The point of lockdown is that for many people it is individually rational to break the lockdown—you can see your family, go to work, or have a small wedding ceremony with little risk and large benefits—but this imposes external costs on other people. As more and more people break lockdown, these costs get higher and higher, so we need a way to persuade people to stay inside—to make them consider not only the risks to themselves, but also the risks they are imposing on other people. We solve this with a combination of social stigma and legal sanctions.
The issue is exactly the same with ideologies. To environmentalists, preventing climate change is more important than covid. To pro-life people, preventing over half a million innocent deaths every year is more important than covid. To animal rights activists, ending factory farming is more important than covid. To anti-lockdown activists, preventing mass business failure and a depression is more important than covid. But collectively we are all better off if everyone stops holding protests for now.
The correct question is “is it good if I, and everyone else who thinks their reason is as good as I think this one is, breaks the lockdown?” Failure to consider this, as it appears most people have, is to grossly privilege this one cause over others and defect in this iterated prisoners dilemma—and the tragic consequence will be many deaths.
I think this argument conflates the fact that p, and people’s belief that p. Consider these two principles
1. If people correctly believe that going on the protests produces more good than harm, then they should go on the protests.
2. If people believe that going on the protests produces more good than harm, then they should go on the protests.
Principle 1 seems to me clearly correct from a utilitarian point of view. Principle 2 is absurd—people can have mad and false beliefs. If someone believes that going on a neo-nazi rally is going to produce greater marginal benefits than staying at home, that doesn’t mean that they should in fact break the lockdown. The proposition “The BLM protests will produce more good than harm” doesn’t entail principle 2.
(I’m not saying that the protests do in fact produce more good than harm, I’m just criticising Larks’ counter-argument in the above comment)
But collectively we are all better off if everyone stops holding protests for now.
Who is the ‘we’ here and by whose yardstick the benefit measured?
Animal rights activists are not turning out in large numbers to get tear gassed and beaten for the cause. This is pretty good evidence that they are not in the set of ‘everyone else who thinks their reason is as good as I think this one is’.
As usual, there are better alternatives being neglected here. Those who want more lockdown have, in this situation, two options to get it: more violence or more concessions.
Negotiation is certainly possible. So, a consequentialist might lay additional covid deaths at the step of a government which failed to negotiate.
Add to this the obvious virtue of the demand to end police brutality and recognize that black lives matter. That being an option now, it seems particularly bizarre, and wrong, to delay granting the wish.
Who is the ‘we’ here and by whose yardstick the benefit measured?
Investigations into police brutality that follow viral footage have historically been quite harmful for all involved. The upside is a small reduction in police brutality. The downside is a massive increase in non-police brutality, as found in this recent paper:
all investigations that were preceded by “viral” incidents of deadly force have led to a large and statistically significant increase in homicides and total crime. We estimate that these investigations caused almost 900 excess homicides and almost 34,000 excess felonies. The leading hypothesis for why these investigations increase homicides and total crime is an abrupt change in the quantity of policing activity. In Chicago, the number of police-civilian interactions decreased by almost 90% in the month after the investigation was announced. In Riverside CA, interactions decreased 54%. In St. Louis, self-initiated police activities declined by 46%. Other theories we test such as changes in community trust or the aggressiveness of consent decrees associated with investigations—all contradict the data in important ways.
Indeed the harm done by one day of reduced policing in Chicago may have already rendered the protests a net negative, even ignoring spreading Coronavirus:
In a city with an international reputation for crime — where 900 murders per year were common in the early 1990s — it was the most violent weekend in Chicago’s modern history, stretching police resources that were already thin because of protests and looting.
The Rev. Michael Pfleger, a longtime crusader against gun violence who leads St. Sabina Church in Auburn Gresham, said it was “open season” last weekend in his neighborhood and others on the South and West sides.
I also think you misunderstand your fellow EAs:
Animal rights activists are not turning out in large numbers to get tear gassed and beaten for the cause. This is pretty good evidence that they are not in the set of ‘everyone else who thinks their reason is as good as I think this one is’.
Many animal rights activists believe that the status quo is far far worse than the holocaust. There are billions of animals being farmed for meat today, generally treated very cruelly. Whatever you think of the state of US race relations, it is clear that, if animals matter, they are much worse off—both much more numerous and treated much much worse!
