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+[[!meta title="The Sociology of Secrecy"]]
+
+## Excerpts
+
+    [...]
+
+    All relationships of people to each other rest, as a matter of
+    course, upon the precondition that they know something about
+    each other. The merchant knows that his correspondent wants
+
+    [...]
+
+    rough and ready way, to the degree necessary in order that the
+    needed kinds of intercourse may proceed. That we shall know
+    with whom we have to do, is the first precondition of having
+    anything to do with another. The customary reciprocal ptresenta-
+
+    [...]
+
+    reciprocally recognized. Their necessity is usually observed only
+    when they happen to be wanted. It would be a profitable
+    scientific labor to investigate the sort and degree of reciprocal
+    apprehension which is needed for the various relationships
+    between human beings. It would be worth while to know
+    how the general psychological presumptions with which each
+    approaches each are interwoven with the special experiences
+    with reference to the individual who is in juxtaposition with us;
+    how in many ranges of association the reciprocal apprehension
+    does or does not need to be equal, or may or may not be permitted
+    to be equal; how conventional relationships are determined in
+    their development only through that reciprocal or unilateral
+    knowledge developing with reference to the other party. The
+    investigation should finally proceed in the opposite direction;
+
+
+    [...]
+
+    given by the total relationship of the knower to the known.
+    Since one never can absolutely know another, as this would mean
+    knowledge of every particular thought and feeling; since we
+    must rather form a conception of a personal unity out of the
+    fragments of another person in which alone he is accessible to
+    us, the unity so formed necessarily depends upon that portion of
+    the other which our standpoint toward him permits us to see.
+
+    [...]
+
+    on the other hand the actual reciprocity of the individuals is based
+    tupon the picture which they derive of each other. Here we have
+    one of the deep circuits of the intellectual life, inasmuch as one
+    element presupposes a second, but the second presupposes the
+    first. While this is a fallacy within narrow ranges, and thus
+
+    [...]
+
+    or by dissimulation he may deceive us as to the truth. No other
+    object of knowledge can thus of its own initiative, either
+    enlighten us with reference to itself or conceal itself, as a human
+    being can. No other knowable object modifies its conduct from
+    consideration of its being understood or misunderstood. 'Tlhis
+
+    [...]
+
+    in misconception about the true intention of the person who
+    tells the lie. Veracity and mendacity are thus of the most far-
+    reaching significance for the relations of persons with each
+    other. Sociological structures are most characteristically dif-
+    ferentiated by the measure of mendacity that is operative in
+    them. To begin with, in very simple relationships a lie is
+    much more harmless foir the persistence of the group than
+    in complex associations. Primitive man, living in communities
+    of restricted extent, providing for his needs by his own produc-
+    tion or by direct co-operation, limiting his spiritual interests to
+    personal experience or to simple tradition, surveys and controls
+    the material of his existence more easily and completely than the
+    man of higher culture. In the latter case life rests upon a thou-
+    sand presuppositions which the individual can never trace back
+    to their origins, and verify; but which he must accept upon faith
+    and belief. In a much wider degree than people are accustomed
+    the economic system
+    to realize, modern civilized life -from
+    which is constantly becoming more and more a credit-economy,
+
+    [...]
+
+    to the pursuit of science, in which the majority of investigators
+    must use countless results obtained by others, and not directly
+    subject to verification- depends upon faith in the honor of
+    others. We rest our most serious decisions upon a complicated
+    system of conceptions, the majority of which presuppose con-
+    fidence that we have nlot been deceived. Hence prevarication in
+    modern circumstances becomes something much more devasta-
+    ting, something placing the foundations of life much more in
+    jeopardy, than was earlier the case. If lying appeared today
+    among us as a sin as permissible as among the Greek divinities,
+    the Hebrew patriarchs, or the South Sea Islanders; if the
+    extremne severity of the moral law did not veto it, the progressive
+    upbuilding of modern life would be simply impossible, since
+    modern life is, in a much wider than the economic sense, a
+    "credit-economy." This relationship of the times recurs in the
+    case of differences of other dimensions. The farther third per-
+    sons are located from the center of our personality, the easier can
+    we adjust ourselves practically, but also subjectively, to their lack
+    of integrity. On the other hand, if the few persons in our imme-
+    dia<te environment lie to us, life becomes intolerable. This
+
+
+    [...]
