2012, lecturers at Sciences Po criticized instructions they received from the school telling them not to take into account grammar mistakes in their marking. The trend would furthermore be a decline of the level; according to Le Monde, the cause would be the 2001 "Equal Opportunity Programme", but a lecturer in the school stated in 2021 that the reason is more the desire to attract international students and therefore the need to mark more leniently: all marks are harmonized so that the average mark would always be the same.The school has also been criticized for its close-mindedness and for its self-persuasion to be an elite institution. Libération stated in an editorial that the school have not understood that it is not special in the outside world.
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Peter Gumbel called Sciences Po and other "Grandes Écoles" "elite colleges have become a machine for perpetuating a brilliant but blinkered, often arrogant and frequently incompetent ruling freemasonry". The academic Gilles Devers criticized the institution for being the "base of the conservatism, and the mold of the molluscs that make the public elite" where "dissenting ideas are only admitted if they strengthen the system".Sciences Po has also been accused of being unduly helped by the media and politicians. "Almost every French newspaper is run by an alumnus of Sciences Po", and most of the journalists in France are alumni from Sciences Po, so it would give the school "an unparalleled media coverage" and permit it to "cultivate a culture of secrecy" about its internal affairs.
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"Sciences-Po is under-criticized," analyzes a professor for Mediapart, "Those who teach there have no interest, and not necessarily the urge, to do so. Those who are not there can hope to be there one day." The journalist Ariane Chemin stated in 2013 that, because so many journalists come from Sciences Po, the school has an unduly good public reputation.The institute has also been criticized for the unfair favoritism it would be the subject of from the State, in which many public servants would be alumni of the school.
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It is partly state-funded, and some, including institutes of political studies in the provinces, have indeed accused it of receiving a disproportionate share of public money. In 2012, for example, Sciences Po Lille student representatives called Sciences Po (Paris) the "coronation of State inequity". Nicolas Jounin stated that the school is a "financial hold-up".The use of public service access to gain lucrative positions in the private sector is generally criticized as "pantouflage", but is advised by the director Mathias Vicherat to the students of the school.
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Sciences Po is funded in large part by public money and is a semi-public institute but is governed as a private institution. It has been described by Alain Garigou as governed from 1872 to 2013 in compliance the "discreet rules of the bourgeoisie". The founder Emile Boutmy stayed the director until his death in 1906 and his successor stayed until he was 90 years old in 1936. In 2013, the process of designation of a successor for Richard Descoings has been openly criticized.
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Louis Vogel, professor of law, former president of the Society of Presidents of university, of Paris 2 University and of Sorbonne University and Sciences Po alumnus, had announced its candidacy based on bringing the school closer to the universités in a new international environment. He was presented as the front-runner as his profile and experience matched the best the advertised job profile. Louis Vogel was one of the three preselected candidacies but ended up retracting its candidacy before the final choice.
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He stated that the pre-selection also chose candidates who did not fit with the job profile, showed that the real desired profile was else, and that he did not want to endorse with his candidacy a process that is in opposition with his convictions. He further stated that Sciences Po "is sending a bad signal" and that they will have to solve their issue internally. The student vice-president of the executive board said that this decision is a "disavowal" for the research committee of Sciences Po.
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Two other candidates publicly criticized the process. In the end, Frédéric Mion made a last minute candidacy with a light application of 9 pages and was chosen with the sponsorship of Olivier Duhamel.In 2021, after the Duhamel scandal, and the resignations of Olivier Duhamel and Frédéric Mion, the process for the designation of the new head of the National Foundation, a new board of the Foundation and a new head the institute (Sciences Po itself) was heated and largely criticized. The press talked about a "bad soap" filled with "low blows", and alumni and academics talked about a "grotesque" "parody of democracy" According to Challenges, people close to Duhamel who are still members of the board of the National Foundation and who will be leaving are creating ad hoc committees, outside of the status of the Foundation, to process to votes in which they have a preponderant voice to choose in advance who can be candidate to become the head and the new members of the board, who will select afterwards the director of Sciences Po itself.
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After several votes which have been criticized for their lack of due process, Laurence Bertrand has been pre-selected to become the new head of the Foundation. Another candidate judged the legitimity of the process "hardly credible".
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A third candidate published an op-ed in Le Monde exposing the details of what he called a "tragicomedy". In the end, Mathias Vicherat, former CEO of Danone, was chosen. This appointment has been criticized, because Vicherat does not have an academic background.
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He would have been chosen as a friend and former classmate of Emmanuel Macron. A lecturer at the Institute said: "The whole procedure was shamelessly rigged so that in the end, only the candidacy of Mathias Vicherat, the President's friend, with no academic experience, remained. They methodically discarded all serious candidates."
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Camille Kouchner, daughter of Bernard Kouchner, published a book in which she wrote that her step-father Olivier Duhamel, at that time president of the Foundation of Sciences Po which was the "heart of power" for 30 years, sexually abused his step-son for two years during his childhood. She denounced the "microcosm of powerful people, Saint-Germain-des-Prés" (headquarters of Sciences Po) who "knew" according to her, but acted "like nothing happened". Newspapers further unearthed a series of controversial attitudes toward the sexuality of minors. It led to a series of investigations on the environment of Duhamel at Sciences Po and on the way they dealt with these abuses.The scandal "shook" Sciences Po (Le Monde) and put it into turmoil (France Culture).
