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CHAPTER 1

SOCIETY. THE PROCESS OF ITS FORMATION

Man is a social animal.
Aristotle, Politics.

Synergetics
The Iron Law of Oligarchy
Let us take the bull by the horns, so to speak, by beginning with the construction and formation of society. This approach will help us find the answers to many questions and lend clarity to our presentation.
Continuing our analogy with a vehicle, we have now brought our student to the car, patted the hood and shown him the steering wheel, the engine and all the pedals and buttons. All of these, in the context of our inquiry in this chapter, fall under sociology and psychology. I will name the various scientists who have discovered the social “pedals and buttons” described in this chapter, both in order to give them credit and because a leader will want to show off his erudition by mentioning their names.
The process of formation of a society is based upon the “Iron Law of Oligarchy” formulated by the German sociologist Robert Michels. While this law is described in every textbook on sociology and political science, any sociologist or political scientist would do well to study the primary source. Below is a brief summary of the law.
All societies, and even voluntary associations, tend to develop oligarchies. Once an oligarchy has established its hold on power, it turns its entire attention to maintaining its position, using the society for its own purposes which may be adverse to the goals and purposes of the society.
From the standpoint of modern physics this law says that any crowd or aggregation of human beings undergoes a process of self-organization which transforms the crowd into an organized society. Synergetics is the study of such processes. The process of self-organization creates the hierarchy with a leader at the top.
In addition to describing the composition of a society and its hierarchy, it is worthwhile to examine the process of self-organization. While that process was described by Michels in his work, the description requires further elaboration. At the time when Michels studied and described organizations such as labor unions and political parties, synergetics did not yet exist as a science and the processes of self-organization were poorly understood. I propose to describe the process using the cell analogy, extrapolate it to an amorphous crowd, and end with the establishment of dictatorship. The process of self-organization is spontaneous and undirected. We will see how society arises, so to speak, out of nothing. We will then examine how the final stage of the process plays out under the influence of repressions. In all cases, the process culminates in the formation of a hierarchy and the emergence of a leader.
The next stage in the development of society is degradation and decay, also affecting the social hierarchy, oligarchy and the leader. It has been noted that decay in fish starts with the head; decay in society starts with the leader. While this is a natural evolutionary process, the individual concerned is rarely willing to submit to the law of evolution. Just as an old man normally does not look forward to the natural culmination of the ageing process, so also a failed leader is rarely willing to cede his throne to others. He acts in accordance with Michels’ Iron Law of Oligarchy, concerning himself only with “maintaining his position”.
The Maslow Hierarchy of Needs
The American psychologist Abraham Maslow summarized the basic human needs in the form of a 7-stage pyramid. Let us examine the first three levels, the most basic human needs:
Biological
Social
Sexual
The biological needs are the basic requirements essential to the maintenance of life: consumption (food, water) and excretion (sweat, urine, etc.).
The social need is man’s innate need for society. Man is a social animal. In society he finds a guarantee of safety and help in meeting his biological needs.
The sexual needs, beginning with the need for procreation, require no elaboration.
The hierarchy of needs is characterized by a rigid order. Only after satisfying his first-level needs will man proceed to second-level needs, and so forth.
When man reaches a stage in Maslow’s hierarchy, he may be considered to be in an existential phase corresponding to a physical state of dynamic equilibrium. Consumption of energy enables him to remain at that level. Progression towards a higher level requires additional energy. Economic studies have demonstrated, for instance, that a woman’s need for expensive jewelry knows no limit.
It is easy to see that the needs of a society are comprised of the needs of its individual members. It is possible therefore to view Maslow’s pyramid, extended to society as a whole, as representing the needs of the society.
The job of a leader lies in trying to meet these needs, especially the social needs. Individuals may often be able to satisfy their biological needs on their own but never their social needs. That is why the second, social stage of the pyramid is the focus of this book. That is also why the leader should attend first to the social needs of his society and only then to the economy.
HEVRAAV: The Measure of Man’s Social Need
Every language has a word to denote “hunger,” or man’s need for food. There was no similar term to denote his need for sex until Freud coined the term “libido,” or “sexual hunger”. In our context we may speak of “hunger for society,” which may be referred to by the Hebrew term “hevraav,” a composite of “hevra” (society) and “raav” (hunger). “Hunger,” “libido” and “hevraav” all describe a feeling of need. When the need remains unsatisfied man becomes irritable, aggressive or depressed.
Hunger comes first in the order of human needs, followed by hevraav and only then by libido. This order corresponds to Maslow’s hierarchy. A hungry man is consumed with thinking and striving to obtain food. Once he is full he begins to think about his safety, social interaction and cohesion. Sexual pleasure comes last in this chain.