+
+    in the majority as compared with the liar who gets his advantage
+    from the lie. Consequently that enlightenment which aims at
+    elimination of the element of deception from social life is always
+    of a democratic character.
+    Human intercourse rests normally upon the condition that
+
+    [...]
+
+    development may gain vitality by alternate concession and resist-
+    ance. Relationships of an intimate character, the formal vehicle
+    of which is psycho-physical proximity, lose the charm, and even
+    the content, of their intimacy, unless the proximity includes, at
+    the same time and alternately, distance and intermission. Finally
+    -and
+    this is the matter with which we are now concerned -the
+    reciprocal knowledge, which is the positive condition of social
+    relationships, is not the sole condition. On the contrary, such as
+    those relationships are, they actually presuppose also a certain
+
+    [...]
+
+    By virtue of the situation just noticed, that antecedent or
+    consequent form of knowledge with reference to an individual-
+    viz., confidence in him, evidently one of the most important syn-
+    thetic forces within society -gains
+    a peculiar evolution. Confi-
+    dence, as the hypothesis of future conduct, which is sure enough
+    to become the basis of practical action, is, as hypothesis, a mediate
+    condition between knowing and not knowing another person.
+    The possession of full knowledge does away with the need o,f
+    trusting, while complete absence of knowledge makes trust evi-
+    dentlv impossible.' Whatever quantities of knowing and not
+    knowing must comnimingle, in order to make possible the detailed
+    practical decision based upon confidence, will be determined by
+    the historic epoch, the ranges of interests, and the individuals.
+
+    [...]
+
+    what is not forbidden is permitted, and, what is not permitted is
+    forbidden. Accordingly, the relationships of men are differen-
+    tiated by the question of knowledge with reference to each other:
+    what is not concealed may be known, and what is not revealed
+    may yet not be known. The last determination corresponds to the
+    otherwise effective consciousness that an ideal sphere surrounds
+    every human being, different in various directionsi and toward
+    different persons; a sphere varying in extent, into which one may
+    not venture to penetrate without disturbing the personal value of
+    the individual. Honor locates such an area. Language indi-
+    cates very nicely an invasion of this sort by such phrases as
+    "coming too near" (zu nahe treten). The radius of that sphere,
+    so to speak, marks the distance which a stranger may not cross
+    without infringing up,on another's honor. Another sphere of
+    like form corresponds to that which we designate as the "signifi-
+    cance" (Bedeutung) of another personality. Towards the
+    "significant" man there exists an inner compulsion to keep one's
+
+    [...]
+
+    signifies violation of the ego, at its center. Discretion is nothing
+    other than the sense of justice with respect to the sphere of the
+    intimate contents of life. Of co-urse, this sense is various in its
+
+
+    [...]
+
+    voluntarily reveal to us-must
+    necessity. But in finer and less simple form, in fragmentary
+    passages of association and in unuttered revelations, all commerce
+    of men with each other rests upon the condition that each knows
+    something more of the other than the latter voluntarily reveals
+    to him; and in many respects this is of a sort the knowledge of
+    which, if possible, would have been prevented by the party so
+    revealed. While this, judged as an individual affair, may count
+    as indiscretion, although in the social sense it is necessary as a
+
+    [...]
+
+    voluntarily reveal to us-must
+    necessity. But in finer and less simple form, in fragmentary
+    passages of association and in unuttered revelations, all commerce
+    of men with each other rests upon the condition that each knows
+    something more of the other than the latter voluntarily reveals
+    to him; and in many respects this is of a sort the knowledge of
+    which, if possible, would have been prevented by the party so
+    revealed. While this, judged as an individual affair, may count
+    as indiscretion, although in the social sense it is necessary as a
+    condition for the existing closeness and vitality of the inter-
+    change, yet the legal boundary of this invasion upon the spiritual
+    private property of another is extremely difficult to draw. In
+    general, men credit themselves with the right to know everything
+    which, without application of external illegal means, through
+    purely psychological observation and reflection, it is possible to
+    ascertain. In point of fact, however, indiscretion exercised in
+    this way may be quite as violent, and morally quite as unjusti-
+    fiable, as listening at keyholes and prying into the letters of
+
+    [...]
