"Spiral Of Silence":
Silence or been silenced

Amar Yumnam *

Until this week I have never heard of Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann. A colleague from the World Bank brought her to my notice in one of the recent e-mails. This took me to her most important contribution.

Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann was a prominent political scientist from Germany. She died recently on 25 March 2010. Her most celebrated work is "The Spiral of Silence". A Theory of Public Opinion – Our Social Skin which was published by the Chicago University Press in 1984. In this she wrote on how public opinions are formed, and how mistakes committed in the process could lead to disastrous consequences like the defeat of the Germans in the 1930s-1940s.

When people feel to be in the minority, they tend to remain silent. People have what we usually call the sixth sense, 'quasi-statistical organ" in the language of Neumann, which enable them to assess the prevailing public opinion. Further people usually feel the fear of isolation, and so tend to conform to the perceived majority opinion.

This fear stops people from expressing their minority views. The opposite is also true in the sense that if the perceived opinion is felt to be similar to the one prevailing majority opinion, people tend to openly disclose their opinion. If the opinion is perceived to be altering, the individuals would restraint from speaking out. In such a way there is a spiral effect in formation of public opinion.

The worst situation would be when certain outcomes of majority opinion could be certainly bad, but individuals do not express their reservations on the fear of being isolated. This would be naturally disastrous for the society. Neumann's contribution reminds one of the significance of deviant behavior in bringing about social transformation. There is necessity of individuals expressing opinions strongly felt on something, and thus save the course of regression of a society.

Such an expression of opinion is particularly important in cases like fighting corruption in the society. But looking at the situation in Manipur, the circumstances are such that they are much worse than the fear of isolation which Neumann cited as the reason. The struggle to fight against corruption in Manipur has reached such a level that it is not isolation, but elimination of life which is the crux.

Talking of corruption takes me to the case of Finland which too my World Bank colleague has brought to my notice. Finland is a country where people do not lock their motorcycles, cars, etc and just leave like that in the city while going for marketing. There are no thieves and such criminals.

My colleague has taken to an article by Darren Zook of the University of California at Berkeley. Zook analyses the tendency of people to speak and write about the bad news of corruption, while there could as well be good news around. In this connection, Zook writes about "curious case of Finland's clean politics".

Finland is a country ranked as the least corrupt country in the world by the well kwon Transparency International. It is as well ranked by the World Economic Forum as one of the most competitive countries in the world; least corrupt and very competitive.

While poverty has mostly been cited as one of the reasons for corruption, the Finnish example negates this. Like Portugal she has been a very poor country for the greater part of recent European history. Besides, the postcolonial situation in Finland is very different from that of countries like India. While during this period corruption took roots in India, the Finnish people shook off all the negative legacy of colonialism and created a very political regime.

Well, the Finnish case should be examined by all of us with a view to draw lessons for us. Like Manipuris excelling in sports despite all the troubles in the home front, there is something astonishing about absence of corruption in Finland. It is exactly at this point where the endogeneity of institutions matter; Finland has really hit the right cord in this regard. For once, let us all look at the culture, politics and institutions of Finland to which I cannot do justice in this space.