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Authoritarianism is occasionally useful when collective action is necessary to prevent a major disaster. Individual people have a tendency to take everything th
by jschwartzi 7y ago
Authoritarianism is occasionally useful when collective action is necessary to prevent a major disaster. Individual people have a tendency to take everything they can, like in cases where entire stores have been bought out of meat or toilet paper or cleaning supplies. An authoritarian approach of dictating what a person can and cannot do at a very fine-grained level can prevent these things from happening. For example, rationing is currently very popular as a way to maintain stocks of toilet paper for people who need it.
The key here is that we understand it to be for the common good. Whereas most authoritarianism is to force people to fit the same mold, here it has an application in keeping people from hurting each other by their actions.
- ghaff 7y agoThe thing is that I suspect that the problem is mostly not (yes, with some widely publicized exceptions) that you have people individually buying hundreds of rolls of toilet paper or dozens of eggs, but LOTS of people figuring that a bit of buffer stock in the house can't hurt because who knows what the future will bring. I know in my case I did a couple shopping trips before the panic buying started. I bought nothing at all out of the ordinary but I did stock my house up a bit more than average on various things. You multiply that by the majority of people and it's not hard to clear out a store.
- jlokier 7y agoMy pet theory adds that people were previously eating out a lot, and getting snacks from little shops. Now all of a sudden they are getting everything from supermarkets and cooking more often at home, so even without any hoarding, there's been a surge in the number of people eating home-made food at home.