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“In static terms, Relative Deprivation is a discrepancy between value expectations and value capabilities, its intensity and scope determinable in any accessible population by the use of survey and other techniques.”
-Ted Gurr 1970
The previous chapters have explored the occurrence of revolutionary situations through the lenses of Brinton, Marx, and Moore. This chapter will examine Dr. Ted Gurr’s works with an emphasis on the theories outlined within his 1970 text Why Men Rebel. In contrast to the theorists mentioned above, Dr. Gurr attempts to forge a theory out of nearly all the written works published at the time. By doing so, he introduces two crucial concepts: Relative Deprivation (RD) and Frustration-Aggression theory. This chapter will explore both concepts in order to create a better understanding of, at least in the mind of Gurr, why revolutionary situations occur.
Before exploring these concepts and theories proposed by Gurr, this chapter will highlight his background and influences that helped form his theory proposed in Why Men Rebel. Gurr attended Reed College in Portland, Oregon, where he earned his bachelor’s degree in psychology, which provided a framework on why humans behave the way they do and gave him a foundation to build upon during his Ph.D. studies. Upon completing his undergraduate degree, Gurr attended New York University, where he received his Ph.D. in government and international relations, which ultimately led to a teaching position at Princeton University. (American Academy of Political & Social Science, 2020) During his time at Princeton, Gurr studied an array of theories surrounding human violence and political strife that would be influential in generating his own theories on why men do rebel.
Relative Deprivation
Gurr’s work’s most critical takeaway is the concept of “Relative deprivation” (RD). Relative deprivation is a term Gurr uses to denote tension that develops from what one “ought” to have and what one “does” have, which can lead men to violence. Gurr asserts that the deprivation does not have to be real for a revolutionary situation to occur. It just has to be seen as real by enough people (Gurr, 1970: p. 27). Perception matters in the theory of RD more than objective facts. When discussing RD, two central questions need answers for a proper examination of a potentially revolutionary situation: What is being deprived, and how is it being deprived?
Gurr defined RD as the perceived discrepancy between value expectations and value capabilities. Value expectations are the goods and lifestyle an actor believes they are entitled to obtain. On the other hand, value capabilities are the goods and lifestyle an actor believes they are capable of achieving. (Gurr, 1970: p. 27) That is to say, if an actor believes they should be able to feed a family of four with one job but is unable to, then he or she will feel frustrated. Similarly, what might be seen as “abject poverty” may not be considered unjust by the actors living in those conditions. The emphasis here is placed on perception, not objectivity. If an actor sees no hope of escape from their conditions, they are more likely to accept them. Because of this, RD and the frustration that comes with it becomes more common when one or both of value expectations and value capabilities are changing, particularly when the gap between the two begins to widen.
Now getting back to those questions. When an actor experiences RD, it can stem from a lack of various values. In this case, values are defined as goods, conditions, or events that an actor wants and can strive to obtain (Gurr, 1970: p. 25). How many values there are and how those values are categorized is beyond the scope of this text. Gurr notes three general categories: welfare values, power values, and interpersonal values, which this chapter will discuss.
Values
Welfare values are the most straightforward of the three categories. This category describes values that directly provide for an actor’s well-being. Food, shelter, medicine, physical comforts, education, and work all fall under this umbrella. (Gurr, 1970: p. 25) Economic values and values related to self-actualization also can be included among welfare values, but these are also somewhat intrinsically tied to the other two categories.
Power values are defined as those values that allow an actor to have a meaningful influence on their surroundings. These values are often political in nature, including voting and participating in the political machine. (Gurr, 1970: p. 25) The desire for security and self-actualization falls partially under this umbrella as well. It may seem redundant to say that being unable to participate in government peacefully would lead to revolutionary situations, but this links between deprivation of power and frustration, which is essential for Gurr’s other theory.
Interpersonal values are defined as a softer psychological satisfaction an actor receives from his or her personal life. These values include things like the desire for status, family, or friends. It emphasizes the importance of societal norms and the belief that an actor has a place within society (Gurr,1970: p. 26).
Understanding the values that an actor can be deprived of only makes up half of Gurr’s theory application. The other half involves how the value expectations and value capability of an actor diverges. Again, Gurr gives three different instances of how Relative Deprivation comes about. They are Decremental deprivation, Aspirational deprivation, and Progressive deprivation.