+
+    strangers. To anyone with fine psychological perceptions, men
+    betray themselves and their inmost thoughts and characteristics
+    in countless fashions, not only in spite of efforts not to' do so, but
+    often for the very reason that they anxiously attempt to guard
+    themselves. The greedy spying upon every unguarded word;
+    the boring persistence of inquiry as to the meaning of every slight
+    action, or tone of voice; what may be inferred from. such and
+    such expressions; what the blush at the mention of a given name
+    may betray-all this does, not overstep the boundary o'f external
+    discretion; it is entirely the labor of one's own mind, and there-
+    fore apparently within the unquestionable rights of the agent.
+    This is all the more the case, since such misuse of psychological
+    superiority oiften occurs as a purely involuntary procedure. Very
+    often it is impossible for us to, restrain our interpretation of
+    another, our theory of his subjective characteristics and inten-
+    tions. However positively an honorable person may forbid him-
+
+    [...]
+
+    so unavoidable, the division line between the permitted and the
+    non-permitted is the more indefinite. To what extent discretion
+    must restrain itself from mental handling " of all that which is its
+    own," to what extent the interests of intercourse, the reciprocal
+    interdependence of the members of the same group, limits this
+    duty of discretion - this is a question for the answer to, which
+    neither moral tact, nor survey of the o'bj ective relationships and
+    their demands, can alone be sufficient, since both factors must
+    rather always work together. The nicety and complexity of this
+    question throw it back in a much higher degree upon the respon-
+    sibility of the individual for decision, without final recourse to
+    any authoritative general norm, than is the case in connection
+    with a question of private property in the material sense.
+    In contrast with this preliminary form, or this attachment of
+
+    [...]
+
+    quently friendship, in which this intensity, but also this
+    inequality of devotion, is lacking, may more easily attach the
+    whole person to the whole person, may more easily break up
+    the reserves of the soul, not indeed by so impulsive a process,
+    but throoughout a wider area and during a longer succession.
+    This complete intimacy of confidence probably becomes, with
+    the changing differentiation of men, more and more difficult.
+    Perhaps the modern man has too much to conceal to make a
+    friendship in the ancient sense possible; perhaps personalities
+    also, except in very early years, are too peculiarly individualized
+    for the complete reciprocality of understanding, to which
+    always so much divination and productive phantasy are essen-
+    tial. It appears that, for this reason, the mo,dern type of
+    feeling inclines more to differentiated friendships; that is, to
+    those which have their territory only upon one side of the person-
+    ality at a time, and in which the rest of the personality plays no
+    part. Thus a quite special type of friendship emerges. For our
+    problem, namely, the degree of intrusion or of reserve within the
+    friendly relationship, this type is of the highest significance.
+
+    [...]
+
+    must come sooner or later.
+    In marriage, as in free relationships of analogous types, the
+    temptation is very natural to open oneself to the other at the
+    outset without limit; to abandon the last reserve of the soul
+    equally with those of the body, and thus to. lose oneself completely
+    in another. This, however, usually threatens the future of the
+    relationship. Only those people can without danger give them-
+    selves entirely to each other who canntot possibly give themselves
+    entirely, because the wealth of their soul rests in constant pro-
+    gressive development, which follows every devotion immediately
+    with the growth of new treasures. Complete devotion is safe
+    only in the case of those people who, have an inexhaustible fund
+    of latent spiritual riches, and therefore can no more alienate them
+    in a single confidence than a tree can give up the fruits of next
+    year by letting go what it produces at the present moment. The
+    case is quite different, however, with those people who, so to
+    speak, draw from their capital all their betrayals of feeling and
+
+    [...]
+
+    intensity so soon as it is confronted by a purpose of discovery.
+    Thereupon follows that purposeful concealment, that aggressive
+    defense, so to speak, against the other party, which we call
+    secrecy in the most real sense. Secrecy in this sense- i. e., whichi
+    is effective through negative or positive means of concealment
+    is one of the greatest accomplishments of humanity. In contrast
+    with the juvenile condition in which every mental picture is at
+
+    [...]
+
+    by the fact that what was formerly putblic passes under the pro-
+    tection of secrecy, and that, on the contrary, what was formerly
+    secret ceases to require such protection and proclaims itself. This
+    is analogous with that other evolution o,f mind in which move-
+    ments at first executed consciously become unconsciously me-
+    chanical, and, on the other hand, what was unconscious and
+    instinctive rises into the light of consciousness.