I think what you are missing is that there are factors other than believed importance of cause that determine one’s actions. For example, animal rights activists might care about suppressing the pandemic! Or they might think getting tear gassed was counter-productive!
You suggest that concessions will help reduce the scale of the protests, but my impression is that the literature suggests that actually repression is effective. For example, this study on the 2011 London Riots, where first-time looters were punished relatively harshly, found it was successful in reducing crime:
The criminal justice response was to make sentencing for rioters much more severe. We show a significant drop in riot crimes across London in the six months after the riots, consistent with a deterrence effect from the tougher sentencing. Moreover, we find that non-riot crimes actually went in the opposite direction, suggesting a response from criminals who look to have substituted away from the types of crimes that received tougher sentences. We find little evidence that spatial displacement or extra police presence on the streets of London in the wake of the riots accounts for these patterns of change. More evidence of general deterrence comes from the observation that crime also fell in the post-riot aftermath in areas where rioting did not take place.
Similarly, this study on Israeli counter-terrorism police:
An increase in repressive actions leads to a reduction in terrorist attacks. … An increase in conciliatory actions has no effect on terrorism.
Finally my guess is that this is sort of irrelevant anyway because OP is probably not a senior government official; she may be able to persuade some friends not to go protest, but probably can’t change US policy.
You suggest that concessions will help reduce the scale of the protests, but my impression is that the literature suggests that actually repression is effective.
Presented with options to get largely non-violent protestors-for-justice to go home quickly:
a) Justice
b) Repression
Your response is that b) is a tried and tested intervention. Seriously?
I don’t think this is an accurate portrayal of what Dale was trying to say.
I don’t see them actively recommending a particular policy in the post—just noting that some studies of repressive behavior find that it may lead to a certain outcome. It can be true that repression sometimes quells riots while also being true that it has many other negative outcomes and should clearly be avoided. (Though I didn’t see Dale say that, either, and I don’t want to put words in their mouth.)
Of course, the vague term “repression” and the differing social context of the examples Dale cited mean that blanket statements like “literature suggests that repression is effective” aren’t very useful, and I wish they’d acknowledged that more clearly in their post, especially given the awful consequences of policies like “harsher prison sentences for a lot of people.”
*****
As for the claim that “justice” will clear up protests quickly; leaving aside the question of which specific demands will have a positive impact on their own merit (likely many), have we seen enough demands granted so far to have a sense of what usually happens after vis-a-vis public protest? Especially in cases where actually following through on promises of change will take a long time?
The clearest example of responsiveness to protest I can recall (haven’t been following the topic too closely) was action taken by the Minneapolis City Council to ban certain restraint practices and explore “dismantling” the police department. Did either action lead directly to a reduction in public protest?
Negotiation is certainly possible. So, one might lay additional covid deaths at the step of a government which failed to negotiate.
Even if it isn’t difficult to cast blame at one’s government, this doesn’t mean much for the people who have died. It also seems unlikely that governments are going to feel much additional pressure from deaths for which they bear only indirect responsibility.
I don’t have any developed opinion on the original post, but I did want to take mild issue with the idea of thinking about deaths as a bargaining tool. (I’m sure you meant for this to be a neutral/factual point about negotiating, but it’s hard for me to shake off the devastating impact of additional deaths.)
I think this is the wrong question.
The point of lockdown is that for many people it is individually rational to break the lockdown—you can see your family, go to work, or have a small wedding ceremony with little risk and large benefits—but this imposes external costs on other people. As more and more people break lockdown, these costs get higher and higher, so we need a way to persuade people to stay inside—to make them consider not only the risks to themselves, but also the risks they are imposing on other people. We solve this with a combination of social stigma and legal sanctions.
The issue is exactly the same with ideologies. To environmentalists, preventing climate change is more important than covid. To pro-life people, preventing over half a million innocent deaths every year is more important than covid. To animal rights activists, ending factory farming is more important than covid. To anti-lockdown activists, preventing mass business failure and a depression is more important than covid. But collectively we are all better off if everyone stops holding protests for now.
The correct question is “is it good if I, and everyone else who thinks their reason is as good as I think this one is, breaks the lockdown?” Failure to consider this, as it appears most people have, is to grossly privilege this one cause over others and defect in this iterated prisoners dilemma—and the tragic consequence will be many deaths.