A child has no need for society. His hevraav, like his libido, is not developed. His parents provide his food and ensure his safety. By about 13 years of age both hevraav and libido will have developed. Hevraav varies in the course of a person’s development, as does the pleasure he derives from society. This variation reflects the evolution of both man and society. For example, once a man forms his own family his hevraav goes down. Environment and upbringing also affect hevraav. Someone raised in an African tribe has a greater need for a cohesive society than does someone raised in Europe. There is a similar difference between Catholics and Protestants, or between Jews and Muslims. Hevraav varies inversely with the level of cohesion and discipline in society.
It would be good to be able to quantify our feelings, but even hunger is not quantifiable. We have to content ourselves with verbal descriptions such as “hungry, very hungry,” etc.
Were we able to quantify hevraav, as will be demonstrated, that measurement would allow a leader to keep his society “on course” with a greater degree of accuracy. It is the leader, and he alone, that determines the degree to which our hunger for society, our hevraav, will be satisfied.
And it is hevraav that pushes a person into what is known as “bifurcation” between depression and aggression.
First Group of Bonds
Sigmund Freud noted that human behavior is driven by a desire for pleasure. Pleasure brings people together into a herd or society. People derive pleasure from being together. They express it through a process whose close analog is known in physics as “exchange interaction” in various collective actions triggered by certain feelings. We will call these feelings “bonds,” a term used by the sociologist Pitirim Sorokin. Let us picture them as falling into two groups. The first is based on innate instincts. Here is a list of bonds of the first group:
blood kinship
sexual relations, orgies
feasts
drugs and alcohol
dancing, singing, games
fear and discipline
A network of blood kinship is something a child is born into, and its earliest manifestation is something that is known in science as imprinting. The winner of a Nobel Prize Konrad Lorenz developed imprinting in goslings to such a degree that they followed him as they would their mother - the goose.
Bonds are also found among social animals. Dogs like to play. Wolves howl in unison, and the harmony or discord of their howling is indicative of the level of cohesion in their pack.
Those who would deny that fear brings pleasurable sensations should recall that there are people who enjoy horror films. Children, swinging high on the swings, shriek with fear but still enjoy it. Max Weber and Konrad Lorenz wrote about fear or its expectation. We will return to this.
Any herd or group of mammals is characterized by discipline.
We are willing to pay for each bond on the above list. For example, we pay for our meals in restaurants, for tickets to a play or a soccer game. I will not elaborate on the other bonds, although those given to drugs or group sex know that none of these are without their cost.
We may look at these bonds is a slightly different way. Our list of bonds contains those bonds that bring pleasure, but they are also bonds whose absence we find unpleasant or irritating. Take an alcoholic whose “fix” is a daily glass of vodka. If he does not get his glass of vodka he becomes irritable. The same is true of the other items on the list: they bring pleasure, but their absence causes irritation. Some bonds on the list may be substituted for others, but still their absence causes irritation. Later we will examine what this irritation leads to.
The above bonds presuppose a close contact between people; close enough to be measured in feet and inches. We call this “communication distance.” The forces of cohesion arise as quickly and easily and just as easily disappear. They are instinctual, so that we do not need to spend much time on learning how to play games or have sex.
This initial analysis of bonds allows some conclusions to be drawn about human behavior and society. For example, group sex and feasts featuring singing and dancing are characteristic of primitive tribes.
Why, in our “civilized” times, has the popularity of group sex increased in certain quarters?
The Formation of Society
All of the above may be called a structural transformation. Nevertheless, our emphasis is on specific processes.
Communication
The issue with communication is that it is often confused with bonds and cohesion. That is how television and later the Internet have come to be seen as “tools of socialization”.
The difference between communication and bonds may be illustrated using the example of plumbing. The pipe is a means of communication while the water inside it is a bond. We use the pipe to carry water from one point to another. Similarly, means of communication are used to connect people. Nevertheless, the presence of means of communication is not in itself sufficient to unify them. Those who believe that television or the Internet bring people together tend to forget that oftentimes the means of communication are used to transmit information that demoralizes society and leads to its degradation and decay. Censorship was invented to control the news, publications, and all of the things which affect social behavior.
Communication Distance
For a society to arise, the bonds must be transmitted to others. How far will the bonds stretch? The distance at which the bonds exert influence is called “communication distance”.