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The scandal was compared to a "bomb" launched on Sciences Po (Le Figaro), to an "unpinned grenade throwned on Sciences Po" (Le Temps and Courrier International) and to a "shockwave" on Sciences Po (The Times, La Croix etc.). Frederic Mion had been alerted, in particular by Aurélie Filippetti in 2019, former Ministry of Culture, of the situation but a "law of silence" had been put in place in the family regarding this.
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Mion declared he thought it was a "rumour" and that he should have taken the issue more seriously. He told Le Monde: "I let myself be fooled".
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According to Le Temps, a group of lecturers knew these allegations, some of them since 2008. They didn't break the silence, justifying themselves by the possible prescriptive period or that these facts were part of the "familial saga" in a hedonist context and "complex parents-children relations" in the 1970s.The scandal eventually led to a series of resignations under pressure at Sciences Po. After Duhamel himself resigned, both students of Sciences Po and public figures asked for the resignation of Frédéric Mion, director of Sciences Po, who first refused to do so.
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Mion, who Duhamel hand-picked in controversial circumstances as director of Sciences Po with a salary of 200,000 euros, first acknowledged "errors in judgment in handling of the allegations", and after a continuous pressure to do so, resigned in the end. It later became apparent that he had lied to the inspectors to protect at least 6 other people inside Sciences Po. Marc Guillaume, former secretary of state, current prefect of the Paris region, and a close associate of Duhamel, resigned from the National foundation of Sciences Po.Through Sciences Po, Duhamel had a large "network of influence" in politics, newspapers, TV channels, finance, etc. and therefore the scandal attained many people because of their link with the institution.
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Their role in protecting this intellectual environment has been questioned. Duhamel's power has extented to Emmanuel Macron and Édouard Philippe (former prime minister), both Sciences Po alumni, and both are trying to distance themselves from the "Dumahel case". Elisabeth Guigou, former minister of Justice, resigned from the national commission on incest.The scandal also has put into light the power of the Foundation of Sciences Po, less well known than Sciences Po itself but "at the heart of strategical decisions since 1945", and that the FNSP and Sciences Po are "untouchable with the power of their network".Following the Duhamel scandal, Sciences Po issued a statement condemning "all forms of sexualized violence" and declaring "its shock and astonishment". It also stated: "The fight against sexual and gender-based violence is at the heart of our institution's core values and actions."
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After Richard Descoing, head of the school from 1997 to 2012, died under suspicious circumstances, it was revealed that he had sex with students, and made no case of Dominique Strauss-Kahn's habit of "seducing" young students. Descoing also has been accused of sending burning messages to students, but no further inquiry was made. Descoing had a controversial night life and relation to drugs, and was found dead in a hotel in suspicious circumstances.
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After the New York v. Strauss-Kahn case, DSK had to stop giving lectures at Sciences Po. He admitted orgies with young women but had denied any violence.In February 2021, hundreds of students and former students shared on Twitter allegations of rape or sexual abuse at several Instituts d'études politiques, and claimed that despite denunciations of victims, "colleagues and staff unwilling to take their complaints seriously". A hashtag #SciencesPorcs ("Sciences Pigs", similar to the French #Metoo hashtag #Balancetonporcs) has been widely used to do so.Among many op-eds dealing with the 2021 crisis at Sciences Po, two male alumni published in L'Express an op-ed specific to the sexual violence scandal, stating their disagreement with the "caricature" that is made of Sciences Po, which would be the object of "passions, sometimes irrational ones" in the public "imaginary" because of the elite status they say the institute has; they assured there is no systemic problem regarding sexual violence in Sciences Po. Bénédicte Durand, interim administrator of the school, further told Le Figaro that "no, there is no rape culture in Sciences Po".The school published a report on sexual and sexist violence that was called "abundant but shy".
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Students have created the associations "Alwanat" and "Being Black at Sciences Po" to denounce open anti-Arab, anti-Muslim, anti-Black and anti-Asian hate by staff and students in the Reims and Menton campuses. Students anonymously asked the institute to recognise the existence of racism in Sciences Po.Many students and some members of the French Parliament have expressed concern about the enforcement of racialism in Sciences Po.Sciences Po have been criticized in 2022 for "censuring" lectures on darwinism and theory of evolution, considered by some critics as the "ultimate taboo" in the institute. Vicherat, director of Sciences Po, insisted however that Darwin is not censured at Sciences Po.The institution has been accused in 2021 by two members of Parliament, in particular Annie Genevard, to give additional points to students using the controversial écriture inclusive. Sciences Po has denied this claim and it has been widely reported as fake news, but Le Figaro news have found the information to be true and some media have taken back their assessment of this information as being fake news.
