When discussing social norms, it is tempting to present them as strict rules that classify behaviour as either correct or incorrect. On this picture, social norms simply allow, disallow or require particular actions. If you follow the rules, you act as you are supposed to; if you break them, you are doing something wrong. We can conceive of the social norms in force as an unwritten rulebook that tells one exactly what behaviour is correct. Yet, it is impossibly hard to write this rulebook and surprisingly difficult even to list a few entries. There may seem to be plain examples. One must wait in line. You may not insult your host. Even here, though, the black-and-white rule is blurred in some aspects. In which waiting situations should you form a queue? What if a new register opens and you can be helped earlier than others without skipping an existing queue? What counts as an insult? What if your host is easily offended by innocent remarks? Perhaps, with sufficient attention, such gaps in the rules can be filled in – perhaps a complete rulebook can be written for a particular social context by adding sufficient specifications and clauses. Another possibility is that this cannot be done in principle, because social norms are not strict rules that can simply be followed for the right result in each case.
The expectation that social norms are strict and potentially fully explicable fits with the modern understanding of rules as algorithms. In Rules: A Short History of What We Live By, Lorraine Daston explains how the concept of rules has not been constant but has drastically changed over the course of history. Now, the paradigmatic rule is the algorithm: a thin, specific and strict rule that human or machine calculators can use to arrive at the correct outcome every time, no matter the input or circumstances, without exceptions.
In contrast, for most of Western history the standard rule was thick: “[a] thick rule is upholstered with examples, caveats, observations, and exceptions. It is a rule that anticipates wide variations in circumstances and therefore requires nimble adaption” (Daston, p. 3). Using such a rule requires passing judgement on whether it applies in the current situation and, if so, how to apply it. The rule will not automatically yield the correct answer; using it takes skill, experience, and knowledge of its logic. One of Daston’s examples is the use of models in art: the statue Doryphoros by ancient Greek sculptor Polykleitos was treated as a paradigm of male beauty (Daston, p. 11). As such models cannot simply be imitated, they do not give straightforward guidance on what to do. It takes skill to see what is good about the model artworks and know how to transform that into the artist’s own work.
The model that constitutes the rules can also be a person. Daston illustrates this with The Rule of Saint Benedict, the elaborate set of rules regulating every detail of life in Benedictine monasteries since the 6th century, from when the monks must wake to what and how much they may eat. The precise nature of the 73 chapters of the Rule may make us think again of the ideal of an explicit rulebook with rules that always correctly indicate what to do. Nonetheless, Daston classifies the Benedictine rules as thick, due to their built-in room for exceptions (Daston, pp. 31-40). The rules were not universally followed, but were to be applied with discretion – the discretion of the monastery’s abbot, that is. The rules explicitly let the abbot allow deviations based on the circumstances. A sick monk may receive more food and the ban on speaking during mealtimes may be lifted when a visitor is present. The abbot decides what the rules are in concrete situations. In Daston’s words, “[t]he abbot does not simply enforce the Rule; he exemplifies it” (p. 36). The content of the rules is not black and white, but depends on what the abbot would do.
Thinking of rules as a model in the form of a person may seem very alien to us now. Nonetheless, it could help us to get a more accurate picture of social norms. Should we conceive of social norms as thick rather than thin rules? In particular, is there a regulating role for exemplars in this domain?
We are not unfamiliar with exemplars for social norms, as becomes clear when we zone in on etiquette. Advice on thorny etiquette matters is constantly sought from supposed experts in magazines, in newspapers and on blogs. These advice columnists are presented as having the correct answers: when you are conflicted about how to respond to overly friendly colleagues, family tensions or an embarrassing situation at a party, they can tell you what the rules of etiquette require here. Moreover, beyond indicating the rules, these experts can also shape what they are: in her insightful book On Manners, Karen Stohr suggests that well-known etiquette advice columnists like Emily Post and Miss Manners (Judith Martin) have the power to create and share concrete rules when these are needed (Stohr, p. 67). As a result of their public status as persons who know how to behave well and are able to advice others, they have some of the regulative power we saw in the abbot.
Stohr argues that the authority of these experts lies in their practical wisdom: they do not merely know what the rules of the relevant social context are, but understand their rationale, and are able to assess the situation at hand in line with this (Stohr, pp. 43-69). In Stohr’s view, the point of local etiquette rules is to express more general principles of manners. She understands these principles of manners to be moral (Stohr, pp. 20-42). As a result, our etiquette exemplars must have the same practical wisdom required for moral expertise, which includes the “intellectual dexterity” (Stohr, p. 59) to reason from abstract principles to the current situation:
What makes someone like Post or Martin a genuine etiquette expert is not simply the fact that she is knowledgeable about customs and traditions, but also that she is unusually good at identifying and articulating what the principles of manners imply about how we should behave in the complicated, messy circumstances of real life.
Karen Stohr, On Manners (New York: Routledge, 2011): p. 56.
