Within a community whose members compete on ideological commitment, positions ratchet toward the extreme because nobody can be seen to be less committed than the last speaker.
Haynes described the process in a small craft community where the escalation could be observed in full. The proposed mechanism is asymmetric risk: overstating commitment carries almost no cost and understating it carries a large one, so each round shifts the acceptable position outward and the previously acceptable becomes evidence of bad faith.
In practice
- A committee where each speaker restates the previous position more strongly has stopped deliberating.
- A group whose founding members are eventually expelled for insufficient commitment has ratcheted past its own origin.
- Possible explanations
- The proposed mechanism is asymmetric risk: overstating commitment costs almost nothing and understating it is dangerous, so each round shifts the acceptable position outward. Another is selection, since those who object leave, narrowing the remaining range.
- In its favour
- The dynamic resembles preference falsification and moral grandstanding, which have better evidential support, and the process has been observed in detail in small communities.
- Against it
- It is a journalistic coinage rather than a research finding, and applies mainly to small groups with high exit costs; there is no measure of how often it happens or when it stops.
- Standing
- A journalistic coinage rather than a research finding. The dynamic resembles preference falsification and moral grandstanding, both of which have more developed accounts. Frequently used as a term of abuse for movements one dislikes.
- Further reading
- Wikipedia
- Subject
- Sociology & Culture
- Essay
- How societies hold together, sort people, and change