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Alain Lancelot, director of Sciences Po from 1987 to 1996, was investigated for financial mismanagement by the French Court of Audit.Since 1997, the institution has been hit by a number of scandals, notably concerning the leadership of Richard Descoings, its director from 1997 to 2012.Descoings, director from 1997 to 2012, had been criticized for offering large sums of money (through salary rise, free accommodation, etc.) to diverse members of staff, including his wife, in spite of the fact that Sciences Po is partly stately funded.In February 2012, it was revealed that an inspector of the French Court of Audit, in charge of investigating the financial behaviour of Sciences Po, was at the same time employed by Sciences Po.On 3 April 2012, Descoings was found dead in his Manhattan luxury hotel room during a trip where he was representing Sciences Po in New York. The police initially concluded that his death had been caused by an overdose, but the final coronary report eventually stated that he died a natural death. Descoings' energy on this last day and the missing phones and computer have raised questions as to the precise circumstances of his death.In October 2012, the Court of Audit reprimanded Sciences Po for financial mismanagement, accusing it of opaque remuneration procedures, unwarranted expenses claims and excessive pay-rises for managers. The Court noted that the school's complex legal status – a public institute managed by a private trust – had contributed to dysfunction and waste.
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It also criticized the French government for increasing state funding for the school without insisting on additional public oversight. Sciences Po has also been accused to prevail results over morals.In November 2012, the government dismissed Hervé Crès, Sciences Po's interim director, but he sought the school's permanent directorship all the same, reasoning that Alain Lancelot and Richard Descoings, former Sciences Po directors, had also been reprimanded by the Court of Audit and yet performed well in their management of the school.In July 2015, Jean-Claude Casanova, the former president of the Foundation Nationale des Sciences Politiques, the private trust which manages Sciences Po, was fined €1500 for failing to properly consult the Foundation's Administrative Council over budgeting decisions involving public money. The Court of Financial and Budgetary Discipline eventually found Casanova guilty, but gave him a lenient sentence because the procedures had some part of regularity and because it was not customary in Sciences Po to follow all the financial rules.In February 2016, the Court of Audit noted that reforms had been made, but stated that greater transparency was still needed. Frédéric Mion, the then director of Sciences Po, defended the school's record and asked the judges to write their report again.
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Originally, only the "maîtrise en droit" delivered after 4 years of study by universités (as opposed to Grandes écoles like Sciences Po) was giving access to the legal profession. As soon as 2004, fearing for the access to the bar and legal professions to be open to institutions that are not faculties of law in universités, 54 professors of law signed a long text in the 'Recueil Dalloz' (major French legal journal), called "The Fight for the Law". They pointed out in particular the problem of the quality of the knowledge of legal professionals and of their deontology, should it be otherwise. They managed to have the education in law to have a special place in the French Code of Education.
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The move was co-led by Guillaume Drago, professor at Paris II Panthéon-Assas, and François Gaudu, professor at Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne.In 2007, however, a governmental decree authorized Sciences Po students to pass the Bar exam, providing they take a master's degree with the mention "law". Academics in law labeled such a move as a "coup" and created an online petition called "call against the questioning of the utility of legal studies in the education of lawyers" ("appel contre la remise en cause de l'utilité des études juridiques dans la formation des avocats").
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445 academics publicly signed the petition, which is 15% of all French academics in law. The unity of the French academic body was noted: left- and right-wing professors, professors from Paris and outside Paris, in public law or private law... were in favor of the move.
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Students’ unions supported it. The union of (French) law school's deans "totally" associated itself to the move too. These critics said that it would not be a problem if Sciences Po was offering 8 semesters of law, as required as a general rule, to access to the bar.
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However, Sciences Po would be offering only general courses in social sciences with only a "sprinkling of law" in the masters programs. That would not be enough to become a barrister (avocat) and would put into question the utility of the law to become one. It would be creating barristers with a cheap education in law and would be detrimental, in particular, for the citizens who would take the services of barristers who did not have a proper education in law.
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To them, with this decree, the law was becoming a marketing product in a service of a school of political science that has many connections with politicians. They would have preferred Sciences Po to keep with political sciences.In 2009, Sciences Po created the "École de droit de Sciences Po" ("law school", as opposed in French to a faculté de droit, "faculty of law"), delivering masters (graduate) degrees only. In 2008, partly as an answer, Paris II Panthéon-Assas created a collège de droit (undergraduate level) and then an "école de droit" (graduate level) on top of its faculty of law to attract top students in France. A lot of universities followed this model, and created these highly selective "colleges" or "schools".
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Sciences Po has been criticized for the abuse of the title of "professor" from their adjunct lecturers. Only 7% of the teaching body have permanent employment. People lecturing only a few hours call themselves "professor at Sciences Po". This creates artificial advertisement, both for Sciences Po advertising a prestigious "staff" and for politicians and journalists linking themselves to this prestigious network.
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It has been customary to graduate in Sciences Po in addition to a law school or a grande école in Paris, therefore many of these graduates are also graduates of the latter. Most the alumni network is composed of students who received lectures in Sciences in addition to another studies. In 2016, the Sciences Po Alumni Association declared that there were 55,000 alumni. Many alumni are notable for their roles in fields such as politics or business.
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Five of the eight presidents of the French Fifth Republic have attended Sciences Po, including Georges Pompidou (in addition to the École normale supérieure), François Mitterrand (in addition to the Paris Law Faculty), Jacques Chirac, Nicolas Sarkozy (who did not graduate; in addition to the law school of Paris Nanterre University), François Hollande (in addition to HEC and Paris II), and Emmanuel Macron. Acting president Alain Poher (in addition to Mines ParisTech) is also an alumnus. A number of French politicians who are Sciences Po alumni also graduated from Ecole Nationale d'Administration (ENA), as the Sciences Po degree and its preparatory programmes prepare well for the competitive entrance to ENA.According to a study published in Le Monde in 2017, 14% (81 of the 577) of French members of parliament elected the same year were Sciences Po graduates, the most represented university in the National Assembly.
