Self-Image Reinforcement and Leadership
Aside from dominance hierarchies’ influence on group interactions, there is one more “pre-installed system” in humans that must be considered in attempts to predict how people will react within the context of governing structures: The self-image-reinforcement system.
The self-image-reinforcement system is the part of our psyche dedicated to maintaining a specific image of ourselves. About a third of The Pragmatist’s Guide to Life is dedicated to understanding how this system functions and how it can be altered, as on an individual basis it drives most of a person’s behavior.
How does this system work? When you have an imaginary argument with someone in your head long after the real argument ended, you are creating a model of that person in your brain. Your brain is emulating the way it thinks they will react to things using something called a “mental model.” Essentially, your brain separates out a part of itself and runs a predictive model of the other person’s brain on that part of your consciousness in the same way a Mac computer can run a PC emulator on top of its operating system.
We don’t just create emulations of other people; we all have at least one emulation always running in the background of our psyche that models our perceived self. This emulation is used to drive your behavior when you are not really paying attention to life (about 98% of the time in even fairly lucid people).[[64]](#_ftn64) This social simulation program is also used by your brain to determine how to emotionally react to various scenarios.
All of this is relevant to governance because many governance structures rely heavily on a single person, their decisions, and their actions: A king, CEO, dictator, pope, general, president, etc. The fact that these individuals’ day-to-day decisions and sources of happiness are often driven by an unconscious system instead of logic has a massive impact on how governments run. Just as we must consider dominance hierarchies when studying units of government centered around boards and councils, we must factor in self-image-reinforcement systems when studying units of government run by a central figure of authority.
The most important thing to note about this system is that it is highly susceptible to feedback loops, which can cause those with concentrated power to care less and less about the wellbeing of others and more about their own perceived power within the system. This is well backed by research, with empathy lowering with increased power and wealth.
Anyone from the supervisor of a coffee shop to a dictator can fall prey to this dynamic, though it is more dangerous the higher in the system an individual rises. Historically, this effect has been moderately ameliorated by reminding the individual in charge at the top—be they a pope or a king—that they are themselves servants of a higher power. When presidents and CEOs came into vogue, this changed to: ”You are actually a servant of the people” or “You are actually a servant of the shareholders.” Famously, during Roman triumphs, a type of slave called an Auriga would whisper into the ear of the victorious commander “Memento Mori” (“remember you are mortal”). These methods are only moderately effective.
Fortunately, there are ways to mitigate the effect of this snowballing lack of interest in others’ wellbeing, such as short and strict term limits (which, alas, have their own negative effects we will explore soon). Theoretically, a society might also contextualize rulers as having lower social rank than the general population, but we haven’t seen groups do this much yet. We will explore ways to manipulate these types of systems to create better functioning governments toward the end of the book.
Instead of encouraging people to make the most logical decisions, the self-image-reinforcement system pushes them to maximize their ideal self image. A leader may make a decision that, instead of maximizing the good of his stakeholders, maximizes his perceived power to others—or more commonly a decision that he believes makes him look good (this is commonly cited as “virtue signaling”).
Virtue signaling is dangerous as it allows an individual to feel like they are addressing system-wide mandates when ultimately engaging in acts of vanity. A CEO might appoint a female COO and assume he has made a difference in increasing workplace gender equality rather than carefully analyze company hiring and promotion dynamics and launch new policies.
The virtue signaling system makes it very hard for an individual to see themselves as the “bad guy.” The longer a person is in power, the harder it becomes for them to contextualize their actions as potentially “bad.” If you are building a governing structure with a position of central authority, you must establish fail-safes that anticipate this turn of events at least 30% of the time a person is in power for more than half a decade.
Should you find this system interesting and wish to explore it in greater detail, review Part III of The Pragmatist’s Guide to Life.