In parallel to Stohr’s description of practical wisdom, Daston writes that using discretion when faced with rules requires experience as well as guiding values. The Benedictine abbot was not supposed to decide on particular cases randomly or based on personal opinion, but on the basis of “the Christian values of compassion and charity” (Daston, p. 38). We may see these underlying values as part of the Rule, together with the room for discretion.
We need not agree with Stohr that etiquette rules are underwritten by moral principles. We may think the underlying rationale of etiquette or social norms in general is the utility they have for the group, or even for the individual, by coordinating actions and expectations and enabling large-scale cooperation. Whatever story we provide for why (some) social norms are significant and should be complied with, we end up with some larger principle or aim in the background of judgements about what the norms require in a particular case. An underlying aim can call for exceptions and adjustments, making the rules less thin.
Understanding social norms as thick rules also helps us to make sense of the opposite of etiquette exemplars. Consider the unusual type of impoliteness of Larry David in Curb Your Enthusiasm. Larry is explicitly aware of the social norms in the contexts he finds himself in, often formulating specific unwritten rules and calling out perceived violations. Despite this knowledge, he is rude enough to get kicked out of most dinner parties he is invited to. We can see these two sides in the ice cream sampling scene from the 2007 episode “The Ida Funkhouser Roadside Memorial” (S6E3):
Larry believes there is a norm not to take more than two samples in an ice cream shop. He loudly objects to the woman breaking this supposed norm, calling her rude and accusing her of being a “sample abuser”. As usual, Larry’s concern with others following the rules leads him to cause a scene and ruin the atmosphere. Negative responses to violations are needed to uphold the norms – in this case, an eyeroll or some tutting may have been appropriate. However, Larry’s overblown response is itself rude. He disrupts an interaction that does not involve him, gets angry at a stranger over something insignificant, and even makes fun of her after she has already left.
Larry David’s rudeness is not at odds with his preoccupation with the rules, but rather a result of it. In a later scene, he recounts this incident to people not so sympathetic to his anger – as it happens, the insulted ice cream sampler was someone they needed a favour from, which is now out of reach. When Larry is told he should just mind his own business, he responds:
“She was breaking the rules, she wasn’t following the rules of society!”
“What rules?”
“The unwritten rules, that we have as we go about our day.”
Larry treats social norms as a precise rulebook that must always be followed. Without recognising room for discretion, he simply applies the rules: more than two samples = incorrect. And when behaviour is incorrect, you can call it out even if this upsets others – apparently there are no rules on how to appropriately respond to violations in his book. Furthermore, there is no attention to the underlying aims. If good manners are largely about expressing respect and consideration, as Stohr and others argue, then Larry is more at fault for how he treats the sampler than she is for trying too much ice cream.
The main characters of Seinfeld also tend to combine a focus on specific rules with ignorance of the deeper and more important principles. As Stohr points out, it is typical for them to behave impolitely while trying to comply with what they perceive as a rigid etiquette rule (Stohr, p. 4). The plot of “The Rye” (S7E11, 1996) is a good example. George’s parents have brought a marble rye to a dinner party with his in-laws, but take it home again when it does not get served at the dinner. George sees this as a severe violation of etiquette. To prevent his in-laws from finding out, he devises an elaborate plan to place an identical bread back inside, which includes lying to force them out of their own house. Things take a dark turn: due to a marble rye shortage in the bakery, Jerry ends up robbing an old, frail lady of her bread. All for the sake of following – or being perceived to have followed – proper guest etiquette.
Aside from being clearly morally wrong, the behaviour of George and Jerry also displays bad manners. Presenting a stolen bread to your hosts is much more inappropriate than not presenting a bread at all. George and Jerry miss this due to a preoccupation with more simple rules: in their eyes, a marble rye must be brought to the dinner and left there, no matter what it takes. It is inconceivable that Miss Manners would have responded to the problem in the same way; with an eye to the deeper point of bringing gifts to a dinner party, she would have fixed or simply explained the absence of bread in a way that conveys respect to the hosts, without harming any old ladies in the process.
Examples of escalating inappropriate behaviour in Curb and Seinfeld make clear how things go wrong when we treat social norms as very strict thin rules. It is not merely difficult to capture everything in a comprehensive and sufficiently specific rulebook; this picture of social norms also misses the unavoidable room for exceptions and divergent applications. While Larry David responds to particular black-and-white rules, real etiquette experts can form a nuanced judgement based on knowledge of the conventions as well as an understanding of the underlying aims and the case at hand.
One way to think of social norms as thick is to see them as constituted by the exemplars, as models to follow: what you should do is what Miss Manners would do. An alternative view more in line with the modern conception of rules is that social norms are thick because they have deeper aims or principles built into them, which can yield exceptions and deviations from what the rules seem to be on the surface. Etiquette experts remind us of this element of thickness by showing that discretion and judgement is required. Overly simple rule-following can lead to yelling in ice cream shops; for actual good manners, we need to grow our awareness of why we have these rules in the first place.
Thanks to Guy Fletcher for pointing me to the sample abuser scene.
Read my first post about Daston’s history of rules here.
Eline Gerritsen 
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