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The French Castex government included a number of Sciences Po graduates, including Florence Parly, Bruno Le Maire, and Jean-Michel Blanquer.Some politicians having a role in international organisations were also students at Sciences Po, including Simone Veil, former President of the European Parliament; Boutros Boutros-Ghali, former UN Secretary General; Pascal Lamy, former Director-General of the World Trade Organisation; Michel Camdessus and Dominique Strauss-Kahn, former presidents of the International Monetary Fund; Jean-Claude Trichet, former President of the European Central Bank; and Marisol Touraine, Chair of Unitaid Executive Board. Sciences Po is also alma mater to politicians including Władysław Grabski (Prime Minister of Poland 1920, 1923-1925), Habib Bourgiba (Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Tunisia 1956-1957 and the first President of the Tunisian Republic 1957-1987), Joseph Ki-Zerbo (Burkinabé advocate for African independence), Mohammad Mosaddegh (Prime Minister of Iran 1951-1953), Pierre Trudeau (Prime Minister of Canada 1968–1979, 1980–1984), and Thanat Khoman (Thai Minister of Foreign Affairs 1959-1971 and Deputy Prime Minister 1981-1983). Among the recipients of Sciences Po doctorate honoris causa are Václav Havel (2009), Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (2011), Elena Zhemkova (2022), and Angela Merkel (2023).
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Senior French diplomats including Jean-Marcel Jeanneney (France's first Ambassador to Algieria) François Delattre (currently Permanent Representative of France to the UN), Gérard Araud (former ambassador to the USA), Sylvie Bermann (currently ambassador to Russia), Bernard Émié (currently Director of the DGSE), Jean-Maurice Ripert (former Permanent Representative of France to the United Nations, Ambassador of France to Russia, and Ambassador of France to China), and Maurice Gourdault-Montagne (currently ambassador to China) are also alumni.
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The writer Marcel Proust for one year, the founder of the modern Olympics Pierre de Coubertin for one year, fashion designer Christian Dior, author Leïla Slimani, author Emmanuel Carrère, Harvard University Professor of political science Stanley Hoffmann, Chinese linguist Ma Jianzhong, Director of Paris Peace Forum Justin Vaïsse, journalist Arthur Dreyfus, researcher, Margaret Maruani, political scientist Tiago C. Peixoto, and former Le Monde editor Jean-Marie Colombani have all graduated from Sciences Po.
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Jurist and 1907 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Louis Renault taught international law at Sciences Po from its foundation in 1875 until his death in 1918. Economist Jean-Paul Fitoussi has taught at Sciences Po since 1982. Élie Halévy taught history of English political ideas and socialism at Sciences Po from 1896 until his death in 1937. Pierre Renouvin, a French historian of international relations, taught at Sciences Po from 1938 to 1970 Arbitrator Emmanuel Gaillard taught at the Law School until his death.The philosopher, anthropologist and sociologist Bruno Latour taught at Sciences Po from 2006 until his death in 2022.Pierre Hassner, a Romanian-French geopolitologist and philosopher, was Director Emeritus of Research at the Sciences Po Center for International Studies and Research. Jean-Luc Parodi, a French political scientist, worked at the Sciences Po Center of Political Research for the entirety of his career.
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...-2021: Olivier Duhamel 2021-...: Louis Schweitzer (interim)
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1872-1906: Emile Boutmy 1906-1936: Eugène d'Eichtal 1945–47: Roger Seydoux 1947–79: Jacques Chapsal 1979–87: Michel Gentot 1987–96: Alain Lancelot 1997–2012: Richard Descoings 2012: Hervé Crès (interim) 2012–13: Jean Gaeremynck (interim) 2013–2021: Frédéric Mion 2021–2021 Bénédicte Durand (interim) 2021–present Mathias Vicherat
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A mythomoteur (compound of the French words for myth and engine) is the constitutive myth that gives an ethnic group its sense of purpose. The term was first used in this context by Ramon d’Abadal i de Vinyals, and was later taken up by John Armstrong in his book Nations before Nationalism. It has subsequently become a common theme in Anthony D. Smith's work on ethnicity and nationalism, particularly his book The Ethnic Origins of Nations. Three types of mythomoteur have been identified, the communal-political, the communal-religious, and the dynastic.
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Serbs: Kosovo Myth Romanians: Protochronism Gikûyû: Ngai
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Groupthink is a psychological phenomenon that occurs within a group of people in which the desire for harmony or conformity in the group results in an irrational or dysfunctional decision-making outcome. Cohesiveness, or the desire for cohesiveness, in a group may produce a tendency among its members to agree at all costs. This causes the group to minimize conflict and reach a consensus decision without critical evaluation.Groupthink is a construct of social psychology but has an extensive reach and influences literature in the fields of communication studies, political science, management, and organizational theory, as well as important aspects of deviant religious cult behaviour.
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Groupthink is sometimes stated to occur (more broadly) within natural groups within the community, for example to explain the lifelong different mindsets of those with differing political views (such as "conservatism" and "liberalism" in the U.S. political context or the purported benefits of team work vs. work conducted in solitude). However, this conformity of viewpoints within a group does not mainly involve deliberate group decision-making, and might be better explained by the collective confirmation bias of the individual members of the group.The term was coined in 1952 by William H. Whyte Jr. Most of the initial research on groupthink was conducted by Irving Janis, a research psychologist from Yale University.