+    How this
+    development is distributed over the various formations of private
+
+    [...]
+
+    essential and significant. The natural impulse to idealization, and
+    the natural timidity of men, operate to one and the samne end in
+    the presence of secrecy; viz., to heighten it by phantasy, and to
+    distinguish it by a degree of attention that published reality could
+    not command.
+    Singularly enough, these attractions of secrecy enter into
+
+    [...]
+
+    not command.
+    Singularly enough, these attractions of secrecy enter into
+    combination with those of its logical opposite; viz., treason or
+    betrayal of secrets, which are evidently no less sociological in
+    their nature. Secrecy involves a tension which, at the moment of
+    revelation, finds its release. This constitutes the climax in the
+    development of the secret; in it the whole charm of secrecy con-
+    centrates and rises to its highest pitch - just as the moment of the
+    disappearance of an object brings out the feeling of its value in
+    the most intense degree. The sense of power connected with
+    possession of money is most comnpletely and greedily concentrated
+    for the soul of the spendthrift at the moment at which this power
+    slips from his hands. Secrecy also is sustained by the conscious-
+
+    [...]
+
+    466
+    THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
+    ness that it might be exploited, and therefore confers power to
+    modify fo,rtunes, to produce surprises, joys, and calamities, even
+    if the latter be only misfortunes to ourselves. Hence the possi-
+    bility and the temptation of treachery plays around the secret, and
+    the external danger off being discovered is interwoven with the
+    internal danger of self-discovery, which has the fascination of the
+    brink o,f a precipice. Secrecy sets barriers between men, but at
+    the same time offers the seductive temptation to break through the
+    barriers by gossip or confession. This temptation accompanies
+    the psychical life of the secret like an overtone. Hence the socio-
+    logical significance of the secret, its practical measure, and the
+    mode o,f its workings must be found in the capacity or the inclina-
+    tion of the initiated to, keep the secret to' himself, or in his resist-
+    ance or weakness relative to the temptation to, betrayal. From the
+    play of these two interests, in concealment and in revelation,
+    spring shadings and fortunes of human reciprocities throughout
+    their whole range. If, according to our previous analysis, every
+    human relationship has, as one of its traits, the degree of secrecy
+    within or around it, it follows that the further development of the
+    relationship in this respect depends on the combining proportions
+    of the retentive and the communicative energies -the
+    former
+    sustained by the practical interest and the formal attractiveness
+    of secrecy as such, the latter by inability to, endture longer the
+    tension of reticence, and by the superiority which is latent, so to
+    speak, in secrecy, but which is actualized for the feelings only at
+    the moment o'f revelation, and o'ften also, on the other hand, by
+    the joy of confession, which may contain that s,ense o,f power in
+    negative and perverted form, as self-abasement and contrition.
+    All these factors, which determine the sociological role of
+
+
+    [...]
+
+    too great temptation to disclose what might otherwise be hidden.
+    But in this case there is no need of secrecy in a high degree,
+    because this social formation usually tends to level its members,
+    and every peculiarity of being, acting, or possessing the persist-
+    ence of which requires secrecy is abhorrent to it. That all this
+    changes to its opposite in case of large widening of the circle is
+    a matter-of-course. In this connection, as in so many other par-
+    ticulars, the facts of monetary relationships reveal most distinctly
+    the specific traits of the large circle. Since transfers of economic
+    values have occurred principally by means of money, an otherwise
+    unattainable secrecy is possible in such transactions. Three pecu-
+    liarities of the money form of values are here important: first,
+    its compressibility, by virtue of which it is possible to, make a man
+    rich by slipping into his hand a check without attracting attention;
+    second, its abstractness and absence of qualitative character, in
+    consequence of which numberless sorts of acquisitions and trans-
+    fers of possessions may be covered up and guarded from publicity
+    in a fashion impossible so long as values could be possessed only
+    as extended, tangible objects; third, its long-distance effective-
+    ness, by virtue of which we may invest it in the most widely
+    removed and constantly changing values, and thus withdraw it
+    utterly from the view of our nearest neighbors. These facilities
+    of dissimulation which inhere in the degree of extension in the
+    use of money, and which disclose their dangers particularly in
+    dealings with foreign money, have called forth, as protective pro-
+    visions, publicity of the financial operations of corporations.
