Sternstunde Philosophie: Theodor Adorno und Herbert Marcuse

H/T LP Syll

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Observation and introspection have convinced me that, 
even in our times of numerous and detailed laws, 
men are in fact ruled much less by laws than by compulsive 
internal images of what they should do – behavioral models; 
that their conduct is not a matter of personal fancy 
within the limits set by legal obligations, 
but gravitates around their behavioural image, 
which itself alters over time; that, even though 
public commands become both more frequent and more specific, 
behaviour and action are governed in the main by suggestions 
without legal force; that these phenomena are more important 
than those usually denominated “political” and are in fact 
basic to so-called “political phenomena.”  
Men can in fact be moved to certain actions and behaviours 
by means lacking all legal authority and power of constraint 
no less well than by the public authorities….

Bertrand de Jouvenel