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Janis published an influential book in 1972, which was revised in 1982. Janis used the Bay of Pigs disaster (the failed invasion of Castro's Cuba in 1961) and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 as his two prime case studies. Later studies have evaluated and reformulated his groupthink model.Groupthink requires individuals to avoid raising controversial issues or alternative solutions, and there is loss of individual creativity, uniqueness and independent thinking.
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The dysfunctional group dynamics of the "ingroup" produces an "illusion of invulnerability" (an inflated certainty that the right decision has been made). Thus the "ingroup" significantly overrates its own abilities in decision-making and significantly underrates the abilities of its opponents (the "outgroup"). Furthermore, groupthink can produce dehumanizing actions against the "outgroup".
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Members of a group can often feel under peer pressure to "go along with the crowd" for fear of "rocking the boat" or of how their speaking out will be perceived by the rest of the group. Group interactions tend to favor clear and harmonious agreements and it can be a cause for concern when little to no new innovations or arguments for better policies, outcomes and structures are called to question. (McLeod).
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Groupthink can often be referred to as a group of “yes men” because group activities and group projects in general make it extremely easy to pass on not offering constructive opinions. Some methods that have been used to counteract group think in the past is selecting teams from more diverse backgrounds, and even mixing men and women for groups (Kamalnath). Groupthink can be considered by many to be a detriment to companies, organizations and in any work situations.
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Most positions that are senior level need individuals to be independent in their thinking. There is a positive correlation found between outstanding executives and decisiveness (Kelman). Groupthink also prohibits an organization from moving forward and innovating if no one ever speaks up and says something could be done differently. Antecedent factors such as group cohesiveness, faulty group structure, and situational context (e.g., community panic) play into the likelihood of whether or not groupthink will impact the decision-making process.
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William H. Whyte Jr. derived the term from George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, and popularized it in 1952 in Fortune magazine: Groupthink being a coinage – and, admittedly, a loaded one – a working definition is in order. We are not talking about mere instinctive conformity – it is, after all, a perennial failing of mankind.
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What we are talking about is a rationalized conformity – an open, articulate philosophy which holds that group values are not only expedient but right and good as well. Groupthink was Whyte's diagnosis of the malaise affecting both the study and practice of management (and, by association, America) in the 1950s. Whyte was dismayed that employees had subjugated themselves to the tyranny of groups, which crushed individuality and were instinctively hostile to anything or anyone that challenged the collective view.American psychologist Irving Janis (Yale University) pioneered the initial research on the groupthink theory.
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He does not cite Whyte, but coined the term again by analogy with "doublethink" and similar terms that were part of the newspeak vocabulary in the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell. He initially defined groupthink as follows: I use the term groupthink as a quick and easy way to refer to the mode of thinking that persons engage in when concurrence-seeking becomes so dominant in a cohesive ingroup that it tends to override realistic appraisal of alternative courses of action. Groupthink is a term of the same order as the words in the newspeak vocabulary George Orwell used in his dismaying world of 1984.
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In that context, groupthink takes on an invidious connotation. Exactly such a connotation is intended, since the term refers to a deterioration in mental efficiency, reality testing and moral judgments as a result of group pressures. : 43 He went on to write: The main principle of groupthink, which I offer in the spirit of Parkinson's Law, is this: "The more amiability and esprit de corps there is among the members of a policy-making ingroup, the greater the danger that independent critical thinking will be replaced by groupthink, which is likely to result in irrational and dehumanizing actions directed against outgroups".
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: 44 Janis set the foundation for the study of groupthink starting with his research in the American Soldier Project where he studied the effect of extreme stress on group cohesiveness. After this study he remained interested in the ways in which people make decisions under external threats. This interest led Janis to study a number of "disasters" in American foreign policy, such as failure to anticipate the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor (1941); the Bay of Pigs Invasion fiasco (1961); and the prosecution of the Vietnam War (1964–67) by President Lyndon Johnson.
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He concluded that in each of these cases, the decisions occurred largely because of groupthink, which prevented contradictory views from being expressed and subsequently evaluated. After the publication of Janis' book Victims of Groupthink in 1972, and a revised edition with the title Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decisions and Fiascoes in 1982, the concept of groupthink was used to explain many other faulty decisions in history. These events included Nazi Germany's decision to invade the Soviet Union in 1941, the Watergate scandal and others.
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Despite the popularity of the concept of groupthink, fewer than two dozen studies addressed the phenomenon itself following the publication of Victims of Groupthink, between the years 1972 and 1998.: 107 This was surprising considering how many fields of interests it spans, which include political science, communications, organizational studies, social psychology, management, strategy, counseling, and marketing. One can most likely explain this lack of follow-up in that group research is difficult to conduct, groupthink has many independent and dependent variables, and it is unclear "how to translate theoretical concepts into observable and quantitative constructs". : 107–108 Nevertheless, outside research psychology and sociology, wider culture has come to detect groupthink in observable situations, for example: " critics of Twitter point to the predominance of the hive mind in such social media, the kind of groupthink that submerges independent thinking in favor of conformity to the group, the collective"" leaders often have beliefs which are very far from matching reality and which can become more extreme as they are encouraged by their followers.
