Rationale
Like many teachers, the routine for my first day of class with new students is to explain the various rules that will be essential to their success in my class. These, of course, range from the standard procedures for in class discussions to the process by which any student might be allowed to visit the restroom during normal class hours. Logically, these rules have very little meaning or power in and of themselves, but rather, depend on some level of enforcement to make them viable. My ability to do so is crucial to the success of said rules or regulations. This often takes on an interesting dynamic. For instance, I have found it far easier to command high school students than middle school. For some reason my "Great Santini" impression does little to strike fear into the hearts of these very young, very small people. I also have historically much more success with boys than girls. Girls are regularly able to convince me that they have special rights to skirt the rules, no pun intended, and that I can hardly be serious about any restriction that would impinge upon their freedoms in the class. If it sounds ridiculous, it most certainly is ridiculous.
The lesson of this very common human situation is that it can be a means to discovery when thinking about the history of the United States. The penchant for adolescent rebellion occurring in students all over this great nation is strongly akin to a basic human propensity found over much of history. It has often been the case that people have found reason to question authority, and at times, rise up against it. But it is also true that there have been rules and laws that were put into place to control large groups of people that were openly accepted. In fact, we could say with great deal of validity that students as a general population are more likely to adhere to, than repudiate, school rules.
Indeed, there has been some recent scholarship on this issue. Jared Diamond discusses at length in his Pulitzer Prize winning book Guns Germs and Steel the concept of kleptocracy. The idea is that as populations grew in various places around the world so grew the need to establish a system of government that would tax, or take from its people, and then work to control various aspects of a given society. And people from East Asia to South America accepted many different forms of control considering rules and regulations as essential to their own security and prosperity. These lessons seem immediately important to a group of adolescents who, though existing within a far different historical context, are experiencing a very similar circumstance. Without a doubt we all must accept, deny, or at the very least consider, the rule of law and its application to our daily lives.
Given all of this, I suppose that the obvious question then is what prompts some students to obey the rules or laws or to disobey them? More importantly for my classes is to begin to understand the significance of the arguments that have been made in our country's past that have encouraged people to rise up against the law, or the powers attempting to enforce laws, and what variables have combined to convince people to conform to the law? One important clarification at this point: we must understand it is philosophically abject to think that conformity and non conformity aren't part of the same game. In other words, if one decides to deviate from one social, economic, political, or religious standard, he or she is most likely conforming to another. That does not mean however, that it is either the most popular or practical path and therefore can be determined to be greatly revolutionary in nature. This rather difficult proposition is the focus of my unit.
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