+    This points to a closer definition of the formula of evolution dis-
+    cussed above; viz., that throughout the form of secrecy there
+    occurs a permanent in- and out-flow of content, in which what is
+    originally open becomes secret, and what was originally concealed
+    throws off its mystery. Thus we might arrive at the paradoxical
+    idea that, under otherwise like circumstances, human associations
+    require a definite ratio of secrecy which merely changes its
+
+
+    [...]
+
+    this exchange it keeps its quantum unvaried. We may even fill
+    out this general scheme somewhat more exactly. It appears that
+    with increasing telic characteristics of culture the affairs of
+    people at large become more and more public, those of individuals
+    more and more secret. In less developed conditions, as observed
+    above, the circumstances of individual persons cannot protect
+    themselves in the same degree from reciprocal prying and inter-
+    fering as within modern types of life, particularly those that have
+    developed in large cities, where we find a quite new degree of
+    reserve and discretion. On the other hand, the public function-
+    aries in undeveloped states envelop themselves in a mystical
+    authority, while in maturer and wider relations, through exten-
+    sion of the range of their prerogatives, through the objectivity of
+    their technique, through the distance that separates them from
+    most of the individuals, a security and a dignity accrue to them
+    which are compatible with publicity of their behavior. That
+    earlier secrecy of public functions, however, betrayed its essential
+
+    [...]
+
+    Footnote 2 This counter-movement occurs also in the reverse direction.
+    It has been
+    observed, in connection with the history of the English court, that the actual
+    court cabals, the secret whisperings, the organized intrigues, do not spring up
+    under despotism, but only after the king has constitutional advisers, when the
+    government is to that extent a system open to view. After that time-
+    and this
+    applies especially since Edward II-the
+    king begins to form an unofficial, and
+    at the same time subterranean, circle of advisers, in contrast with the ministers
+    somehow forced upon him. This body brings into existence, within itself, and
+    through endeavors to join it, a chain of concealments and conspiracies.
+
+
+    [...]
+
+    have thought possible. Accordingly, politics, administration,
+    justice, have lost their secrecy and inaccessibility in precisely the
+    degree in which the individual has gained possibility of more com-
+    plete privacy, since modern- life has elaborated a technique for
+    isolation of the affairs of individuals, within the crowded condi-
+    tions of great cities, possible in former times only by means of
+    spatial separation.
+
+    To what extent this development is to be regarded as advan-
+    tageous depends upon social standards of value. Democracies are
+    bound to regard publicity as the condition desirable in itself.
+    This follows from the fundamental idea that each should be
+    informed about all the relationships and occurrences with which
+    he is concerned, since this is a condition of his doing his part with
+    reference to them, and every community of knowledge contains
+    also the psychological stimulation to community of action. It is
+    immaterial whether this conclusion is entirely binding. If an
+    objective controlling structure has been built up, beyond the
+    individual interests, but nevertheless to their advantage, such
+    a structure may very well, by virtue of its formal inde-
+    pendence, have a rightful claim to carry on a certain amount
+    of secret functioning without prejudice to its public char-
+    acter, so far as real consideration of the interests of all is con-
+    cerned. A logical connection, therefore, which would necessitate
+    the judgment of superior worth in favor of the condition of pub-
+    licity, does not exist. On the other hand, the universal scheme of
+    cultural differentiation puts in an appearance here: that which
+    pertains to the public becomes more public, that which belongs to
+    the individual becomes more private. Moreover, this historical
+    development brings o-ut the deeper real significance: that which
+    in its nature is public, wvhich in its content concerns all, becomes
+    also externally, in its sociological form, more and more public;
+    while that which in its inmost nature refers to the self alone-
+    also, gain
+    that is, the centripetal affairs of the individual -must
+    in so-ciological position a more and more private character, a
+    more decisive possibility of remaining secret.
+    While secrecy, therefore, is a sociological ordination which
+
+
+    [...]
+
+    As a general proposition, the secret society
+    emerges everywhere as correlate of despotism and of police con-
+    trol. It acts as protection alike of defense and of offense against
+    the violent pressure of central powers. This is true, not alone in
+    political relations, but in the same way within the church, the
+    school, and the family.