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The predilection of many cult leaders for abstract, ambiguous, and therefore unchallengeable ideas can further reduce the likelihood of reality testing, while the intense milieu control exerted by cults over their members means that most of the reality available for testing is supplied by the group environment. This is seen in the phenomenon of 'groupthink', alleged to have occurred, notoriously, during the Bay of Pigs fiasco.
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""Groupthink by Compulsion roupthink at least implies voluntarism. When this fails, the organization is not above outright intimidation. In , refusal by the new hires to cheer on command incurred consequences not unlike the indoctrination and brainwashing techniques associated with a Soviet-era gulag."
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To make groupthink testable, Irving Janis devised eight symptoms indicative of groupthink:Type I: Overestimations of the group — its power and morality Illusions of invulnerability creating excessive optimism and encouraging risk taking. Unquestioned belief in the morality of the group, causing members to ignore the consequences of their actions.Type II: Closed-mindedness Rationalizing warnings that might challenge the group's assumptions. Stereotyping those who are opposed to the group as weak, evil, biased, spiteful, impotent, or stupid.Type III: Pressures toward uniformity Self-censorship of ideas that deviate from the apparent group consensus. Illusions of unanimity among group members, silence is viewed as agreement. Direct pressure to conform placed on any member who questions the group, couched in terms of "disloyalty" Mindguards— self-appointed members who shield the group from dissenting information.
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Irving Janis identified three antecedent conditions to groupthink:: 9 High group cohesiveness: Cohesiveness is the main factor that leads to groupthink. Groups that lack cohesiveness can of course make bad decisions, but they do not experience groupthink. In a cohesive group, members avoid speaking out against decisions, avoid arguing with others, and work towards maintaining friendly relationships in the group. If cohesiveness gets to such a level that there are no longer disagreements between members, then the group is ripe for groupthink.
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Deindividuation: Group cohesiveness becomes more important than individual freedom of expression. Illusions of unanimity: Members perceive falsely that everyone agrees with the group's decision; silence is seen as consent. Janis noted that the unity of group members was mere illusion.
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Members may disagree with the organizations' decision, but go along with the group for many reasons, such as maintaining their group status and avoiding conflict with managers or workmates. Such members think that suggesting opinions contrary to others may lead to isolation from the group. Structural faults: The group is organized in ways that disrupt the communication of information, or the group carelessly makes decisions.
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Insulation of the group: This can promote the development of unique, inaccurate perspectives on issues the group is dealing with, which can then lead to faulty solutions to the problem. Lack of impartial leadership: Leaders control the group discussion, by planning what will be discussed, allowing only certain questions to be asked, and asking for opinions of only certain people in the group. Closed-style leadership is when leaders announce their opinions on the issue before the group discusses the issue together.
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Open-style leadership is when leaders withhold their opinion until a later time in the discussion. Groups with a closed-style leader are more biased in their judgments, especially when members had a high degree of certainty.
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Lack of norms requiring methodological procedures. Homogeneity of members' social backgrounds and ideology.
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Situational context: Highly stressful external threats: High-stake decisions can create tension and anxiety; group members may cope with this stress in irrational ways. Group members may rationalize their decision by exaggerating the positive consequences and minimizing the possible negative consequences. In attempt to minimize the stressful situation, the group decides quickly and allows little to no discussion or disagreement.
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Groups under high stress are more likely to make errors, lose focus of the ultimate goal, and use procedures that members know have not been effective in the past. Recent failures: These can lead to low self-esteem, resulting in agreement with the group for fear of being seen as wrong. Excessive difficulties in decision-making tasks.
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Time pressures: Group members are more concerned with efficiency and quick results than with quality and accuracy. Time pressures can also lead group members to overlook important information. Moral dilemmas.Although it is possible for a situation to contain all three of these factors, all three are not always present even when groupthink is occurring.
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Janis considered a high degree of cohesiveness to be the most important antecedent to producing groupthink, and always present when groupthink was occurring; however, he believed high cohesiveness would not always produce groupthink. A very cohesive group abides with all group norms; but whether or not groupthink arises is dependent on what the group norms are. If the group encourages individual dissent and alternative strategies to problem solving, it is likely that groupthink will be avoided even in a highly cohesive group. This means that high cohesion will lead to groupthink only if one or both of the other antecedents is present, situational context being slightly more likely than structural faults to produce groupthink.
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As observed by Aldag and Fuller (1993), the groupthink phenomenon seems to rest on a set of unstated and generally restrictive assumptions: The purpose of group problem solving is mainly to improve decision quality Group problem solving is considered a rational process. Benefits of group problem solving: variety of perspectives more information about possible alternatives better decision reliability dampening of biases social presence effects Groupthink prevents these benefits due to structural faults and provocative situational context Groupthink prevention methods will produce better decisions An illusion of well-being is presumed to be inherently dysfunctional. Group pressures towards consensus lead to concurrence-seeking tendencies.It has been thought that groups with the strong ability to work together will be able to solve dilemmas in a quicker and more efficient fashion than an individual. Groups have a greater amount of resources which lead them to be able to store and retrieve information more readily and come up with more alternative solutions to a problem.