Laws and morals may set the communication distance or prohibit some associations. For example, among young people that have reached “communication distance,” paired off and begun the stage of dating and mutual observation, the distance may be further reduced only voluntarily by the partners. Reducing it by force may constitute a crime.
The Core
The formation of a stable and effective society requires a minimum number of people – a core. It may be a small religious group, a gang, etc. The number of people in the core should exceed a threshold number. Only after the core has coalesced is it able to grow and spread. This process is known as nucleation. The further fate of the core is determined by the threshold and fluctuations (the latter will be described below): if the fluctuations are above the threshold number, the core will metastasize and spread, otherwise the metastases will fade.
Because certain types of associations are proscribed by the law as criminal, anyone considering coming within communication distance of a group should first evaluate the nature of the core.

Anomie
Anomie, (from the Greek an - absence of, and nomos: name, law, order, structure), is a term that means a disorder due to the absence of rules.
From Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia
The cohesiveness of an anomic herd raises a number of questions concerning the physiology of behavior. They relate not only to the functioning of organs of perception and the central nervous system that create attraction, a “positive taxis,” but first of all the highly selective nature of these reactions.
Konrad Lorenz
The mob, to me, is nothing more than a herd of sheep, so long as it remains disorganized. I have nothing against it. I only deny that it can govern itself.
Benito Mussolini (Interview with Emile Ludwig)
Below is a description of an experiment in biology taken from the book by Ilya Prigogine and Isabelle Stengers Order Out Of Chaos. This experiment demonstrates the process of self-organization.
Larvae of a coleoptera (Dendroctonus micans [ScoL] are initially distributed at random between two horizontal sheets of glass, 2 mm apart. The borders are open and the surface is equal to 400 cm2.
The aggregation process appears to result from the competition between two factors: the random moves of the larvae, and their reaction to a chemical product, a \"pheromone\" they synthesize from terpenes contained in the tree on which they feed and that each of them emits at a rate depending on its nutrition state. The pheromone diffuses in space, and the larvae move in the direction of its concentration gradient. Such a reaction provides an auto-catalytic mechanism since, as they gather in a cluster, the larvae contribute to enhance the attractiveness of the corresponding region; the higher the density of larvae in this region, the stronger the gradient and the more intense the tendency to move toward the crowded point.
The experiment shows that the density of the larvae population determines not only the rate of the aggregation process but its effectiveness as well - that is, the number of larvae that will finally be part of the cluster. At high density… a cluster appears and rapidly grows at the center of the experimental setup. At very low density … no stable cluster appears.
Moreover, other experiments have explored the possibility for a cluster to develop starting from a \"nucleus\" artificially created in a peripheral region of the system. Different solutions appear depending on the number of larvae in this initial nucleus.
If this number is small compared with the total number of larvae, the cluster fails to develop …. If it is large, the cluster grows …. For intermediate values of the initial nucleus, new types of structure may develop: Two, three or four other clusters appear and coexist, with a time of life at least greater than the time of observation ….
Let us begin with something that is not immediately apparent. The researchers distributed the larvae in such a way as to position them within communication distance: the pheromones emitted by one individual larva reached the other. The pheromones are a good analog to bonds.
Formations of the type describe here are well known in biology. The growth of cancer cells, for instance, follows the same model. The above experiment may also serve as a biological model of such social phenomena as the formation of a crowd, terrorist group, criminal gang, religious sect, etc. This formation is known in ethology as anomic.
The terms “anomie” and “anomic” were introduced by the French sociologist Emile Durkheim. When I first introduced my ranking of societies in terms of cohesiveness, I used the term “anarchy”. Chanoch Yakobson, professor at the Haifa Technion, suggested replacing “anarchy” with “anomie”. The difference between these two words is very nuanced, so that the choice becomes a matter of preference.
The primary form of any aggregation of beings is anomic aggregation, exemplified by schools of fish in the ocean or colonies of penguins. This aggregation has no structure, no leaders and no followers – just a large number of similar units. The anomic aggregation gives rise to more complex structures, culminating with the highest stage of evolutionary development: human society unified by religion.
Human behavior is often compared to animal behavior, although the ethologist Konrad Lorenz has done the opposite in comparing the behavior of a herd or group of animals with the behavior of a human society. Animal behavior may serve as a model for human behavior; biologists use laboratory animals in their research. We will follow their example, although our primary focus is the behavior of a group or a herd of animals rather than individuals.
Below is another quote from Konrad Lorenz’ work On Aggression. In describing an anomic aggregation of fish, Lorenz uses political terminology.