Scope and Intensity
For a proper understanding of relative deprivation, one must also analyze the scope and intensity at which this deprivation occurs. Scope refers to the prevalence of deprivation among individuals. Narrow scope classifies deprivations that mainly occur on a personal level (Gurr, 1970: p. 29). Instances of infidelity or a lack of job promotion affect people sporadically and without a collective manner. Wide scope deprivation, however, has a level of pattern that affects members of a community all together (Gurr, 1970: p. 29). For example, the banning of a political party will forge an environment in which whole groups of people will simultaneously feel the same deprivation at the same time.
Intensity is another factor that comes into play when discussing relative deprivation. Intensity refers to the amount of anger that deprivation inhibits on the individual. Not every instance of deprivation will constitute the same amount of intensity. Therefore, the feelings that deprivation forges such as anger, betrayal and unfairness will depend on the situation. Someone’s inability to afford a nice car, which they believe they should financially deserve, will cause a different level of anger compared to a scenario in which one believes they are feeling cheated and oppressed because their political party has been outlawed (Gurr, 1970: p. 29). Overall, these two factors provide analysts a glimpse at the possible outcome of relative deprivation and whether it has “potential for collective violence (Gurr, 1970: p. 30).
Types of Deprivation
Decremental deprivation is the most straightforward of the three cases. In this case, an actor’s value expectations do not change, but their value capabilities fall over time. (Gurr, 1970: p. 46-46) This deprivation may be the case in countries affected by war or natural disasters. Aspirational deprivation is the inverse, where an actor’s value expectations rise over time even though his or her value capabilities do not. (Gurr, 1970: p. 50-51) In this situation, the actor is not losing anything but feels frustrated regardless due to higher expectations. This situation is often the case in civil rights movements where one class or people demand rights already available to another class or people.
Progressive deprivation is a mix between the previous two. In this case, both value expectations and value capabilities are or have been on the rise. However, neither value capabilities have been able to keep up with value expectations, or value capabilities have suddenly decreased. This deprivation falls in line with other theories where revolution is more likely to happen during a period of economic and social prosperity. As an example, sudden economic depression in a booming economy would cause Progressive deprivation in many citizens.
Different types of values and different types of deprivation defined above allow theorists to use a bit more granularity when talking about societies as they go through social and economic change. A country may be experiencing decremental deprivation with respect to power values and progressive deprivation with respect to welfare values. In addition to this, different groups may feel RD more than others, given the circumstances. In the end, however, if the scope and intensity of deprivation are great enough, it will lead to frustration and later violence.
Frustration-Aggression Theory
To better understand how frustration stemming from the previously mentioned forms of deprivations can lead to a revolutionary situation, it is crucial to explore the various concepts surrounding the origin of humanity’s aggressive tendencies. This analysis can be achieved by examining what Gurr calls the three generic sources of human aggression, which encompass instinctive, learned, and frustration induced aggression.
As the name suggests, instinctive aggression centers around the concept that humanity is inherently prone to aggressive behavior from birth. This form of aggression promotes the position that all men have a deep-rooted aggressive trait exhibited in scenarios that can affect their well-being.
On the other hand, learned aggression is the concept that humanity is born not possessing aggressive tendencies but instead gains these characteristics through various situations encountered throughout one’s life. This learned aggression is then employed to bring about changes in a system in which one feels fails to fulfill their expectations. Frustration induced aggression is the concept that man will exhibit aggressive behavior as a byproduct of frustration (Gurr, 1970: p. 30-34).
While the various sources of aggression outlined above contribute to humanity’s overall aggressiveness, it is the latter of the three that plays the most significant role in the rise of revolutionary situations. The frustration-aggression theory was originally proposed by Dr. John Dollard and his colleagues in the late 1930s. This theory promotes the idea that aggression stems from frustration and that whosoever is frustrated will direct this subsequent aggression towards the party perceived to be responsible for their frustration (Gurr, 1970: p. 33-34). Through the relationship of the frustration-aggression theory and relative deprivation that bring about the potential for collective violence to occur. However, due to RD’s individualist nature, the form of political violence that is generated depends on the intensity and scope of RD on a particular group.
These forms of political violence come in the form of turmoil, conspiracy, and internal war, each of which stems from specified groups’ feelings of deprivation within a system. For Gurr, society is composed of two major groups, the masses, and the elites. When RD is relatively low in both groups, the potential for political violence is low, and the system’s status quo is maintained.