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There was a recognized downside to group problem solving in that it takes groups more time to come to a decision and requires that people make compromises with each other. However, it was not until the research of Janis appeared that anyone really considered that a highly cohesive group could impair the group's ability to generate quality decisions. Tight-knit groups may appear to make decisions better because they can come to a consensus quickly and at a low energy cost; however, over time this process of decision-making may decrease the members' ability to think critically.
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It is, therefore, considered by many to be important to combat the effects of groupthink.According to Janis, decision-making groups are not necessarily destined to groupthink. He devised ways of preventing groupthink:: 209–215 Leaders should assign each member the role of "critical evaluator". This allows each member to freely air objections and doubts.
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Leaders should not express an opinion when assigning a task to a group. Leaders should absent themselves from many of the group meetings to avoid excessively influencing the outcome. The organization should set up several independent groups, working on the same problem.
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All effective alternatives should be examined. Each member should discuss the group's ideas with trusted people outside of the group. The group should invite outside experts into meetings.
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Group members should be allowed to discuss with and question the outside experts. At least one group member should be assigned the role of devil's advocate. This should be a different person for each meeting.The devil's advocate in a group may provide questions and insight which contradict the majority group in order to avoid groupthink decisions.
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A study by Ryan Hartwig confirms that the devil's advocacy technique is very useful for group problem-solving. It allows for conflict to be used in a way that is most-effective for finding the best solution so that members will not have to go back and find a different solution if the first one fails. Hartwig also suggests that the devil's advocacy technique be incorporated with other group decision-making models such as the functional theory to find and evaluate alternative solutions.
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The main idea of the devil's advocacy technique is that somewhat structured conflict can be facilitated to not only reduce groupthink, but to also solve problems. A similar term to groupthink is the Abilene paradox, another phenomenon that is detrimental when working in groups. When organizations fall into the Abilene paradox, they take actions in contradiction to what their perceived goals may be and therefore defeat the very purposes they are trying to achieve.
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Failure to communicate desires or beliefs can cause the Abilene paradox. The Watergate scandal is an example of this.
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Before the scandal had occurred, a meeting took place where they discussed the issue. One of Nixon's campaign aides was unsure if he should speak up and give his input. If he had voiced his disagreement with the group's decision, it is possible that the scandal could have been avoided.Other examples of how groupthink could be avoided or prevented: After the Bay of Pigs invasion fiasco, President John F. Kennedy sought to avoid groupthink during the Cuban Missile Crisis using "vigilant appraisal".
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: 148–153 During meetings, he invited outside experts to share their viewpoints, and allowed group members to question them carefully. He also encouraged group members to discuss possible solutions with trusted members within their separate departments, and he even divided the group up into various sub-groups, to partially break the group cohesion. Kennedy was deliberately absent from the meetings, so as to avoid pressing his own opinion.
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Cass Sunstein reports that introverts can sometimes be silent in meetings with extroverts; he recommends explicitly asking for each person's opinion, either during the meeting or afterwards in one-on-one sessions. Sunstein points to studies showing groups with a high level of internal socialization and happy talk are more prone to bad investment decisions due to groupthink, compared with groups of investors who are relative strangers and more willing to be argumentative. To avoid group polarization, where discussion with like-minded people drives an outcome further to an extreme than any of the individuals favored before the discussion, he recommends creating heterogeneous groups which contain people with different points of view. Sunstein also points out that people arguing a side they do not sincerely believe (in the role of devil's advocate) tend to be much less effective than a sincere argument. This can be accomplished by dissenting individuals, or a group like a Red Team that is expected to pursue an alternative strategy or goal "for real".
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Testing groupthink in a laboratory is difficult because synthetic settings remove groups from real social situations, which ultimately changes the variables conducive or inhibitive to groupthink. Because of its subjective nature, researchers have struggled to measure groupthink as a complete phenomenon, instead frequently opting to measure its particular factors. These factors range from causal to effectual and focus on group and situational aspects.Park (1990) found that "only 16 empirical studies have been published on groupthink", and concluded that they "resulted in only partial support of his hypotheses". : 230 Park concludes, "despite Janis' claim that group cohesiveness is the major necessary antecedent factor, no research has shown a significant main effect of cohesiveness on groupthink.
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": 230 Park also concludes that research on the interaction between group cohesiveness and leadership style does not support Janis' claim that cohesion and leadership style interact to produce groupthink symptoms. Park presents a summary of the results of the studies analyzed. According to Park, a study by Huseman and Drive (1979) indicates groupthink occurs in both small and large decision-making groups within businesses.
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This results partly from group isolation within the business. Manz and Sims (1982) conducted a study showing that autonomous work groups are susceptible to groupthink symptoms in the same manner as decisions making groups within businesses. Fodor and Smith (1982) produced a study revealing that group leaders with high power motivation create atmospheres more susceptible to groupthink.
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Leaders with high power motivation possess characteristics similar to leaders with a "closed" leadership style—an unwillingness to respect dissenting opinion. The same study indicates that level of group cohesiveness is insignificant in predicting groupthink occurrence. Park summarizes a study performed by Callaway, Marriott, and Esser (1985) in which groups with highly dominant members "made higher quality decisions, exhibited lowered state of anxiety, took more time to reach a decision, and made more statements of disagreement/agreement".