The purely quantitative and, in a sense, democratic action of this process called \"social induction\" by sociologists means that a school of fish is the less resolute the more individuals it contains and the stronger its herd instinct is. A fish which begins, for any reason, to swim in a certain direction cannot avoid leaving the school and thus finding itself in an isolated position. Here it falls under the influence of all those stimuli calculated to draw it back into the school. The more fish there are swimming in the same direction, as a result of some exogenous stimulus, the more likely they are to draw the school with them; the bigger the school and its consequent counterattraction, the less distance its members will swim before they return to the school, drawn as if by a magnet. A big school of small and closely herded fish thus presents a lamentable picture of indecision. Again and again a small current of enterprising single fish pushes its way forward like the pseudopodium of an amoeba. The longer such pseudo pods become, the thinner they grow, and the stronger their longitudinal tension becomes. Generally the whole advance ends in precipitate flight back to the heart of the school. Watching these indecisive actions, one almost begins to lose faith in democracy and to see the advantage of authoritarian politics.
However, it can be shown by a very simple experiment how little justified this standpoint is. Erich von Hoist removed, from a common minnow, the forebrain, which, in this species, is the site of all shoaling reactions. The pithed minnow sees, eats, and swims like a normal fish, its only aberrant behavior property being that it does not mind if it leaves the shoal unaccompanied by other fish. It lacks the hesitancy of the normal fish, which, even when it very much wants to swim in a certain direction, turns around after its first movements to look at its shoal mates and lets itself be influenced according to whether any others follow it or not. This did not matter to the brainless fish: if it saw food, or had any other reason for doing so, it swam resolutely in a certain direction and - the whole shoal followed it. By virtue of its deficiency, the brainless animal had become the dictator! (Emphasis added.)
According to Durkheim, a person facing anomie instead of society may become depressed and commit suicide. There is also another extreme outcome, aggression, which will be discussed later.
Anomie interests us not because it constitutes a lower evolutionary stage in the development of society, but because human society in its cyclical development systematically degenerates down to that stage.
The Formation of a Gang or Sect
Let us consider how children enter communication distance and develop “exchange interaction” during puberty. Up until a certain age children show no real interest in the opposite sex and have no “sexual pheromones” or sexual needs. At around 13-14 years of age the “pheromones” appear and from that moment, not only the opposite sex but the individual himself turns, to borrow the terminology from an example discussed above, into a larva with distinguishing characteristics. Demand and supply arise. Eventually the density of hormone-driven adolescents increases; some of them enter communication distance and form couples. These couples, held together with sexual bonds, may evolve into families which, at most, may give rise to a clan, but they are not capable of forming larger human associations. Larger associations require different types of bonds.
Let us turn to the formation of a political party or a criminal gang. As in our biological experiment, we start with a number of people drawn at random. Initially they are not connected to each other. As the number, and therefore the density in society, of people with similar characteristics (political or criminal tendency) increases, they may enter communication distance. After the number of people entering communication distance exceeds 10 we may begin to see the formation of a core and the establishment of a gang. Initially the gang will be anomic. To retain its stability it will need a hierarchy, that is to say, a set of strong bonds.
To recapitulate, in order for a sect, a terrorist group, or a gang to be formed, the following conditions must be met:
1. Its members must enter communication distance.
This requires an increase in the density in society of potential suitable members.
2. There must be a religion or ideology serving to unite the gang members.
3. The number of group members must exceed a certain threshold.
We do not know the threshold number since there has not been any research in this area, but we may assume it to be approximately ten people. If the number is small, the gang will lack stability and may dissolve. A stable gang will grow and metastasize like a cancerous tumor.
4. The gang must secure sufficient funds and materials to maintain it.
A gang or sect represents a mutation in society. Like biological mutations, it is part of the evolution and adaptation of society. A mutation may lead to positive or negative consequences, although in most cases the consequences are negative.
Like any mutation, a gang tests the stability of the society. For example, the test may take place in the context of a civil war. If the society is unstable, the gang and its ideology will gain ascendancy and take power, at which point a new loop in the evolutionary spiral will begin. If the society is stable, the gang will be destroyed.
Let us conclude by examining the terrorist group that existed in the beginning of the last century within the Russian political party of Socialist Revolutionaries. The group, calling itself the Central Fighting Organization, numbered about 80 people in the period from 1902 to 1908 and its core did not exceed 10 people, with perhaps a few more immediate supporters. At that time the level of terrorist training and support existing today, with special training camps and schools, was unknown: these people’s fighting skills were limited to bombs and small arms. Nevertheless these 10-30 people had a discernible effect on the history and politics of Russia, becoming instrumental in the events leading up to the Russian revolution of 1917.

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