Turmoil occurs within a system when RD is experienced by a collective of individuals from the masses. The turmoil is considered to be somewhat spontaneous, unstructured, and carried out by the masses. During times of turmoil, RD is high for the masses while low for the elites and results in minor political violence levels. When the feeling of RD shifts from that of the masses to that of the elite, you encounter the potential for conspiracy. Unlike turmoil, conspiracy consists of a small number of elites that are well organized in their attempt to upset the status quo through various means but exhibit small scales of violence. The last and most effective type of political violence comes in the form of internal war, which is generated through an expansive feeling of RD through both the masses and the elites. This widespread feeling of RD combines elements of turmoil and conspiracy that subsequently create a volatile environment primed to erupt into either internal or revolutionary war (Gurr, 1970: p. 334-335).
To better understand the concepts and theories proposed by Dr. Gurr, the following will examine real-world scenarios that embody various traits associated with the concept of relative deprivation and the frustration-aggression theory and how in some cases, prompt the occurrence of revolutionary situations.
Ukrainian Orange Revolution
This chapter’s first case study will focus on not one but multiple revolutions within Ukraine. The Orange Revolution in the early 2000s began due to the failures and widespread corruption of Prime Minister Leonid Kuchma’s regime. In 2004, there was an election between Viktor Yanukovych, a pro-Russian replacement to Kuchma, and Viktor Yushchenko, a pro-Western candidate. Yushchenko was favored by the Ukrainians, mostly the young, based on his progressive and pro-democracy. As the election progressed, it became evident that something was afoot. Yushchenko was barred from campaigning in certain cities and, at some point, poisoned along the campaign trail. The poisoning resulted in the disfigurement of his face, which affected his ability to speak, and was thought to have come at the hands of either Russia or Yanukovych. When Yanukovych won the election, supporters of Yushchenko declared foul play, donned Yushchenko’s signature orange campaign color, and took to the streets in protest.
The Orange Revolution was not much of a revolutionary situation because it did not turn violent. All the protesters wanted was a recount of the election, but demonstrations in the streets, civil disobedience, and workers went on strike. Ultimately, the people got their recount, and Yushchenko was elected. In reality, the Orange Revolution was more of a democratic demonstration where the people of Ukraine showed they wanted free and fair elections. A leader was able to change the status quo. Despite not being much of a revolutionary situation, the Orange Revolution led to a revolutionary outcome in a pro-democracy leader. According to Gurr’s theory, the mass dissatisfaction among Ukrainians following the election should have triggered violence. However, through the Orange Revolution events, the state was pushed to conduct a recount before large scale violence occurred.
During the early 2000s, Ukraine was on its way towards western democratization and away from the Russian authoritarian democracy style. As Gurr is quoted in Ethnic Tensions and State Strategies: Understanding the Survival of the Ukrainian State, “democratization is likely to facilitate both protest and communal rebellion. The serious risk is that the rejection of accommodation by one or all contenders will lead to civil war and the reimposition of a coercive rule.” (D’anieri, 2007: p. 8) This interpretation fits Ukraine very well. Ukraine was an autocratic government working towards a fair democracy, and when the Russian-backed Yanukovych initially won, protest and communal rebellion broke out. Once again, Ukraine got lucky as there was a high potential for civil war over a nationalistic identity split along Russian and Ukrainian identity lines (D’anieri, 2007: p. 4-29).
In this instance, the people in Ukraine were deprived of participating fairly in government, a power value, and became frustrated. The citizens had lost faith in their government and protested as a way of expressing that frustration. Ukraine stands as an example of mass frustration that did not break into a violent revolutionary situation thanks to a responsive government. Put in Gurr’s words while the scope of the orange revolution affected a whole ethnic group the intensity was soothed by the response of the Ukrainian courts. In contrast, the Haitian Revolution demonstrates what happens when this frustration is left to build unchecked.
The Haitian Revolution
The other case study that this chapter will explore is the Haitian Revolution, which took place at the end of the 18th century. What began as a massive slave revolt resulted in a complete revolutionary outcome that entirely changed Haiti’s government. There were four main groups of people in Haiti, which then can be split into two categories. The first category is those who owned land and were often better off economically: wealthy white plantation owners and also free people of color who served in the militias and occasionally owned land. The second group consisted of impoverished whites and slaves.
