The Person and the Situation

Once people do not trust themselves, they are subject to easy manipulation.

Milgram’s experiment draws out this chapter’s final mistake: explaining behavior by focusing on people’s dispositions, rather than considering the situation. This is a restatement of the fundamental attribution error. The vital point is that the situation is generally much more powerful than most people—especially Westerners—acknowledge.

First, situational power is most likely in novel settings, where there are no previous behavioral guidelines. Second, rules—which may emerge through interaction or be predetermined—can create a means to dominate and suppress others because people justify their behavior as only conforming to the rules. Third, when people are asked to play a certain