Political Ponerology: A Science on the Nature of Evil Adjusted for Political Purposes

control to reason. It also appears that some people have a

somewhat richer and more subtle instinctual endowment than

others. Significant deficiencies in this heritage nevertheless

occur in only a tiny percentage of the human population; and

we perceive this to be qualitatively pathological. We shall have

to pay closer attention to such anomalies, since they participate

in that pathogenesis of evil which we would like to understand

more fully.

A more subtle structure of effect is built upon our instinc-

tual substratum, thanks to constant cooperation from the latter

as well as familial and societal child-rearing practices. With

time, this structure becomes a more easily observable compo-

nent of our personality, within which it plays an integrative

role. This higher effect is instrumental in linking us to society,

which is why its correct development is a proper duty of peda-

gogues and constitutes one of the objects of a psychotherapist’s

efforts, if perceived to be abnormally formed. Both pedagogues

and psychotherapists sometimes feel helpless, if this process of

formation was influenced by a defective instinctual substratum.

~~~

Thanks to memory, that phenomenon ever better described

by psychology, but whose nature remains partly mysterious,

man stores life-experiences and purposely acquired knowledge.

There are extensive individual variations in regard to this ca-

pacity, its quality, and its contents. A young person also looks

at the world differently from an old man endowed with a good

memory. People with a good memory and a great deal of

16 Relating to or marked by sthenia; strong, vigorous, or active. [Editor’s

note.]

POLITICAL PONEROLOGY

63

knowledge have a greater tendency to reach for the written data

of collective memory in order to supplement their own.

This collected material constitutes the subject matter of the

second psychological process, namely association; our under-

standing of its characteristics is constantly improving, although

we have not yet been able to shed sufficient light upon its nur-

turance. In spite of, or maybe thanks to, the value judgments

contributed to this question by psychologists and psychoana-

lysts, it appears that achieving a satisfactory synthetic under-

standing of the associative processes will not be possible unless

and until we humbly decide to cross the boundaries of purely

scientific comprehension.

Our reasoning faculties continue to develop throughout our

entire active lives, thus, accurate judgmental abilities do not

peak until our hair starts greying and the drive of instinct, emo-

tion, and habit begins to abate. It is a collective product derived

from an interaction between man and his environment, and

from many generations’ worth of creation and transmission.

The environment may also have a destructive influence upon

the development of our reasoning faculties. In its environment

in particular, the human mind is contaminated by conversive

thinking17, which is the most common anomaly in this process.

It is for this reason that the proper development of mind re-

quires periods of solitary reflection on occasion.

Man has also developed a psychological function not found

among animals. Only man can apprehend a certain quantity of

material or abstract imaginings within his field of attention,

inspecting them internally in order to effect further operations

of the mind upon this material. This enables us to confront

facts, affect constructive and technical operations, and predict

future results. If the facts subjected to internal projection and

inspection deal with man’s own personality, man performs an

act of introspection essential for monitoring the state of a hu-

17 Conversive thinking: using terms but giving them opposing or twisted

meanings. Examples: peacefulness = appeasement; freedom = license; initia-

tive = arbitrariness; traditional = backward; rally = mob; efficiency = small-

mindedness. Example: the words “peacefulness” and “appeasement” denote

the same thing: a striving to establish peace, but have entirely different con-

notations which indicate the speaker’s attitude toward this striving toward

peace. [Editor’s note.]

64

SOME INDESPENSIBLE CONCEPTS

man personality and the meaning of his own behavior. This act

of internal projection and inspection complements our con-

sciousness; it characterizes no species other than the human.

However, there is exceptionally wide divergence among indi-

viduals regarding the capacity for such mental acts. The effi-

ciency of this mental function shows a somewhat low statistical

correlation with general intelligence.

Thus, if we speak of man’s general intelligence, we must

take into account both its internal structure and the individual

differences occurring at every level of this structure. The sub-