Each of these four groups had grievances towards one another, which led to widespread frustration between the groups. The poor white citizens of Haiti, or petits Blancs, were frustrated over their seeming inability to climb the nation’s social and economic ladders. Under French colonialism, they were mostly artisans and craftsmen with no real opportunity. Slaves were fed up with their oppression from the beginning, and their revolt eventually led to the real outcome of the Haitian revolution. The wealthier blacks, freedmen, were frustrated due to years of constant economic and social discrimination and oppression even after earning enough to become free from slavery. This frustration would continually build up until after the French Revolution. Slaves wanted to be free, and the petits Blancs were frustrated due to their inability to afford slaves like that of the wealthy landowners. (Geggus, 2014)
Following the passage of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, free people of color became legal citizens in Haiti. This declaration further upset the poor whites who began to spread violence through the island. Before this point, Haiti’s slave population acted as bystanders despite making up roughly 90 percent of the population. This obedience changed in 1791 when the slaves of Haiti revolted. With their superior numbers, the slaves were able to overpower and kill their masters. The revolt began years of fighting in which the British, Spanish, French, and former slaves all fought for control of Haiti. France reclaimed Haiti under Napoleon’s rule and tried to reestablish slavery; however, one final slave revolt led to permanent Haitian independence (Baptist, 2015).
The Haitian people, mainly slaves and poor whites, had many of the hallmarks of groups experiencing aspirational or progressive deprivation that would lead to violence and revolution. This deprivation existed in Haiti before the revolution as people of the lower-class felt no way to bridge the gap between the wealthy landowners and their current situation. This gap widened after the French Revolution when all but the most well off saw others as improving while they stagnated. According to Gurr’s theory, the Haitian revolution should have been a surprise.
In terms of welfare values, Haiti provided a strong incentive to revolt. Many whites lived in destitute and could not afford to own land or slaves. The free people of color were not any better off. Slaves and free people of color did not have a place in society, and many felt worthless, demonstrating a lack of interpersonal value. Power values were the most extreme in Haiti. Nearly the entire population of Haiti were slaves, poor whites and slaves had no way to influence the government, and free blacks were denied citizenship before the French Revolution. When the French gave citizenship to wealthy black people, the whites on the island had no say in the matter, and when the French declared slavery illegal, the plantation owners refused to cooperate. In a textbook case of progressive deprivation, slaves were given freedom before having the decision reversed on them by their masters. Frustration quickly boiled over into open revolt against the former slave owners. Like Ukraine Haiti’s scope was wide as slaves made up 90% of the population. However, the differentiation occurred in the intensity as Haiti’s government failed to ease the tension leading to a greater collective violence.
Conclusion
Ultimately, Haiti provides a distinct example of what can occur when multiple groups feel the effects of relative deprivation. On the other hand, Ukraine demonstrates how a government can potentially maneuver to entirely avoid a revolutionary situation. Individuals in Haiti felt deprived of welfare, status, and the powers in France and Haiti were unable to respond and avoid a revolutionary situation like seen in Ukraine. Gurr’s theory of RD and Frustration-aggression explain how people become willing to commit acts of violence. However, the theory does not provide for the spark that turns mass frustration into a revolutionary situation. That said, Gurr’s theory still has broad application to all types of political movements, which are discussed further by the likes of James Defronzo and Charles Tilly. Additionally, it can be used directly to examine social climates to determine whether it is primed for revolution.
Works Cited
American Academy of Political & Social Science. Accessed November 6, 2020 at: https://www.aapss.org/fellow/ted-robert-gurr/.
Baptist, Edward (2015), The Bittersweet Victory at Saint-Domingue, August 06, 2015, Accessed online 10 November, 2020 at: https://slate.com/human-interest/2015/08/the-most-successful-slave-rebellion-in-history-createdan-independent-haiti-and-secured-the-louisiana-purchase-and-the-expansion-of-north-americanslavery.html
D’anieri, Paul (2007) Ethnic Tensions and State Strategies: Understanding the Survival of the Ukrainian State, Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics, Vol. 23:1, 4-29. Accessed online 13 November 2020 at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/13523270701194896
Dun, James Alexander (2016), Dangerous Neighbors: Making the Haitian Revolution in Early America. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Geggus, David (2014), The Haitian Revolution: A Documentary History. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.
Gurr, Ted (1970), Why Men Rebel. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Image Attribution
Protesters gather in Times Square for Occupy Wall Street protests by TenSafeFrogs is licensed under CC by 2.0