Instinct For Submission

The Evolutionary Psychology of Authoritarianism

Human history repeatedly reveals a troubling but undeniable truth: authoritarianism seems to come naturally. Liberalism, individual autonomy, and critical rationalism, by contrast, are precious but fragile cultural achievements. This observation demands explanation: why might authoritarianism be humanity’s default psychological state?

1. Evolutionary Foundations: Hierarchy for Survival

Humans evolved in tightly-knit groups reliant on efficient, stable hierarchies. Quick, coordinated actions under clear authority offered significant survival advantages during resource scarcity or external threats. In these contexts, authoritarian structures optimized group cohesion, reduced internal dissent, and provided rapid decision-making—traits critically advantageous for survival.

2. Cognitive Efficiency: Heuristics and the Outsourcing of Thought

Individual decision-making and autonomous agency require constant vigilance, cognitive effort, and emotional resilience. Humans frequently default to heuristics—mental shortcuts that outsource complex decisions to accepted authorities. Accepting prescribed beliefs and norms saves cognitive resources, making authoritarianism psychologically attractive, especially in uncertain or stressful environments.

3. Innate Biases: Conformity and Group Identity

Cognitive biases like conformity bias and in-group favoritism are deeply ingrained. These biases push individuals toward alignment with majority opinions and authoritative dictates to maintain group belonging and avoid ostracism. Authoritarianism leverages these natural tendencies, strengthening group cohesion through rigid conformity, suppressing costly internal disagreement, and simplifying social interactions.

4. Epistemic Comfort: The Appeal of Certainty

Humans crave epistemic security, favoring clear, comforting, and unequivocal explanations over ambiguous, uncertain realities. Authoritarian narratives promise absolute truths and moral clarity, powerfully appealing to the human need for psychological comfort and existential certainty. Liberal, conditional epistemologies, demanding continuous reflection and humility, feel inherently more fragile and challenging.

5. The Dynamics of Fear and Coercion

Fear is easily weaponized. Authoritarian systems depend fundamentally on coercion—the credible threat of harm to enforce compliance. Humans naturally seek to avoid immediate threats, making them vulnerable to coercive control. This creates self-reinforcing dynamics where submission to authority becomes habitual, even internalized, as a defensive psychological strategy.

6. Agency and Responsibility: Trading Autonomy for Comfort

Individual agency and autonomy entail continuous personal accountability. The psychological burden of constant responsibility can be overwhelming. By centralizing agency within an authoritative figure or institution, authoritarianism relieves individuals of the heavy responsibility of personal decision-making, offering an emotionally appealing trade-off despite its profound ethical cost.

Integrating Philosophical Insight: Agency and Coercion

Authoritarianism explicitly circumvents conditional truths, imposing dogmatic certainty to simplify reality. Coercion exploits human instinctual aversion to harm, suppressing agency by leveraging fear and conformity. Agency, while ethically desirable, is cognitively demanding, precarious, and continuously threatened by the psychologically simpler allure of authoritarian submission.

Thus, authoritarianism might indeed be humanity’s default precisely because it aligns closely with deeply-rooted psychological, cognitive, and evolutionary impulses. Liberalism, by contrast, is a deliberate and continuous struggle—a cultural and philosophical project requiring vigilance, critical reflection, and persistent courage.