I think this argument conflates the fact that p, and people’s belief that p. Consider these two principles
1. If people correctly believe that going on the protests produces more good than harm, then they should go on the protests.
2. If people believe that going on the protests produces more good than harm, then they should go on the protests.
Principle 1 seems to me clearly correct from a utilitarian point of view. Principle 2 is absurd—people can have mad and false beliefs. If someone believes that going on a neo-nazi rally is going to produce greater marginal benefits than staying at home, that doesn’t mean that they should in fact break the lockdown. The proposition “The BLM protests will produce more good than harm” doesn’t entail principle 2.
(I’m not saying that the protests do in fact produce more good than harm, I’m just criticising Larks’ counter-argument in the above comment)
Who is the ‘we’ here and by whose yardstick the benefit measured?
Animal rights activists are not turning out in large numbers to get tear gassed and beaten for the cause. This is pretty good evidence that they are not in the set of ‘everyone else who thinks their reason is as good as I think this one is’.
As usual, there are better alternatives being neglected here. Those who want more lockdown have, in this situation, two options to get it: more violence or more concessions.
Negotiation is certainly possible. So, a consequentialist might lay additional covid deaths at the step of a government which failed to negotiate.
Add to this the obvious virtue of the demand to end police brutality and recognize that black lives matter. That being an option now, it seems particularly bizarre, and wrong, to delay granting the wish.
Investigations into police brutality that follow viral footage have historically been quite harmful for all involved. The upside is a small reduction in police brutality. The downside is a massive increase in non-police brutality, as found in this recent paper:
Indeed the harm done by one day of reduced policing in Chicago may have already rendered the protests a net negative, even ignoring spreading Coronavirus:
I also think you misunderstand your fellow EAs:
Many animal rights activists believe that the status quo is far far worse than the holocaust. There are billions of animals being farmed for meat today, generally treated very cruelly. Whatever you think of the state of US race relations, it is clear that, if animals matter, they are much worse off—both much more numerous and treated much much worse!
I think what you are missing is that there are factors other than believed importance of cause that determine one’s actions. For example, animal rights activists might care about suppressing the pandemic! Or they might think getting tear gassed was counter-productive!
You suggest that concessions will help reduce the scale of the protests, but my impression is that the literature suggests that actually repression is effective. For example, this study on the 2011 London Riots, where first-time looters were punished relatively harshly, found it was successful in reducing crime:
Similarly, this study on Israeli counter-terrorism police:
Finally my guess is that this is sort of irrelevant anyway because OP is probably not a senior government official; she may be able to persuade some friends not to go protest, but probably can’t change US policy.
Presented with options to get largely non-violent protestors-for-justice to go home quickly:
a) Justice
b) Repression
Your response is that b) is a tried and tested intervention. Seriously?
That is not the path to human flourishing.
I don’t think this is an accurate portrayal of what Dale was trying to say.
I don’t see them actively recommending a particular policy in the post—just noting that some studies of repressive behavior find that it may lead to a certain outcome. It can be true that repression sometimes quells riots while also being true that it has many other negative outcomes and should clearly be avoided. (Though I didn’t see Dale say that, either, and I don’t want to put words in their mouth.)
Of course, the vague term “repression” and the differing social context of the examples Dale cited mean that blanket statements like “literature suggests that repression is effective” aren’t very useful, and I wish they’d acknowledged that more clearly in their post, especially given the awful consequences of policies like “harsher prison sentences for a lot of people.”
*****
As for the claim that “justice” will clear up protests quickly; leaving aside the question of which specific demands will have a positive impact on their own merit (likely many), have we seen enough demands granted so far to have a sense of what usually happens after vis-a-vis public protest? Especially in cases where actually following through on promises of change will take a long time?
The clearest example of responsiveness to protest I can recall (haven’t been following the topic too closely) was action taken by the Minneapolis City Council to ban certain restraint practices and explore “dismantling” the police department. Did either action lead directly to a reduction in public protest?
Even if it isn’t difficult to cast blame at one’s government, this doesn’t mean much for the people who have died. It also seems unlikely that governments are going to feel much additional pressure from deaths for which they bear only indirect responsibility.
I don’t have any developed opinion on the original post, but I did want to take mild issue with the idea of thinking about deaths as a bargaining tool. (I’m sure you meant for this to be a neutral/factual point about negotiating, but it’s hard for me to shake off the devastating impact of additional deaths.)