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: 232 Overall, groups with highly dominant members expressed characteristics inhibitory to groupthink. If highly dominant members are considered equivalent to leaders with high power motivation, the results of Callaway, Marriott, and Esser contradict the results of Fodor and Smith. A study by Leana (1985) indicates the interaction between level of group cohesion and leadership style is completely insignificant in predicting groupthink.
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This finding refutes Janis' claim that the factors of cohesion and leadership style interact to produce groupthink. Park summarizes a study by McCauley (1989) in which structural conditions of the group were found to predict groupthink while situational conditions did not. The structural conditions included group insulation, group homogeneity, and promotional leadership.
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The situational conditions included group cohesion. These findings refute Janis' claim about group cohesiveness predicting groupthink.
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Overall, studies on groupthink have largely focused on the factors (antecedents) that predict groupthink. Groupthink occurrence is often measured by number of ideas/solutions generated within a group, but there is no uniform, concrete standard by which researchers can objectively conclude groupthink occurs. The studies of groupthink and groupthink antecedents reveal a mixed body of results. Some studies indicate group cohesion and leadership style to be powerfully predictive of groupthink, while other studies indicate the insignificance of these factors. Group homogeneity and group insulation are generally supported as factors predictive of groupthink.
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Groupthink can have a strong hold on political decisions and military operations, which may result in enormous wastage of human and material resources. Highly qualified and experienced politicians and military commanders sometimes make very poor decisions when in a suboptimal group setting. Scholars such as Janis and Raven attribute political and military fiascoes, such as the Bay of Pigs Invasion, the Vietnam War, and the Watergate scandal, to the effect of groupthink. More recently, Dina Badie argued that groupthink was largely responsible for the shift in the U.S.
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administration's view on Saddam Hussein that eventually led to the 2003 invasion of Iraq by the United States. After the September 11 attacks, "stress, promotional leadership, and intergroup conflict" were all factors that gave rise to the occurrence of groupthink. : 283 Political case studies of groupthink serve to illustrate the impact that the occurrence of groupthink can have in today's political scene.
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The United States Bay of Pigs Invasion of April 1961 was the primary case study that Janis used to formulate his theory of groupthink. The invasion plan was initiated by the Eisenhower administration, but when the Kennedy administration took over, it "uncritically accepted" the plan of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). : 44 When some people, such as Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. and Senator J. William Fulbright, attempted to present their objections to the plan, the Kennedy team as a whole ignored these objections and kept believing in the morality of their plan.
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: 46 Eventually Schlesinger minimized his own doubts, performing self-censorship. : 74 The Kennedy team stereotyped Fidel Castro and the Cubans by failing to question the CIA about its many false assumptions, including the ineffectiveness of Castro's air force, the weakness of Castro's army, and the inability of Castro to quell internal uprisings.
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: 46 Janis argued the fiasco that ensued could have been prevented if the Kennedy administration had followed the methods to preventing groupthink adopted during the Cuban Missile Crisis, which took place just one year later in October 1962. In the latter crisis, essentially the same political leaders were involved in decision-making, but this time they learned from their previous mistake of seriously under-rating their opponents. : 76
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The attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, is a prime example of groupthink. A number of factors such as shared illusions and rationalizations contributed to the lack of precaution taken by U.S. Navy officers based in Hawaii. The United States had intercepted Japanese messages and they discovered that Japan was arming itself for an offensive attack somewhere in the Pacific Ocean.
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Washington took action by warning officers stationed at Pearl Harbor, but their warning was not taken seriously. They assumed that the Empire of Japan was taking measures in the event that their embassies and consulates in enemy territories were usurped. The U.S.
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Navy and Army in Pearl Harbor also shared rationalizations about why an attack was unlikely. Some of them included:: 83, 85 "The Japanese would never dare attempt a full-scale surprise assault against Hawaii because they would realize that it would precipitate an all-out war, which the United States would surely win." "The Pacific Fleet concentrated at Pearl Harbor was a major deterrent against air or naval attack." "Even if the Japanese were foolhardy to send their carriers to attack us , we could certainly detect and destroy them in plenty of time." "No warships anchored in the shallow water of Pearl Harbor could ever be sunk by torpedo bombs launched from enemy aircraft."
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On January 28, 1986, the US launched the space shuttle Challenger. This was to be monumental for NASA, as a high school teacher was among the crew and was to be the first American civilian in space. NASA's engineering and launch teams rely on group work, and in order to launch the shuttle the team members must affirm each system is functioning nominally. The Thiokol engineers who designed and built the Challenger's rocket boosters warned that the temperature for the day of the launch could result in total failure of the vehicles and deaths of the crew.
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The launch resulted in disaster and grounded space shuttle flights for nearly three years. The Challenger case was subject to a more quantitatively oriented test of Janis's groupthink model performed by Esser and Lindoerfer, who found clear signs of positive antecedents to groupthink in the critical decisions concerning the launch of the shuttle. The day of the launch was rushed for publicity reasons.
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NASA wanted to captivate and hold the attention of America. Having civilian teacher Christa McAuliffe on board to broadcast a live lesson, and the possible mention by president Ronald Reagan in the State of the Union address, were opportunities NASA deemed critical to increasing interest in its potential civilian space flight program. The schedule NASA set out to meet was, however, self-imposed. It seemed incredible to many that an organization with a perceived history of successful management would have locked itself into a schedule it had no chance of meeting.
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